The Hyperdermic Needle Model

Hello everyone!
Recently in class we learnt more about the theory of 'The Hypodermic Needle Model'. This theory explores how audiences can be manipulated into believing certain themes and concepts from the Media. The theory was not made by anyone specifically but it was first created within the 1920s. Here are some brief notes that I made about this theory:

•   A model of communications suggesting that the message intended is successfully portrayed to the audience
•   Dating from the 1920s, this theory was the first attempt to explain how mass audiences might react to mass media.
•  It suggests that audiences passively receive the information transmitted via a media text, without any attempt on their part to process or challenge the data.
•   This theory was developed in an age when the mass media were still fairly new - radio and cinema were less than two decades old.
•  Governments had just discovered the power of advertising to communicate a message, and produced propaganda to try and sway populaces to their way of thinking.
•  Basically, the Hypodermic Needle Model suggests that the information from a text passes into the audience sub-conscientiously
•   For example the experience, intelligence and opinion of an individual are not relevant to the reception of the text.
•   This theory suggests that, as an audience, we are manipulated by the creators of media texts, and that our behaviour and thinking might be easily changed by media-makers.
•   It assumes that the audience are passive.
•   This theory is still quoted used by parents, politicians and pressure groups, and is used to explain why certain groups in society should not be exposed to certain media texts for fear that they will watch or read sexual or violent behaviour and will then act them out themselves.

Main Notes

•   The hypodermic syringe model is a theory of media effect on audience.
•  The term is used to describe interaction between the media and public belief, offering the idea of people becoming affected by the information 'injected' into them through their information medium (brain).

Negative point

This can be seen as negative as it can make people do terrible things just because of what they saw in a film or another media text. A prime example of this is the murder of Jamie Bulger and how his murderers (being children) had access to seeing an 18 rated film and was influenced by the film they watched which was Child’s Play. This portrayed a negative image into their heads that killing was not a bad thing to do.

Psycho and Texas Chainsaw Massacre

Hi!
On Monday we identified the similarities and differences between Psycho and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It was interesting to discover how many differences and similarities there were and how they were conveyed throughout one or both films. These were our findings as a class:

What have I learnt?
I have learnt that there are more differences when it comes to these two films then differences. I believe there are more differences then similarites because most horror films want to be unique and have their own style so to have too many similarities would take that element away.

Paul Well's Research 1990

Hello!
Today we learnt about our own roles as an audience and how to analyse audience theories. Additionally, we studied Paul Well's research theory which was based around a small group study looking at the relationship between audiences and the horror genre. Here is the table of his findings:

 

What have I learnt?

I have learnt that relationships change with age and relates to all broader factors such as life. Additionally another I have learnt that young audiences are aware of artificality and are becoming harder to shock.

The Male Gaze Theory - Laura Mulvey

Hello!
I always had a burning desire to know why females are presented in a particular way during films; I wondered if there was a type of theory  that described why they are depicted as they are and luckily in class we had the opportunity to explore the male gaze theory. This theory basically states that women are conveyed in a way for example with short skirts or a view of the cleavage etc for the entertainment and eyes of males.

Laura Mulvey wrote a very influential essay which was called "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" (1975). Using the theories of Sigmund Freud (a famous philospher) and Lacan, Mulvey suggests that the way women are viewed in cinema in "unequal" when compared to the status of the male. The camera unnecessarily presents women as "sexualised" for the pleasure of the men. She once said that " the preserve of woman is indispensable element of spectacle in normal narrative film, yet her visual prescense tends to work against the development of the story-line to freeze the flow of action  in moment of erotic contemplation."

Mulvey's three types of "looking" (or formally known as voyeurism):



A way to remember this is that 1. is focusing on the camera, 2. is focusing on the audience and 3. is focusing on the characters.







Vladimir Propp - Character Theory

Hey everyone!
Recently within Media we learned more about theorist ideas and how the theorists came about. The theory that we learnt about what 'Character Theory' which was created by Vladimir Propp. He stated that there are eight characters within every film but mainly focused on fantasy stories. He gathered his research from reading my fairy-tale stories and then came to the conclusion that there are only a couple of characters in each narrative. The film chosen here is Shrek as the narrative and the film in general fall under Vladimir Propp's character theory. Within the narrative there is:

Character Type	Definition	Example
The Hero	v  Leads the narrative; story being told by the hero v  Usually looking for something – quest, solving mysteries etc v  As an audience, we want the hero to succeed	Shrek
The Villain	v  Struggles against the Hero and is morally bad v  Turns audience against him and drives them to support the hero v  Lack of morals v  Serves to highlight the goodness of the Hero	Lord Farquaad
The Donor	v  Gives the hero something special e.g a magical weapon, particular wisdom, a clue or special power v  The gift enables the Hero to complete their quest v  May be combined with that of a Helper	Dragon
The Helper	v  Supports the Hero at critical moments to provide a helping hand v  May be a support role throughout v  They may have limitations which highlight the Hero’s defining characteristics	Donkey
The Princess	v  Deliberately sought after by the Hero or she could be the reward v  May be seen very little in the story or may even be seen as an important character	Princess Fiona
The Princess’ Father	v  Gives the task to the Hero and is a key figure for the Hero to persuade as the Father is protective v  May be in competition with the Hero for the Princess’ affection	The King
The Dispatcher	v  Sends the Hero on his mission, this can be a family member like the Princess’ Father v  Gives the Hero a set of quests to be completed before the Hero can claim his award	Lord Farquaad
The False Horror	v  Appears to act heroically but may be initially mistaken for the real Hero. v  Will try to steal the real Hero’s thunder and will grab the credit	Prince Charming

I do believe that Propp's Character Theory is well used throughout today however I do not believe it is necessarily used within the horror genre anymore. Females are becoming more dominant and there does not necessarily have to be a false hero or a father to the so called 'Princess'. This theory can be called useful as it avoids treating characters as if they are individuals and reminds us that they are merely constructs.

