HOW DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT REPRESENT PARTICULAR SOCIAL GROUPS?By Jake Lawson

TEENAGERS

Our media project is based around three characters. They are called Tom, Gemma and Charlie who both support and subvert typical conventions of teenagers in our film. One way in which teenagers are typically portrayed is in the first clip shown. This is a close-up of Charlie who is wearing a dark, shady coat with his hood up. Through mise en scene, he supports typical portrayals of some teenagers as he is shown to have a trouble-causing look. This creates a sense of suspicion and could hint he has something to hide, as he reveals very little about himself. However, his use, and later shown to be an obsession, of a lighter could subvert Charlie from typical portrayals, as it shows to be a distraction from social situations. This subverts expectations as teenagers are usually portrayed to be very sociable and they hang around in groups, this is shown when Charlie walks behind Gemma and Tom. Charlie also rarely interacts with anyone throughout the clip.

In the film, Tom has a grey jumper and blue jeans whilst Charlie has very dark clothes. Gemma however, has both darker and lighter colours of clothing. This could represent the different social groups that they would normally be in. The mixture of dark and light colours Gemma has could demonstrate she is more accepting whilst Tom is shown clearly, that he doesn’t like Charlie. This is later shown through very direct dialect such as “I don’t like him.”

GENDER PORTRAYALS FOR TOM AND CHARLIE

In terms of gender portrayals, Tom is demonstrated to be the most stereotypical of his gender as he is shown to be headstrong when it comes to voicing him opinions and thoughts “we can’t leave the body with him.” His use of “him” rather than Charlie, demonstrates his lack of respect for Charlie as well as his high level of confidence. This is a typical representation of the male gender. Charlie, however, subverts gender conventions as he is passive, quiet and doesn’t like to stand out in a crowd. This is shown when he falls behind Gemma and Tom as they continue their conversation without Charlie. At points, he is not visible in scenes, this is done intentionally because his lack of contribution makes him invisible to other characters which demonstrated to the audience in this way.

GENDER PORTRAYALS FOR GEMMA Gemma both subverts and supports typical gender conventions as she is

demonstrated to be kind and accepting of other people as she invites Charlie to join her and Tom despite not knowing him very well. Also, she introduces Charlie to Tom, showing her to be understanding of Charlie’s insecurities “Hello Tom, this is Charlie, he is in my psychology class.” A possible reason as to why she could be seen to subvert typical portrayals of her gender is because of her use of swearing when seeing the body, through a medium shot, demonstrates a form of aggressive which is normally associated with the male gender.