Question 1 In what ways does your media use, develop or challenge

forms and conventions of real media products?

Sound The music can have a large influence on the way the piece is taken, it
can represent the humour or jolly nature that may be held in a film such as
Reservoir Dogs. The featuring song in the opening sequence to this film is Little
Green Bag which portrays the less professional, non-higher class status of the
main characters and their initial heist. This song is typical music of the time the
film is set which sets the scene for the film, it is connoted that there is a lack of
seriousness or formality to the film and this sets up the rest of the film. I took
inspiration from the way the music portrays the nature of the film and the
situation of the characters in my music, although it had a very different meaning
and approach. My music Time by Hans Zimmer was an orchestral piece which
created the contrasting mood of serious and dramatic in comparison the lighthearted, Jolly track that inspired my use of Music. The inspiration was to set the
mood up correctly, the dramatic, fight against a higher power in an unfortunate
manner and when brought side to side with voice overs of a dramatic speech by
the main character it created a severely dramatic feeling. The use of voice over
challenged the conventions I found in the Genre, although Reservoir Dogs starts
the opening sequence with a voice over it did cut out and allow for the music to
encumber the scene. My opening sequence had short, echoed bursts of a scene
that was originally meant to follow of from my opening sequence and this
created the support to gain the musics full effect and portray the dramatic
nature of my Crime-Thriller.
Typography The credits in each of my researched films held a similar theme
that I copied to emulate the appropriate look of a crime Thriller. The red, bold
titles that were mainly featured in Reservoir Dogs and Thief were a good
representation of the Crime Thriller genre and thus I took them as influence and
made my credits typical of this theme. The connotations of danger, violence and
blood from the red of the text is clear for what it needs to do, it creates an
understanding with the audience of what the theme of this theme and sequence
is and therefore creates the excitement with the target audience. As you can see
my font matches the theme that is clearly used to portray the genres nature
through the typography and this adds a little aesthetical feel to the genre.
Camera Work The camera work in Reservoir Dogs made many close ups of the
characters whilst they walked across set in the opening sequence, I made a
decision to challenge the use of this introduction to the characters and instead
went with what Thief did instead. The use of long shots, pans, etc. made a
distance between audience and character which I felt, for a Crime-Thriller was an
effective Camera strategy. The basis of this genre is to centre the film around
criminals which was the intention for what my opening sequence would set up as
it did in Thief where we see the character explicitly breaking the law; although
my sequence did not do this as the set up for criminal activity hadnt occurred.
The criminal nature made me feel we should feel a distance with the on-screen
characters hence why I took inspiration and used LS and Pans, in the latter half
of the sequence more so as she got closer to her destination and in the first half

had her at MS and not looking at the camera as this followed on from the setup
of her social class which was intended to create a similarity. The tea at the start
portrayed her as a normal woman which is good to settle the audience and then
by creating the distance through camera work, we get the understanding that
she has some form of mystery to her. On the note of not introducing the
characters it is worth mentioning that Oceans 11 did not introduce them either,
yet the lack of Camera work makes it hard for a comparison to be made between
the two however I felt it would be worth to show the links in the conventions.
Mise-en-Scene- The Mise-en-Scene of both Reservoir Dogs and Oceans 11
creates a distance between the audience and the characters, the costume being
the specific example of this in Reservoir Dogs and the editing of the casino, high
life vibe in Oceans 11. I wished to challenge this and once more take inspiration
from Thief which sets the scene as lower class and more relatable for the target
audience. The suits create the professionalism that I wished to avoid so I decided
to stick to a simple method of setting the scene which was merely having Rhiann
in her normal clothes; this idea created the normality to the film which contrasts
with the heist that it climaxes with. The social representations of having her in
the front room of a normal house, in her everyday clothes creates the link with
the audience and character on top of the lack of professionalism which we see in
comparison to Reservoir Dogs and Oceans 11, we see a doubt hang over the
eligibility of this character we are introduced to succeed in a heist, creating the
tension this genre needs.
Conclusion There were many things that inspired me from the title sequences I
watched that I ended up contrasting in my own crime-thriller sequence as the
social representation became a problem to me, the main example being how I
wished for my opening sequence to be comparable to Reservoir Dogs as this was
my main inspiration but the dramatic nature of my own devised story altered this
and I ended with something much more similar of thief. The crime-Thriller ideas
of a highly dramatic piece did come through better through this change, the
challenging to this stereotype came more from Oceans 11 and Reservoir Dogs so
for me to oppose these two films, I resulted in a piece more stereotypical of the
genre.