This is the "piecing together of narratives to make a new narrative." The best example of this is The Mighty Boosh, which explores many genres, styles, techniques and formulas (ecclesiastic) to create a new story. For example, the stereotypical "Frankenstein" set with frothing glasses and an evil villain is mixed in with a thriller style dance mix, and then with a romantic comedy. This mixing of stereotypes and from old examples of genres is an example of bricolage- a mix of styles to create a new piece of media. Here is an example from the Mighty Boosh:
This shows a dream of a dream state-already a convention of thriller or epics, where dreams are important to "tell you something". The bricolage in this dream is very obvious- the catuses link to Indians, who used to take this for drugs, whereas the didgeridoos and tribal dance link to Aborigines. The sudden use of rock music brings in Americans stereotypes, the Afros represent the 70's funk, the masks are parody's of Easter island, and the red light is "other worldly." There is huge use of other cultures, therefore creating a culture bricolage. This relies on an active audience, as it relies on cultural knowledge and significance.
The Mighty Boo sh also uses cliqued techniques such as shooting "through binoculars" and being very self aware of being a film- the time blood falls on the managers head, and we pan out and realize it is just tomato juice, plays on audience expectations and is very aware of being a camera lens.
Who's Reality?
This could be linked to Marxism, and who has the power to control or create realities. Reality is quite a tricky term, but this idea questions who it belongs to. You could say that the reality being create3d belongs to the person creating it- the production company, the writers, the funding company. However, interpretations change, and one person watching a film can interpret a reality differently. Therefore, the reality could be said to belong to a single person, or to a region or town as they might have similar ideologies. However, although the reality relies on who creates or interprets it, it also relies on cultural knowledge- and who creates this? For example, who comes up with the representation of a nation, or a sub culture? this gives them power as can often force people to act in a certain way. It could be said that the common representation of English people is a American creation as they are the most powerful and have most access to technology and media to reinforce and create these images. However, representations of America shown is as less powerful. It could probably be considered that the reality doesn't belong to anyone, and is created and represented at the same time. (Although it could be argued that the more powerful nations have a more powerful say in this, and so it belongs to the "west" more than anyone else.) Good film for discussing this: Stranger than fiction: it discusses the idea of belonging to someone Else's story and being controlled.
Extras
This is very postmodern for a number of reasons. It has a huge number of representations in it- of big brother and celebreties (who are just representations of media texts anyway) and representations of media construction, with a studio audience. it has a meta fiction, comedy within a comedy, so very self referential.
Tuesday 22 December 2009
Monday 14 December 2009
essay
Explain how and why post-modern media plays with the verisimilitude of a text.
Post modern media is often self referential and playful, meaning that the reality of a text becomes less genuine or more realistic depending on the style of text. The verisimilitude, (reality) can therefore be altered by postmodernism and sometimes become destroyed completely to make a hyper-reality.
There are several ways in which post-modern media can play with verisimilitude. One way is through the text being self referential. As the text is referring to itself, or to the unreality of the film world, this can affect the realism of the text, as it becomes aware that it is a piece of media, not a representation of reality. An example is in “24 hour party people” where the protagonist talks to the camera about what is going to happen, referring to the fact that it is a film, and breaking the 4th wall. This awareness of the audience breaks the illusion of the film being its own “world” and draws attention to the camera, meaning the construction of a film is more obvious-this is done also by the play with time in “24 Hour Party People,” where everyone but one person is going slow-speed- a clear play with camera effects. This makes a text less real. However, some methods of being self referential, such as shaky camera movements to allude to the fact that someone is holding the camera can make the text more real, such as in Blair Witch Project, which uses this type of camera to make itself more believable and scary. Therefore, the verisimilitude can be affected both ways.
This links to pastiche and parody, which are also forms of post modern media which can play with reality. These conventions of postmodernism use conventions, characteristics and ideas from well known genres and other media texts and satirize them- often for comic effect. The reference to other texts through parody can often make the world being created very unreal-such as in Scary Movie where a women falls over and a line appears around her to make her look as she if had fallen in the same spot as someone who’d died. The unreality of this could be said to make the verisimilitude diminish, as it’s using well known conventions from horror and converting them for comic effect in a very open way. Therefore, the construction of a text, and the converting of other media texts is very self-aware, and therefore less real-it wouldn’t happen in real life.
