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Representational response:Gender Alice AtkinsA2 Advanced Media Portfolio Evaluation

+Representation: A representation in media is the ways in which the media portray

things such as ages, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, religion, regional identity and disability. It usually plays with stereotypes and the beliefs that people already have about specific people.

In terms of gender, the audience is usually shown a male as being powerful, and in control, where as women are portrayed as weak, domesticated and in need of protection. But in Noir these roles are reversed and the female is perceived as controlling, manipulative and uses her assets to get her own way. The male is seen as being weak and lust driven.

+Representations of gender in the Neo-Noir genre: In most genres women are portrayed as being weak,

domesticated and in need of protection, but Neo-Noir plays on this representation and usually portrays the women as a ‘femme fatale’ meaning they will do anything to get their own way, they are usually dangerous and use their sexuality to lure people in. Where as men are seen as mysterious and lust driven.

+Richard Dyer- Media theorist

Richard Dyer is a media theorist that comments on the representation within texts.

Dyer asked 4 questions when analysing media, these were-

1. What sense of the world is it making?

2. What does it imply? Is it typical of the world or deviant?

3. Who is it speaking to? For whom? To whom?

4. What does it represent to us and why? How do we respond to the representation?

+Dyers 4 questions (relating to my trailer)Richard Dyer asked four questions, my response in my practical was-

Question 1- Our trailer is giving the sense that Brighton is a underlying drug world and that it is crawling with crime and violence. It also gives the sense that there is a conflict with morality due to the corruption of youth.

Question 2- It is typical of the world in the fact that it utilises everyday issues of life, from drinking to drug to being a parent. It implies to the audience that there is a constant internal battle of morality and that it can have both positive and negative effects on an individuals life (as seen through Ross).

+(Dyer continued)

Question 3- I believe our texts speak to both male and females, but I feel it is primarily based towards males. This is because the protagonist is male and our femme fatale is sexualised and portrayed to use her sexuality to get her ways, which suggests our trailer will conform to the ‘Male Gaze’ by Laura Mulvey. This theory suggests that there are two types of scopophila in texts- narcissism (most protagonists are the protagonist/hero which results in males falling in love with themselves as they are the dominant figure) and voyeurism (the pleasure of sexualised looking). Because Ross is the protagonist of the film, males will watch our trailer and get sexual pleasure from the femme fatale and love themselves more due to them relating to Ross. Where as women will watch our trailer and will feel inadequate, and strive to be Lilah, in order to get the male (the figure of authority).

+(Dyer continued)

Question 4- Our trailer represents an internal battle of morality, temptations and love, this is due to these being some of the key aspects of classic noir. The aim of this was to get the audience to relate to the protagonist and as a result sympathise with him, his struggles and his constant battle to be a good role model to his child. Through the femme fatale it represents manipulation as well as heart break. This is through her being hurt by the protagonist and as a result of being hurt, her transition to manipulative, from what some could primarily decoded as weak. We aimed for the audience to also relate with the femme fatale, so they would have an internal battle and therefore can fully sympathise with both characters.

+Representations in our trailer:We represented our femme fatale in a sexualised way. We dressed her in a low cut lace top, this is to show off her assets and to make her visually appealing to the audience, especially males. We applied dark red lipstick, this is because red has connotations of lust as well as dangerous. Also in typical Noirs, femme fatales usually wear this kind of lip colour. By doing this, she have conformed to the idea of the male gaze and how she uses her assets to her favour when wanting her own way.

It is a typical convention of the femme fatale to smoke, because of this we made our femme fatale smoke, this ensured we conformed to the typical Noir convention. Smoking and cigarettes are typically associated with males, so for our femme fatale to take on a phallic symbol, it subverts from usually representation within in media, but due to the representations in Noir, it conforms to it.

The first thing the audience hears the femme fatale say is ‘No he hasn’t’. This phrase emphasises her power to the audience as she refers to Ross as ‘He’ and not ‘Ross’. This also shows her manipulative side and how she believes she is in power and that all the men have to be spoken for.

‘Its either him or me’ is what Lilah says in the trailer when Ross looks at a photo of James. This once again represents her manipulative nature and her conformity to the typical femme fatale convention.

+(Trailer continued):By having the two main male protagonists wearing police uniforms, it conforms to the typical stereotypical representation of males within media. The police uniform suggests to the audience that they are authority of strength and power. This subverts from the representations within Noir, this is because men are seen as lust driven and weak, therefore our trailer plays on this representation.

+Representation in our film poster:Our ancillary film poster emphasises

the superiority of women. This is because the main central image is our femme fatale. She is positioned large in the middle of the cover and above of Ross and his son. By using this position, it suggests to the audience that she is almost a puppeteer an she has full control over Ross and James life and their actions. This idea links to the representation of the femme fatale in the way that she is manipulative. By placing them under her hand, it links to the title of the movie and portrays to the audience that they are under her hand.Also in this text she is smoking like in the trailer, this then emphasises the phallic symbolism. In this text the additional images of Ross and James are at a low opacity level, this emphasises the noir representation of males in that they are inferior to females and therefore have very little power and control.

+Representation in our front cover:

Half of the males face is in low key, chiaroscuro lighting, this creates an atmosphere of mystery. It links to the representation of men and how they can be secretive and lie about their true self.

The males costume in the front cover portrays to the audience that he is important and a figure of authority. This links to typical representations of male in modern media representation. Also this subverts from the male representation of Noir.

Like the other texts, this front cover utilises the noir convention of smoking and cigarettes. By having the smoke, it obscures the identity of the male. This creates a sense of mystery. It can also portray to the audience that the male has two different sides to him, so it is likely that this will occur in the film. This links to Ross’ character in the movie as he is seen as a lovely father/policemen and then a deceptive drug gang member