Investigating into genre

Reflect on genre.
Genre is the concept of catagorising films, however it is also the foundations for all films giving them their key themes and issues, which, in Media, we call the conventions and this is where all writers, producers and directors take the necessary elements to create a genre.  Genre is influenced by social, economic, political and cultural changes which effect the film studios.  This has forced genre to develop and evolve from the classic Hollywood Studio system with sub-genre to the contemporary hybrid such as a rom-com.


The process of film making.
The process in which film studios have to undertake to create a film is lengthy and time consuming.  They first need to consider the type of genre that they see a gap in the market for and then have to undertake, in a survey, to investigate whether or not the audience would be interested and engaged with this type of genre.  If the survey is positive then the studio starts to create the plot line, characters, setting etc.  If negative the studio returns to the drawing board.  During the creation of the plot the writers and studio must stick to the conventions and build upon past films in the same genre so that the audience is engaged and knows what to expect from the type of film.


What have you learned about genre?
I have learned that the audience requires repetition, variation and familiarity with new films.  This is critical to the film making process as they must keep similar elements within film resonates with the audience, however, they need some variance to keep the audience engaged.  One aspect to film making is regenrification. This is the ability to repackage and rebrand a film if the box office suggests that the film would not be a success if is stays within the genre it is in. This shows that the division between genres is weak and blur into one another with no set standards. 


What can you take from what you have learned?
I have learned that I need to undertake my research with greater detail and more thoroughly and to ask a wide set of question to my audience.  Besides the genre that they may be most interested in.  Things like characters, setting, theme and issues and lighting.  Also I can take my learning of how to investigate in greater detail from the problems that I have faced and where I have gone wrong.


 

Concepts of Genre

© Filmsite.org

Steve Neale has said that the relationship of conventions and their expectations in genre are in a continuous circle, going between the industry, text and subject.


One of the most important things genre needs to have is a familiarity with their audience. That is to say there needs to be something that the audience can relate to and/or that they have seen before. This is very important as if it is so far removed from what they are watching they will not enjoy it or understand. Also there needs to be repetition of key elements or themes with in the same genre. As with repetition comes a sustained ease and comfort to watching or reading any media, we don't want the audience to feel uncomfortable as they want to enjoy or find pleasure in what they are consuming. However we don't just want the films to be consistently the same as each other, so we need some variation - without variation the audience becomes desensitised to what is being shown to them. As well as having variation with films there needs to be variation with what the studios produce. If we only have horror films for the next 5 years we, as the audience, will become desensitised, uninterested and bored of that genre of film.


I believe that the most limiting type of genre is the sub-genre, yes you are building upon other past films with in that genre, however you can't branch out and make the film more than two dimensional. It becomes to repetitive and familiar without variation, which makes it very easy to guess what happens next. An example of this is in a romance, boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love, boy and girl fall out and don't talk and at the end of the film boy and girl get back together, the audience does not even need to go and see the film as they already knows what is going to happen.


When starting to undertake research into thrillers I need to consider what type of thriller genre, if that would be the conspiracy thriller, crime thriller or even political thriller. Then after that I need to research in to the conventions of that sub-genre and analyse other past films of that same sub-genre. What shots do they use? How are these shots different from each other type of sub-genre? What is the music like for each? How does the Mise-en-scéne play its part to create the mood for that sub-genre? [Update] What are the main themes and issues, iconography, character development, and setting in each of the sub-genre films. Also I will need to research into the other type of genre, Hybrids. What are the main element of a hybrid film? What is the Camera, Sound, Editing Mise-en-scene like?


I feel that being given a brief of only doing thriller is a good thing as we have a starting point something to work with. Anyway the film crew is given a brief of what genre they are creating so I don't see that it is limiting to have a set genre but a positive, something to start with.