It could also be seen in another way. Hyper reality and the reference to conventions could be seen to increase the realism, as the referent, according to Chandler’s model, is the film world and not the real world- it refers to media texts not reality. This creates a hyper reality. This links to an idea of Baudrilliard, who says that our world is media saturated, and that this means that there is no reality anymore- it is just a simulacrum for reality, and that the world is a hyper reality made up of semiotics and media events. In postmodernism, the hyper-reality is presented in films through many things including intertexuality and the reference to media instead of reality- for example, the use of famous one-liners or memes. These recognizable references to other texts link to our own lives, as something we would see/recognize everyday and often post-modern comedy is dependent on our knowledge of our culture. An example is in some of the Cohen Brother films, which use huge amounts of intertexuality to represent the film world. This representation uses conventions the audience recognize and connect with, and link to their own experiences in the media. This links to the hyper-real world the audience is in, and therefore could seem like reality as it is presenting hyper-reality and media reality. Another example could be internet memes, such as the word “OMG” a shortening of oh my God. This originated from internet chat-rooms, and travelled through social networking sites and then to film and TV (the genre of “chic flicks” use OMG quite seriously, in “Mean Girls” for example.) OMG is now considered normal language to speak in. This recognizable media expression therefore can make a text more real, as it is alike to our normal life, even though it creates hyper reality through blurring the edges of reality and the internet.
The playfulness of postmodernism can also alter the verisimilitude of a text. Often the play is comic through pastiche and parody, which has the effect of making the text less real- such as “The Life of Brain” which plays with ideologies about God and politics to ridicule them. Play can often have different results too -an example is in “The Big Lebowski” where the main character is very liberal and lazy, preferring to live off benefits than anything else. This plays with the normal values of society, which are to be independent and to work hard- and creates a nihilistic world with no values. “24 hour party people” takes this further, and plays with narrative structure, making the story confusing and random- a nihilistic way of story telling with no traditional narrative. This can create both a more real and less real text- the nihilism of the world can been seen as unreal, and the way of story telling seen to be just comic or confusing-hindering the telling of the story for comic effect. But it could also be seen as a true representation of life, which has no structure and often is said to have few values. For example, “In the Thick of It” which is a hugely cynical and nihilistic representation of a political party. This could be considered unreal as the play and loss of values is exaggerated comically. However, it could also be argued that the portrayal, shot in hand-held camera to reinforce its realism, is structured and acted out like real life, and seems a realistic verisimilitude.
A last example of the way that post modernism plays with a text links back to the Chandler’s theory- it is aware of it’s construction, aware of it’s audience and uses audience’s knowledge of the referent to create the media. This takes into account intertexuality and hyper reality, relying on the culture knowledge of a nation to construct a media, and yet using the construction of media as a way of making media too. An example could be the TV series “Extras.” This is very post modern through its self referential style, with reality being marred by actors playing themselves and the audience not being sure of what is reality and which isn’t. This shows the awareness to the construction of reality for the audience- it constructs a hyper-reality that the audience both know is there but also believe. This can be seen as both real and unreal in the verisimilitude of a text. Another example on another platform is “Private Eye.” This is also very post-modern, and aware of the reader’s knowledge of recent events in the news. It then plays with these stories, adding in parodies and intertexuality, while being self referential. (For example, they say: “That’s enough now Ed” in the middle of sentences to end the story.) This is self referential in the construction of the news story -creating the illusion that the editor has read this and stopped the news story there. The use of “Ed” is also informal and has connotations of someone uneducated writing the article. This takes realism from the text, but adds comedy through the play and audience awareness of referent and construction. The comedy in it also creates by the nihilistic and comic representation of the world by Private Eye.
Therefore, postmodernism largely makes texts less real as it presents a world quite distanced or playful compared to our own. However, as postmodernism uses hyper reality and some techniques which use construction to make text more real, it could also make the verisimilitude of a text more real.
