In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and convention of real media product?

Comparison between my product and real media products

• I believe that Retribution has a suspenseful and breath taking edge to it. The thriller conventions that makes up real media products have been included in my opening which has allowed me to think they are similar.

• We used themes, narratives, characters, iconography and cinematic style. These thriller conventions allowed Retribution to fit in to the thriller genre as we had to contemplate, adjust and suggest idea’s to one another to get a story line that include these conventions.

• When we planned our opening we decided to find films that we could pick out ideas and storylines from. We wanted our opening to have a gruesome feel; to leave our audience on edge wanting to watch more, enigma codes assisted this and allowed our target audience to question themselves and say “why is this happening to him?” “who is he?” “what mission was he supposed to complete?”.

• We viewed Hostage and James bond which are two contrasting types of thriller films. However, we picked out the professionalism from James Bond and blood-spattered bits from Hostage and decided to combine the two in our own way.

• We decided that a cliff hanger would be the best option to ending our opening. We wanted the audience to watch more in the same way they would if it was real media product.

• In a thriller film it is imperative to include a credit sequence. The sequence usually consists of the names of the production team, director, actors/actresses ect. This is for acknowledgement and honor for those that have taken part in, worked on or created and assisted in the making of the film. In addition to that the credit sequence usually is in a particular order in every thriller movie, we decided to use this in our work to make it look more professional. We realized this by using real media products

• On the left ‘An Eclipse Production” is the page that we designed and used for our production page. On the right “A NEW REGENCY PRODUCTION” is the production page for the movie Mr and Mrs Smith.

• As you can see both production pages have a plain black background which contrasts with the white writing allowing it to stand out and look simple and professional. As a group we decided that simple is better and having too much things going on like images would disrupt the simplicity and professionalism of the opening

• Looking at both images you can see that our fonts and layouts are very different. Retributions font has a childlike and almost un so professional look to it. The way in which we laid our writing is shaped in a triangle, most real media products wouldn’t do this as it would give the audience the impression that its not a thriller film they are about to watch.

• However, real media products such as Mr and Mrs Smith’s font and layout gives a statement. It uses capital letters right the way through which I believe shows importance and authority but also varies in size. The actual name of the production team is bigger which I noticed and I believe that the production team had it this way purposely to be noticed. The writing is in a straight line which complements the simplicity of the white writing and black background.

• Our group decided to put our title ‘Retribution’ at the end of our opening for it to be memorable and more effective towards our target audience. Retribution is in white bold capital letters and has been placed on a plain black background. The title looks strong and bright which complements the thriller movie well showing seriousness and sincerity. We chose to have one word as our title as its quick and simple and self explanatory which is revenge.

• Mr and Mr Smith had there title in the middle of their opening, I believe it was placed their to reflect the relationship of the. The title is quite dim and is in capital letters on a black background; the dimness in the title could represent the strength of mr and mrs smiths relationship, its there but not there.

• On the left is a print screen of one of our scenes which involves Metjons character of the boss questioning Tonys character about “where it is”. On the right there is a shot from the film taken which shows Liam neesons character questioning the man that has kidnapped his daughter. As you can see Metjons character and Liam neesons characters are both dressed very similar looking down on their victims which suggests authority and power. The victims are sat down looking up at them with scared facial expressions which shows how vulnerable they are and how intimidating the bosses are. low key lighting is used in both scenes to create shadows and sinister atmosphere, we believe that these dark shadows in the shots represent mystery in addition to that both The victims look secluded as not much is shown in either shot. However we thought that we should make it a bit different as we took Tonys shirt off we thought that by doing this and adding the blood all over his body we could show the seriousness of the situation that he is in and we could also show how much pain he is going through. In both scenes neither of the victims give the information the boss needs showing their ignorance.

• On the left hand side is one of the scenes from our opening, on the right is a scene from Attack the block.

• Costumes and props assisted in setting the mood and urban atmosphere we tried to create. We made our two male characters dress up in hoodies, dark colors and scarves to cover their faces. Youths are often stereotyped to look this way, society find them intimidating and unapproachable. This is the theme we attempted to achieve in Retribution. Similarly, Attack the block consists of the same atmosphere and the youth behave similar to the youths in retribution. Dark colors and bandannas are used to cover up their faces in order to make them look frightening.

• However, the scenes contrast because Retribution was set at day and Attack the block was set at night. The darkness in Attack the block creates a sense of impending doom whereas in Retribution the attack happens in broad day light which makes it more unpredictable as attacks usually happen at night time when no one is around.

• Camera work and editing • As you can see above there is a scene between the boss and the victim. We used

shot reverse shot to show the facial expressions made within the conversation. This shows the audience who the conversation is between and also shows them what their wearing so you can see their social class which is clearly higher class for the boss and working class for tony’s character. Their posture and their facial expression shows the emotion that they are feeling which is worried for Tony and anger for the boss. We used slow paced editing for this particular scene because we thought that it would be easier for the audience to understand what is happening in this conversation and what is being said.

Story and how the opening is set up

• Our group decided to start our opening by introducing ‘The boss’ talking on the phone making demands showing his importance as he is the main character. Tony is then introduced as he walks in to the boss’s office for a word. The boss acts calm and collected and advises Tony to get the job done. Tony then walks out the room agreeing to do so. The boss then makes another phone call to someone to do his dirty work which triggers an enigma code to the audience as they are wondering who could be on the other line and what is about to happen. Farouke is waiting outside the subway as Tony passes we can see Dan inside the subway waiting. As Tony approaches Dan he asks ‘Yo, you got the time?’ to which Tony replies ‘Sorry