Evaluation Question 2

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

In this section I shall be talking about how effective the combination of my main product and ancillary tasks are in promoting my film to my target audience. My last ancillary task must be taken into account though because if this were a real media product I would not have control over what the review reads or what it displays in its layout and pictures, so i will be evaluating the last as if it wasn't my own piece of work and how it promotes the movie.

Main Product: How effective was our film?

When we started creating our film we already had our aims in mind of what we wanted to achieve, we wanted it to evoke questions with the audience, we wanted it thrill them, we wanted the audience to feel empathy for the protagonist 'Alice' and we wanted a plot twist that leaves the audience saying 'oh i didn't see that coming'. So the question is how effectively did we follow our aims and how well did our ancillary tasks support our movie?

The conventions of a thriller movie involves plot twists, scenes of suspense and tension to thrill and typically a protagonist and an antagonist. These are the basics to a thriller movie which i feel we covered completely, we received positive feedback about our movie from peers in our class and outside of our class from people who didn't know the long process we had to go through to create our 5 minute movie, we therefore received unbiased feedback from outside to support our opinion of its effectiveness. I feel the most effective scene in our product was the ending because it ended with a plot twist that was very much unexpected to the audience, the short 'Behind Closed Doors' ends with the Antagonist killing his colleague and questionable love affair by strangling her with his dead girlfriend's necklace. We had purposefully made the relationship between the Antagonist (Richard) and his colleague (Stacey) to seem normal and slightly romantic so the audience would predict that Richard would end up being with Stacey now, after the death of his girlfriend and not predict our plot to have him kill her in a bid for revenge. 

When shown to an exterior audience the ending received many gasps and open mouths and looks of confusion which is what we wanted to achieve, the film effectively thrilled the audience and left them with questions, meaning it wasn't the ending they expected.

How effective was our poster at portraying our movie?

The purpose behind our movie poster for behind closed doors is to help promote the film and give our target audience a taster of what the movie will be like which will promote people to go watch it. It was important that the poster gave a sense of the movie and was eye catching but didn't give too much away. We started toying around with ideas on way to make the poster alluring so the audience wanted to see more but not revealing to the best bits of the product. We needed essentially for the poster to compliment the movie but not overshadow it so much that the audience wouldn't want to see the movie.

The movie poster promotes our thriller movie by displaying dark shadowed images of two women, one looking vulnerable while the other looks calm and confident, the use of the males hands in the middle adds mystery which will entice the audience into watching our movie, the poster displays aspects which are in the movie but gives not much away to the actual storyline unless you're a very good artistic interpreter. The poster its self compliments the movie with the use of shadows dark shadows, deep colours like red and props like the necklace which if you have watched the movie is an important prob in the film as it starts out as Alice's necklace and ends up as a murder weapon. If you look closely you will see a minor detail on the antagonist's hand, it is dried blood. A keen eye will see this detail and someone who has surely watched the movie would pick up on this subliminal detail and appreciate the intricacy that we have gone into with the poster it self. 

How does the movie review compliment the main product?

Our review we created wouldn't be made by us if it was a real media product, a real magazine company would review our work and choose the picture they wanted, this review compliments the main product nicely though because if this were a real review 4 stars would promote our movie and the review containing phrases like "Oscar worthy performance" would promote it as a "must see" movie. The Reason we gave a good review was to promote our movie (and give ourselves a backwards form of praise for our hard work) and practice our reviewing technique. 

The language used in the review is strong emotive language making the reader want  to go see the movie and the description provided is vague and doesn't give much away to the plot, in the main body of the review the reviewer 'Jack Day' comments on the non-chronological order of the film adding an intriguing twist to the movie which prompts the audience to go see it aswell. 

Evaluation Question 1

In What ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Now that our A2 Products are done and our Media Portfolio is drawing to a close we now must evaluate our work in depth, in this question I will be evaluating how my media product 'Behind Closed Doors' used and developed thriller conventions and plots concerning domestic relationships against real media products I have researched.

First of all what are the codes and conventions of the thriller genre? and what are the stereotypes of characters in a domestic abuse relationship?