Post modern media is often self referential and playful, meaning that the reality of a text becomes less genuine or more realistic depending on the style of text. The verisimilitude, (reality) can therefore be altered by postmodernism and sometimes become destroyed completely to make a hyper-reality.
There are several ways in which post-modern media can play with verisimilitude. One way is through the text being self referential. As the text is referring to itself, or to the unreality of the film world, this can affect the realism of the text, as it becomes aware that it is a piece of media, not a representation of reality. An example is in “24 hour party people” where the protagonist talks to the camera about what is going to happen, referring to the fact that it is a film, and breaking the 4th wall. This awareness of the audience breaks the illusion of the film being its own “world” and draws attention to the camera, meaning the construction of a film is more obvious-this is done also by the play with time in “24 Hour Party People,” where everyone but one person is going slow-speed- a clear play with camera effects. This makes a text less real. However, some methods of being self referential, such as shaky camera movements to allude to the fact that someone is holding the camera can make the text more real, such as in Blair Witch Project, which uses this type of camera to make itself more believable and scary. Therefore, the verisimilitude can be affected both ways.
This links to pastiche and parody, which are also forms of post modern media which can play with reality. These conventions of postmodernism use conventions, characteristics and ideas from well known genres and other media texts and satirize them- often for comic effect. The reference to other texts through parody can often make the world being created very unreal-such as in Scary Movie where a women falls over and a line appears around her to make her look as she if had fallen in the same spot as someone who’d died. The unreality of this could be said to make the verisimilitude diminish, as it’s using well known conventions from horror and converting them for comic effect in a very open way. Therefore, the construction of a text, and the converting of other media texts is very self-aware, and therefore less real-it wouldn’t happen in real life.
It could also be seen in another way. Hyper reality and the reference to conventions could be seen to increase the realism, as the referent, according to Chandler’s model, is the film world and not the real world- it refers to media texts not reality. This creates a hyper reality. This links to an idea of Baudrilliard, who says that our world is media saturated, and that this means that there is no reality anymore- it is just a simulacrum for reality, and that the world is a hyper reality made up of semiotics and media events. In postmodernism, the hyper-reality is presented in films through many things including intertexuality and the reference to media instead of reality- for example, the use of famous one-liners or memes. These recognizable references to other texts link to our own lives, as something we would see/recognize everyday and often post-modern comedy is dependent on our knowledge of our culture. An example is in some of the Cohen Brother films, which use huge amounts of intertexuality to represent the film world. This representation uses conventions the audience recognize and connect with, and link to their own experiences in the media. This links to the hyper-real world the audience is in, and therefore could seem like reality as it is presenting hyper-reality and media reality. Another example could be internet memes, such as the word “OMG” a shortening of oh my God. This originated from internet chat-rooms, and travelled through social networking sites and then to film and TV (the genre of “chic flicks” use OMG quite seriously, in “Mean Girls” for example.) OMG is now considered normal language to speak in. This recognizable media expression therefore can make a text more real, as it is alike to our normal life, even though it creates hyper reality through blurring the edges of reality and the internet.
The playfulness of postmodernism can also alter the verisimilitude of a text. Often the play is comic through pastiche and parody, which has the effect of making the text less real- such as “The Life of Brain” which plays with ideologies about God and politics to ridicule them. Play can often have different results too -an example is in “The Big Lebowski” where the main character is very liberal and lazy, preferring to live off benefits than anything else. This plays with the normal values of society, which are to be independent and to work hard- and creates a nihilistic world with no values. “24 hour party people” takes this further, and plays with narrative structure, making the story confusing and random- a nihilistic way of story telling with no traditional narrative. This can create both a more real and less real text- the nihilism of the world can been seen as unreal, and the way of story telling seen to be just comic or confusing-hindering the telling of the story for comic effect. But it could also be seen as a true representation of life, which has no structure and often is said to have few values. For example, “In the Thick of It” which is a hugely cynical and nihilistic representation of a political party. This could be considered unreal as the play and loss of values is exaggerated comically. However, it could also be argued that the portrayal, shot in hand-held camera to reinforce its realism, is structured and acted out like real life, and seems a realistic verisimilitude.
