How does your media product represent

particular social groups?

Social groups in horror/ thriller

The ages of the characters in most horror films are teenagers as they are perceived as being naïve, for example ignoring warning signs that something bad is going happen. This is the binary opposition theory, and many films within this genre follow this.

In horror and thriller films, there are often a certain set of people that are conventional in films of the same genre. There is almost always an antagonist, as it is normally them who cause the fear and tension that the other characters feel. Following this, a protagonist is stereotypically present because they are targeted by the antagonist. In a lot of horror/thriller films, there is also an accomplice or friend who is with the protagonist.

Male representation

Conventionally, males are used as the antagonist of a horror or thriller film as they connote dominance and power. Therefore we negatively presented our male antagonist to portray this authority, and we did this through the use of close up shots.One of the shots in our film consisted of a close up of the camera panning up the antagonist and stopping at his shoulders so as to hide his identity. It helped us to show his masculinity which also represents his strength and portrays him as threatening. Having done this, it conforms the conventional stereotype as mentioned above and the male is shown as being stronger that the female protagonists.

Female representation

Our film opening presents the female characters as being vulnerable and weak because they are the victims in the situation, and are being targeted by the male antagonist. We presented the females as being at risk through the use of shots that made the characters look smaller than the male, because this conforms to the stereotypical representation of women in horror/thriller films.

Normally women are sexualised in films with the use of make up and clothing, however we challenged this as natural make up and casual clothing was used in our film opening.

Women don’t often play the main role in a horror or thriller film, but we defied this convention by having a lead female protagonist.

Representation of class

The location of our film opening doesn’t indicate to the audience as to what class the characters in the film might be because there is no visual sign as to the type of place that they live in.

However, considering that the narrative is based around violence and criminal activity it would suggest that there are elements of lower class citizens because this a stereotypical assumption of the type of things that lower class people do.

Contradicting that, The antagonist was wearing a Nike jumper and this can portray him as being of a higher class because Nike is a well respected brand and is expensive, representing him as being middle to higher class.

Representation of age

The opening of our film includes three characters, two females and one male, all of which are aged between 16 -18 ad they are represented as stereotypical teenagers through the use of speech and clothing. The use of the words ‘Oh my God’ is a stereotypical saying that is associated with youths, and therefore helps to represent their age.

The male antagonist is wearing all black in the film opening, and this was not only done to present him as being dangerous but also to show his age. Black is a colour often linked to teenagers as is signifies unsociable behaviour, which society again considers a stereotype of young adults.

Lighting

In our film we used dark, negative light when something bad was going to happen so that the audience would be aware that the character involved in that scene is to be avoided. By presenting the character as negative is reflects them as being harmful; this low key lighting is done in scenes with the antagonist to reinforce his role in the film.