Codes and conventions of thrillers:
Genre explanation: A thriller usually consists of a battle between the protagonist and the antagonist character which then leads on to a chain of bad happenings to build tension and suspense before the initial climax and ending.
Protagonist: Typically the protagonist is the one trying to restore order and normalcy to the chaos in one way or another, they are usually the vulnerable one being chased after or sort our by the Antagonist, the audience usually creates an empathetic connection with this character because of their innocence or vulnerability.
Antagonist: Usually the antagonist is evil and/or crazy, they conflict with the protagonist and sometimes have strong agenda's for them from the offset.
Conventions: 

• Low key Lighting 
• Quick Cuts
• Shadows
• Tension Music
• Changes in the angle of shot
• Protagonist is in the mercy of the antagonist

Stereo-typically the victim in a domestic abuse relationship is the female who is portrayed as the weaker of the two, being innocent looking and vulnerable. The domineering abuser is therefore the man who is stronger, bigger and looks rough. The clothing says a lot about the characters and the angles used show where the power is held between the two, often with the camera looking down on the victim or placing the aggressor in the rule of thirds making them a focal point meaning they hold importance. Dominance and weakness is also shown in the characters body language, the female/victim will have hunched shoulders or will typically look down. The male will have drawn back shoulders and will lean into the victim threateningly.

The real movie product I watched was a thriller movie titled "Enough" about a woman who is in an abusive marriage and can't escape her angry controlling husband. The Woman is the protagonist in this case and the Antagonist is her power mad husband.

Key frames from 'Enough'

Key Frames from 'Behind Closed Doors'

   
    



The pictures for my 'Behind Closed Doors' Key frame are not in ascending order as they were numbered after arrangement but I will explain and evaluate in ascending order in connection to 'Enough's' key frames.

1) Image 1 of 'Enough' is a still of the protagonist with a background shot of her and the night, it is dark and shadowed this serves its purpose to set the scene and atmosphere, corresponding with that is ours picturing our protagonist sitting at a table, the background is dark and sets a tense atmosphere. A typical thriller convention is the movie has shadows and dark scenes and we picked up on this convention from the movie Enough and integrated this into our work, for further tension we added blurred effects over our "Past" scene of our product making the scene seem more dark and tense.

2) Image 2 of 'Enough' is a shot of the Antagonist in action, the antagonist is typically violent or destructive, in this instance the antagonist is violent as it's a domestic violence thriller, shot 2 of 'Enough' is a picture of the antagonist attacking the protagonist, because this is a tense moment in the movie the scene is dark and the Antagonist is shadowed for effect. We implemented this device in our product when the antagonist attacks our second protagonist at the end of our movie, the first 'attack' was not dark and shadowed as we wanted the audience to question the intentions of the antagonist at the start of weather he did mean to kill his spouse.

3) Image 3 is a change in the angle of shot, usually used to portray a sense of something and put you into the scene more. In 'Enough' the change in angle is used to show the protagonist's vulnerability with the camera looking down on her but off to the side, the audience feels like an active viewer in the scene and therefore captures their attention. Not only does it show vulnerability to the protagonist but it empowers the antagonist the culprit of such events. In our short film we used this angle when the protagonist, Alice dies; this is shot in the point of view of the antagonist though and therefore immerses the audience into his shoes creating questions for them which is also another way to raise suspense.

4) Image 4 is a shot of the protagonist in the mercy of the antagonist; for 'Enough' this is portrayed in a violent way where the antagonist has the protagonist by the hair and is subjecting his dominance and control upon her. Where as in our product the Antagonist is trying to manipulate and soften the protagonist so she will bend to his wishes without the use of violence but with the use of psychological manipulation that the audience will piece together further on in the short.

5) Image 5 is an over the shoulder reaction shot of the protagonist's realisation that their spouse is nasty and an antagonist. These shots were used to show the dawning horror and realisation on both actresses faces to the audience. In 'Enough' this is after the protagonist has first been struck that she realises her spouse is evil, this is also a crucial point for the audience to identify the Antagonist. For our product we replicated this moment but without violence being subjected to her, we have her looking down upset as the antagonist breaks a picture frame of the two of them purposefully and another shot of her a few seconds later in the bathroom crying holding her head in distress, this is a minor hint to the audience that Richard could be an antagonist but it doesn't become a realisation till a little later.

6) Image 6 is a still of the protagonist weak and at the mercy of the antagonist, showing the stereotypical feminine victim side. In 'Enough' she is looking up to the antagonist displaying the power once again and in our short we have her shying away from his violence, with hunched shoulders holding her head in fear. 

7) Image 7 is a shot of the protagonist trying to restore the equilibrium and take charge of what is happening to them. This is the turning point in the thriller where the protagonist tries to help there self. image 7 of 'Enough' is a still of the protagonist becoming dominant and fighting back, you can see in facial expression that the innocent wide eyed look is gone and a hardened look has replaced it. We replicated this convention by having our protagonist try and leave the antagonist to restore her equilibrium.

8) Image 8 are stills of the Antagonists, in 'Enough' he wears a business suit to show his power and look more like a man, this makes him seem more threatening than if he was wearing normal everyday clothes so we dressed our antagonist the same for the same threatening powerful effect.