A last example of the way that post modernism plays with a text links back to the Chandler’s theory- it is aware of it’s construction, aware of it’s audience and uses audience’s knowledge of the referent to create the media. This takes into account intertexuality and hyper reality, relying on the culture knowledge of a nation to construct a media, and yet using the construction of media as a way of making media too. An example could be the TV series “Extras.” This is very post modern through its self referential style, with reality being marred by actors playing themselves and the audience not being sure of what is reality and which isn’t. This shows the awareness to the construction of reality for the audience- it constructs a hyper-reality that the audience both know is there but also believe. This can be seen as both real and unreal in the verisimilitude of a text. Another example on another platform is “Private Eye.” This is also very post-modern, and aware of the reader’s knowledge of recent events in the news. It then plays with these stories, adding in parodies and intertexuality, while being self referential. (For example, they say: “That’s enough now Ed” in the middle of sentences to end the story.) This is self referential in the construction of the news story -creating the illusion that the editor has read this and stopped the news story there. The use of “Ed” is also informal and has connotations of someone uneducated writing the article. This takes realism from the text, but adds comedy through the play and audience awareness of referent and construction. The comedy in it also creates by the nihilistic and comic representation of the world by Private Eye.
Therefore, postmodernism largely makes texts less real as it presents a world quite distanced or playful compared to our own. However, as postmodernism uses hyper reality and some techniques which use construction to make text more real, it could also make the verisimilitude of a text more real.
Tuesday 1 December 2009
Postmodern further.
Auteur: An auteur is a director of film, who has a collective body of work with is of a unique quality. An example could be the Coen Brothers or Micheal Winterbottom- the Coen Brothers especially feature in this through their opening of the postmodern genre and exploration of history throug their refferncing. This allows a film to challenge and crtique history. Winterbottom particularly believes in that reality cannot be represented, and therefore he is an auteur of playing with reality and our ideas of it.
Some argue that there is no such thing as auteur, because of the "death of an author" idea by Roland Barthes, which suggests that there is no such thing as a real original story-the same thing is just told and retold in various disguises. It also relates to the audience reception of the idea- the audience can interpret the story however they want to, destroying the original meaning.
Matrix
The Matrix is a postmodern film effected by Baudrillard's ideas about postmodernism. This is because it links to the idea of media consuming the audience and the world being so saturated and controlled by media that there is no such thing as reality. The Matrix uses this idea by having a literal cyberspace which people believe to be reality and is controlled by machines- which Neo among others wakes up from. This is a reflection of our own reality, where we are controlled by media to run all aspects of life. The matrix is also postmodern due to it's self referential aspect-its inside itself. It can be thought to be a zeitgeist. (idea which defines an age.)
Memes
A meme is an idea or creative item passed on virally form person to person to the point that it becomes well known and used.
An example of an internet meme is words such as "fail" "Lol"etc- these have infact passed on to feature as a regular phrase for the english lanaguage. these orginated on internet forums such as Lolcats and MSN.
However there can also be other types of meme- the kind of signs we get used to in life which often beomes symbols as they are so well known. For example, the meme of Banksy, which is passed on through curiousity about him. His unknown, intertexual and playful art is symbolic of the our world. He is also simple, and for a meme to spread quickly, they have to be simple and easy to replicate. (like cells, which replicate to spread quickly.)
Examples of Memes:
"Leave Brtiney alone!" This is a very good example of a meme. It began with an emotional teenager (Chris Crocker) getting angry and upset about Britney (video below)(HOPEFEULLY)
This spawned a huge amount of media off this. If you explore the "related videos" there are huge numbers of people imiating him, and videos of people talking about him or "putting him in a blender." The catch phrase of "leave britney alone" is repeated many times there, and spread across to other media. It is apparent on Lolcats, another site, and appeared on internet forums etc. Soon it made him an internet celebrity, he appeared on many TV shows, there is merchandise with the phrase written on, and it has become part of our culture. (when we want to seem rediculous or exaggerated.
