1. Analyse media representations in one of your coursework productions.
Our Opening Sequence subscribes to, as well as rejects, a number of representation theories.
Primarily is the Laura Mulvey Theory that argues the dominant perspective is masculine. The female
body in our Opening Sequence is heavily subjected to sexualisation by the camera. The two minutes
include close-ups of her lips, eyes, hips and legs, as well as the medium shots of her body, and long
shot of her leaving the house. She also wears very provocative clothing e.g. A short bodycon skirt
and stiletto high heels. However, from one perspective our Opening Sequence is anti Mulvey’s
Theory due to the fact that the aim was to convey the female protagonist as an attractive, possibly
sexually experienced (Based on the panning shots of the “Fifty Shades of Grey” Trilogy and sexual
innuendo make-up e.g. “Glow Job” moisturiser), and confident, rather than simply a sex object the
male members of the audience can drool over, like Megan Fox’s role in “Transformers”. Our target
audience was also teenage girls, mainly.
As an extension, our Opening Sequence rejects Berger’s Theory that the "Men act and women
appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at." Our Opening Sequence
doesn’t have any male characters present, and it is just the female protagonist present and acting.
Male members of the audience may look at the protagonist; however, she is acting and not there as
decoration, to be looked at.
In terms of Dyer’s Theory, it can be applied to our Opening Sequence. Our plot line is hardly original
and so, if told the film will be about a teenage girl, the audience will assume, by way of stereotypes,
that she is attractive and will find love. Although our plot differentiates slightly in terms of the fact
our protagonist is looking for revenge initially, she does find love and is presented as sexually
attractive. However, our Opening Two Minutes also can apply Perkins’ Theory; regarding
stereotyping isn’t always false and negative. Naomi is presented as sexually attractive and therefore
also confident and subject to male attention, a compliment and positive trait in most females’
books. A lot of adolescent females are attractive and do prioritise appearance, perhaps not to the
extremes to which Naomi is portrayed as doing, but her representation does hold some element of
truth, roving Perkins’ Theory.
Our Opening Sequence does subscribe to both Gramsci’s Hegemonic Theory and Althusser’s
Theory’s regarding our representation of teenage females. We haven’t challenged the idea that
females care primarily about their appearance, as our Opening Sequence is centred on our
protagonist getting ready, nor the sexualisation of females by the media. In fact, our decisions with
misé en scene disregard common sense and reality altogether in favour portraying our protagonist
as highly sexualised and attractive e.g. The idea that a teenage girl would wear a pair of stilettos to
meet a boy in the daytime is unrealistic, but furthers the idea that she has sex appeal.
This fits in to the idea of Strinati’s Theory, that ultimately, it is too difficult to represent reality as it is
easily mixed up with imaginary. It was easy for us to follow the simple, cliché storyline Romantic-
Comedies follow, we were heavily influenced by “Legally Blonde” (Particularly regarding the Opening
Two Minutes which is very similar), and the sexual characterisation of Naomi wasn’t original.
However, on the other hand, the sexualisation by teenage girls is a reality, one we are accurately
aware of as an audience, which could disprove, to some extent, that Strinati’s Theory is not entirely
true of our Opening Sequence.