Deborah Knight 1994

In relation to my own short film

Genres may offer various emotional pleasures such as empathy and escapism- a feature which some theoretical commentaries seem to lose sight of. Aristotle, of course, acknowledged the special emotional responses which were linked to different genres. Deborah Knight notes that ‘satisfaction is guaranteed with genre: the deferral of the inevitable provides the additional pleasure of prolonged anticipation (Knight 1994).

In this sense Deborah Knight provides the statement that the longer the audience is made to wait for an already predicted conclusion, the more pleasure the audience will achieve through the chosen media text. This can be seen predominantly through the use of short films. This is due to the way in which short films have only a certain amount of time, for example 5-10 minutes, to create characters, a plot and a conclusion. Because of this the audience can assume how the short film will end as the recurring themes that the short film will be using will allude to something climactic or even ironic happening at the conclusion. For example this can be seen in the 2011 short film ‘The Last Man On Earth.’ This is mainly due to the way in which the short film only lasts 2 minutes with the plot revolving around a man who believes that he is the last man alive. The title, coupled with both the run time of the film and the way in which the protagonist attempts to kill himself, lead the audience to believe that something ironic will take place which is exactly what happens in the end where the protagonist realises that he isn't the only person left alive.

Deborah Knight was quoted to have said this in reference to all forms of media which led me to believe that in my short film this was possible. When Knight states how “The deferral of the inevitable” provides further entertainment I found it contrasting with my own short film in the way in which the climax of my short film happens at the very end. This could also be seen through the way in which the audience are aware of the nature of the ‘mockumentary’ style and therefore already have an idea about the dark humored ending but do not know for certain which in turn will make the audience even more interested in finding out how the plot ends.Knight also makes the point that some genres “may offer various emotional pleasures such as empathy and escapism.” Within my own short film I intend to create a form of escapism where the audience can enjoy the dark humor as well as find some common understanding within the character of the protagonist as well as the way in which, for attention, the protagonist is forced to be overly dramatic to a humorous extent which some of the audience may also identify with.