Genre Evaluation

1
TO DO LIST

• Genre/Barthes Codes

2
Generic Conventions of my Film

• Which Genre(s) does my film belong to?
• My film belongs to the crime/thriller genre
• Give examples of conventions of those genres I
  followed?
• Blood and murder was featured within it, black
  and white filtering, costume follows convention,
  the twist at the end of the film followed
  thriller conventions, Props e.g. knives and guns
  from crime. I followed the conventional plot a
  lot as usually a lot of crime films are a
  straight forward who done it with a twist
  ending.
• Which conventions did I NOT follow?
• By including typical conventions expected to be
  seen inside that genre by the audience
• How did I vary the generic conventions?
• My plot follows convention of the genre however
  my style goes against genre convention a lot as
  thrillers that are set in contemporary times
  arent usually in black and white except for
  movies such as Sin City which also challenges the
  genre stereotype. We did this in the silent
  scenes and during the flashbacks to put
  voiceovers and music over them and differ them
  from the scenes where the detectives are working.

3
Comparing and Contrasting My Film

• Comparing and contrasting my film to 3 examples
• The Usual Suspects, Prisoners, Out of the past
• Narrative structure It follows a twist at the
  end like The Usual Suspects where the man they
  were looking for was right under their nose the
  whole time.
• Plot The plot of our films follows a classic who
  done it
• Themes friendship, mystery. Much like the themes
  of Prisoners.
• Characters Classic Good Cop/Bad cop characters
  like those in most crime dramas.
• Setting/mise-en-scene A police station, like Out
  of the Past and The Usual Suspects
• Cinematography/Editing (for example, types of
  shot, pace, transitions, music) Voice over in
  black and white explaining thoughts of a
  detective with music

4
BARTHES CODE

• The Hermeneutic Code (HER)
• The Hermeneutic Code refers to any element of the
  story that is not fully explained and hence
  becomes a mystery to the reader.
• The full truth is often avoided, for example in
• Snares deliberately avoiding the truth.
• Equivocations partial or incomplete answers.
• Jamming's openly acknowledge that there is no
  answer to a problem.
• The purpose of the author in this is typically to
  keep the audience guessing, arresting the enigma,
  until the final scenes when all is revealed and
  all loose ends are tied off and closure is
  achieved.
• The Proairetic Code (ACT)
• The Proairetic Code also builds tension,
  referring to any other action or event that
  indicates something else is going to happen, and
  which hence gets the reader guessing as to what
  will happen next.
• The Hermeneutic and Proairetic Codes work as a
  pair to develop the story's tensions and keep the
  reader interested. Barthes described them as
• "...dependent on ... two sequential codes the
  revelation of truth and the coordination of the
  actions represented there is the same constraint
  in the gradual order of melody and in the equally
  gradual order of the narrative sequence."
• The Semantic Code (SEM)
• This code refers to connotation within the story
  that gives additional meaning over the basic
  denotative meaning of the word.
• It is by the use of extended meaning that can be
  applied to words that authors can paint rich
  pictures with relatively limited text and the way
  they do this is a common indication of their
  writing skills.
• The Symbolic Code (SYM)
• This is very similar to the Semantic Code, but
  acts at a wider level, organizing semantic
  meanings into broader and deeper sets of meaning.
  
• This is typically done in the use of antithesis,
  where new meaning arises out of opposing and
  conflict ideas.
• The Cultural Code (REF)
• This code refers to anything that is founded on
  some kind of canonical works that cannot be
  challenged and is assumed to be a foundation for
  truth.

5
Barthes Codes

• Applying Barthes Codes to my film
• For example, how did I create expectation?
  (enigma) As we followed typical convention that
  most people already recognise in crime dramas it
  wasnt a huge surprise when his partner turned
  out to be the murderer. However, we used shots
  that suggested his partner could be the murderer
  as he was always watching him and he was always
  there.
• How did I build suspense (action enigma etc) We
  built suspense through having long shots that
  focused on something suspicious, for example, in
  Scene 3 I recorded a shot from behind the
  antagonist that then focused onto the protagonist
  and back onto the antagonist. This created
  suspense as it seemed like the antagonist was
  watching over the detective and trying to cover
  his tracks.

6
Genre as a Concept

• Do you think genre is a useful concept to apply
  to your short film? Yes, it gives a basic outline
  for your film to follow and helps achieve what
  audiences expect from that genre.
• Rigidity (not set in stone- hybridity and change)
  It doesnt follow every convention with that
  genre and can be described as a crime
  drama/thriller as it takes conventions from both
  different genres such as a montage which are
  commonly seen within crime dramas and also using
  action within the final scene which is common
  within Thrillers.
• Commercial (audiences depend on recognition but
  is this as important for a short film?) Most
  people dont watch short films and when they do
  the film is too short to completely follow
  convention. It wouldnt be uncommon for a film
  set for one audience and inside one genre using
  different conventions of other genres or even
  being a hybrid film altogether.