Genre, Narrative and Film task

In todays lesson we looked at the film theories of Nick Lacey, Levi Strauss and Barthes. For our first task we were told to devise an idea with a clear narrative structure. Horror, 5 teenagers on a road trip, Four of the teens disappear/diea. One (a girl) survives. The task was to come up with a detailed synopsis of a story for the above premise, which is as follows:

From Following Nick Lacey's Schema of genre, we can clearly see that our film complies to many of the generic conventions of a horror film, inlcuding narrative, iconography and characters. However, the second part of the task was to look at ways in which we could break the narrative conventions. To do this we changed the changed the chronological order of the narrative so it was more complicated and non-linear:

When coming up with an opening for our film, we investigated the 'Shark Bite' technique. The shark bite technique basically means there is a highly intense and enticing opening, that will make the audience interested from the offset. With regard to our film, we decided that it could open with a flash forward of the couple hectically escaping the hotle room and finding the laundry room full of bodies. This would be followed by the sound of the killer entering the room (sound effects only) followed by the scene coming to an abrupt end, in which we are brought back to the car scene, the initial opening in the linear narrative we composed at the beginning of the task.

Ask the task drew to a close, we looked at how cultural and semic/symbolic codes could give subtle clues that one of the teenage girls is interested in the occult. We instantly jumped to the opportunity of using the character we had labelled 'Moody Girl' in our detailed synopsis. We did not want to overtly display her stating that she worshipped the devil or anything too unrealistic, so we thought we could add to the mise en scene by giving our character a enigmatic book she carries around with her, or possibly including a shot of her wearing a satanic pendant. We thought this idea was also interesting as it could be highly misleading to who the actual danger is, taking the spot light off the evil girl (the girlfriend of the couple).

 Levi Strauss came up with a narrative theory investigating the idea of Binary Opposition. He believed that narrative was made up of conflicting points caused by two conflicting sides, as if there were an us and a them. The story develops through the opposite actions and events that occur. Binary opposties can even be applied to mise en scene. For the final part of our task, we were told to show how there could be a binary opposition in two characters from the film we had created. We decided that the characters that represented the greatest opposition were our 'Arrogant Joker' character, and 'Moody Girl'. To show this we devised a basic photo shoot, creating some basic attire to convey this opposition as clearly as we could, these photos were as follow:

Narrative task - audience feedback

      

 

From the audience feedback you can clearly see that our intentions to convey the Romantic theme was a success. The replies clearly show that the use of the lighting and props were key to the romantic genre and this idea was displayed. I believe that the stereotypical conventions of the romantic genre were evident and is why the audience could easily identify.

 

Narrative task - Romance

Propp's Narrative Theory

The Purge - Narrative

                                T H E    P U R G E

The purge is a futuristic SciFi-Thriller hybrid film set in America. The film is set in the year 2022 where the country has become a ‘nation reborn’. With unemployment and crime rates dropping significantly, the government set up an Annual 12 Hour purging system, whereby emergency services are disabled and the country are permitted to release all of their negativity and anger in whichever way they desire.
    I believe when watching The Purge, as a viewer we can clearly identify the three act system proposed by Field, as well as recognising the 3 term narrative structure suggested by Todrov. As you can see, from merely watching the two and a half minute trailer that the film encompasses both narrative theories.


                      

In the first act of the narrative, also known as 'the set up' we are introduced to the Grandin family, they appear to be a wealthy family and we get an insight into their home life. They are more than prepared for the annual Purge and we can see they are a family that relish harmony and have no interest in purging. The first section of 'The Purge' highly supports Field's ideas, it conforms clearly the first act of the narrative structure. There is also strong links to Todrovs narrative structure in the first part of the film, which he called the 'Equilibrium'. In the first stage of The Purge there is harmony in the village they live in, all neighbours are being polite to each other and there is a clear power balance in with all the people, however we are aware that this will change, leading us to Act two (Field) and the second stage for Todrov.

In Act two of the Purge, we see things starting to go seriously wrong for the Grandin family. It is of course the longest act of the film. In support of what Field says, the Grandin family are facing a number of problematic situations, in which a homeless man has came to seek refuge in a safe place (The Grandin household) and the son of the house has kindly let him in. However, there is a group of sadistic purgers that are preying on the homeless man, claiming he is the 'skidmark of society' and needs to be removed. We see here that the protagonists of the film are facing some serious issues and it is looking relatively helpless on their behalf. Act two of The Purge also supports Todrov's idea of the second stage being the 'Disequilibrium', what initially seemed to be harmony in the village is beginning to become largely disrupted. With a highly respected family having their lives in danger and their own neighbours beginning to turn against them, this supports Fields ideas about the problem that was introduced in the first act (the strange neighbour - Grace) coming back to haunt them, as she also seizes the opportunity to Purge when she sees that her neighbours are in trouble. However towards the end of the act, we see the protagonist (the mother of the family) and her children begin to prevail in the battle, slowly but surely eliminating the opposition. However the film is not yet over and we are not sure how it play out.

In the third and final act of the film, labelled by Field as the 'Resolution' and the 'New Equilibrium' to Todrov, we see that the Grandin family have won the battle. Although they are not in the opponents home territory like suggested by Field, they are in their own territory, a place that was completely unsafe to them merely minutes ago, yet now the Grandin family are there, along with the troublesome neighbours, in a strong position of power. The protagonist has taken complete control of her inner demons and problems that were troubling her through the entirity of Act two - she has accepted that non violence is the best policy and is sticking by her values - which is ultimately crowning her the successor. Todrovs ideas have also been confirmed in this final act, the new equilibrium has been formed, there has been a reinstatement of the disruption that was introduced in Act two. Although they have lost their father/husband, the purge is over, the children and proganist have survived and the enemy has been defeated - both the purgers and the neighbours.

It is clear in this firm that the conventional narrative structures have been abided to, I believe I have demonstrated that the Purge is a great example of a typical narrative in a film.

Investigating Narrative