What have I learnt?
I learnt why Propp's theory has become so well known and why it is used throughout the industry for conducting fairy-tale stories. Additionally, critics argue that Propp's strict order of characters and events is restrictive as we should rather apply functions and events randomly as we meet a new narrative.

Hey there!
I thought that I should just start off by saying welcome to my new blog! As stated on my actual page this blog will show all the evidence of my projects which consist of making a horror trailer, magazine and a film poster. Furthermore, I thought I should also state what I have been up to recently within my media classes. We've been focusing on the conventions within horror films and how we can intertwine these ideas into our horror film trailers. So far we've watched five films (not fully) to look at what are the typical conventions that most pre-modern fillms conist of, so here we go.

Nosferatu (1922)

The film Nosferatu was based upon the story 'Dracula' created by Bram Stoker. It's director F. W. Murnau found the narrative fascinating and decided to create the film inspired by the content within it. However, he could not get permission to formulate a remake of the film and so had to change the film slightly from the original novel and has classically been called an unathorised version of the novel. The title 'Nosferatu' means a symphony of terror and was one of the manu changes that Murnau had to make to the film. Another change is that instead of the vampire being called 'Count Dracula' the vampire was called 'Count Orlok' however, the narrative still closely follows the novel version. As a class, we studied the opening scene and what it included. We stated that the music is a key factor as when the innocent characters such as Ellen and Hutter are around their house they are happy and the music is gentle, smooth and quite high pitched. We also stated that the main ideas that are introduced within the opening scene are fragile nature of love, abandoment, seperation, feminism and corruption.

Here is the opening scene that we studied:

Here is a link if you would like to watch the full movie of Nosferatu (1992):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcyzubFvBsA

Dracula (1992)

The next film we studied was Dracula which was an authorised adaptation of Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Coppola thought it was absolutely crucial that the film stayed true to the narrative within 'Dracula' and so every scene has been articulated greatly so that the audience can relate what is happening within the scene with the novel. Additionally we studied the opening scene of the film and made close analysis on the conventions portrayed and the symbolism shown. A major theme shown within the opening scene is religion; religion is the reason why Dracula's wife to be died and religion (mainly concentrating on the people of the church) and the fact that his wife died is the reason why he had turned into the vampire as he drank the forbidden blood. The love between Dracula and his wife to be is conveyed as a transcendental love as there love will carry on even after they have died.

Psycho (1960)

This was the only film we watched full as a class and it was great that we did as this film is inspiring and memorable. Psycho was created and directed by Alfred Hitchcock, it caused controversy amongst the viewers and for the people within the film industry as it was different to any film before it. The actual film created the 'slasher' genre because of the graphic imagery, the techniques that were pursued for example within the shower scene and because a knife as a weapon had not been used in horror. *SPOILER ALERT* Additionally it was a unique narrative as the protagonist, a women called Marion Crane is killed within the first-forty five minutes. The antagonist which is actually Norman Bates dressed as his mother is intriguing as the character was inpsired by a man called Ed Gein. Ed Gein caused an uproar within America for his cruel acts which included, killing women, wearing their skins and additionally, he lived in isolation. We managed to study the whole of the film in which the main themes within it are betrayal, love and corruption.

Here is the most memorable and controversial scene with Psycho which is the shower scene:

Case 39 (2009)

We didn't spend a lot of time analysing case 39 however as a class we did get the idea of what was going to happen further on within the film. Case 39, directed by Christian Alvart is about a social worker who tries to help a girl called Lililth (nicknamed Lili) who appears to be having trouble at home with her parents. The social worked immediately assumes that the parents are controlling and abusing the child however she then later discovers from Lili that the parents want Lili dead. Lili and another worked called Wayne swoop into the rescue however, there is more to Lili then what meets the eye. I believe what I say from the film followed the conventions of horror as it includes a protagonist and an antagonist whilst having dark, mysterious events. Iconography is also within the film as there is blood which is a main convention within horror films, conveying death or pain.

Let The Right One In (2008)

Again, we did not study this film in detail but we studied the memorable moments from it for example the swimming pool scene. This Swedish film was directed by Tomas Alfredson and is about a little boy called Oscar who is bullied at school and consequently, does not have any friends. He meets a girl called Eli, who moves into the estate block that he is; Eli seems a shy girl and the two then become friends in which Oscar then finds out that Eli is a vampire. The narrative takes an interesting turn and the bond between the two friends strengthen as the narrative continues. I believe this film also follows the conventions of horror films as it includes scary moments that make the audience jump and nervous whilst having horrific events.



The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is directed by Tobe Hooper and it is in the genre of a cult horror film (slashser). Since it was run on a low budget the cast was made up of non-professional actors. Funnily enough, Hooper was hoping for a PG rating so this is why the gore is kept to a minimum however he failed as he got an 'R; rating due to the content and the narrative. Leatherface was inspired by Ed Gein so is similar Psycho as Norman Bates was inspired by Ed Gein also. We focused mainly on the beginning and two scenes of the film which were the ending scene and the scene where two characters are going for a swim but find that the place is empty. I believe that Hooper was successful in making the film scary as the ending scene was nail-biting and personally, I thought that Sally was going to die. However, the tension is built up as the narrative continues and unwinds.