Scream meme
The scream movies are very postmodern. This is for many reasons. They are very intertexual, mentioning Black eyed peas, has pyscho music/scene etc and the scream mask being a reffernce to the scream picturee by Edvard Munch. It is also in a cinema, there is an audience within an audience and a film within film. (metafiction). The movie plays with the conventions of a scary movie, refferncing the conventions of dumb, vulnerable women being attacked within the script, making you aware that the film knows its meant to sacry, and suggesting that the convention might change. The scream became very popular, and the sign of the scream mask became sybolic and has been used in paradies many times. It is reconized both as scary now but also as funny- it has been made fun of so many times, the meme is now amusing. However, the fascination did have bad effetcs- there were several killings by people pretending to be a scream man, who found that the blurring of vioelnce onscreen and off screen meant they were distanced, desensitzed and unable to see wrong in their crime.
These scary movies are paradied by "The Scary Movie" which has been described as the "death of Horror" as it uses every single convention of horror and laughs at it, along with dierctly paradying scenes from popular horror movies, thus reducing their fear. An example is using the scene from signs with the corn feild. The scary movie use the long track to create tension but also to make the actor look stupid as he walks funny. The scream of the child is broken due to him peeing, and the final "sign" left by teh aleins says "attck here" breaking down enigma. In other times, the use of paradoying the scream by having a girl alone in ahouse with a phone, but by emhasising her dumbness, sexuality and her self referential name (she plays herself) this is amsuing. Some people claim that this laughter at violence can lead to a distance from violnce and inablityt o distinguish violnce as real and bad- caused a moral panic.
Some argue that there is no such thing as auteur, because of the "death of an author" idea by Roland Barthes, which suggests that there is no such thing as a real original story-the same thing is just told and retold in various disguises. It also relates to the audience reception of the idea- the audience can interpret the story however they want to, destroying the original meaning.
Matrix
The Matrix is a postmodern film effected by Baudrillard's ideas about postmodernism. This is because it links to the idea of media consuming the audience and the world being so saturated and controlled by media that there is no such thing as reality. The Matrix uses this idea by having a literal cyberspace which people believe to be reality and is controlled by machines- which Neo among others wakes up from. This is a reflection of our own reality, where we are controlled by media to run all aspects of life. The matrix is also postmodern due to it's self referential aspect-its inside itself. It can be thought to be a zeitgeist. (idea which defines an age.)
Memes
A meme is an idea or creative item passed on virally form person to person to the point that it becomes well known and used.
An example of an internet meme is words such as "fail" "Lol"etc- these have infact passed on to feature as a regular phrase for the english lanaguage. these orginated on internet forums such as Lolcats and MSN.
However there can also be other types of meme- the kind of signs we get used to in life which often beomes symbols as they are so well known. For example, the meme of Banksy, which is passed on through curiousity about him. His unknown, intertexual and playful art is symbolic of the our world. He is also simple, and for a meme to spread quickly, they have to be simple and easy to replicate. (like cells, which replicate to spread quickly.)
Examples of Memes:
"Leave Brtiney alone!" This is a very good example of a meme. It began with an emotional teenager (Chris Crocker) getting angry and upset about Britney (video below)(HOPEFEULLY)
This spawned a huge amount of media off this. If you explore the "related videos" there are huge numbers of people imiating him, and videos of people talking about him or "putting him in a blender." The catch phrase of "leave britney alone" is repeated many times there, and spread across to other media. It is apparent on Lolcats, another site, and appeared on internet forums etc. Soon it made him an internet celebrity, he appeared on many TV shows, there is merchandise with the phrase written on, and it has become part of our culture. (when we want to seem rediculous or exaggerated.
Scream meme
The scream movies are very postmodern. This is for many reasons. They are very intertexual, mentioning Black eyed peas, has pyscho music/scene etc and the scream mask being a reffernce to the scream picturee by Edvard Munch. It is also in a cinema, there is an audience within an audience and a film within film. (metafiction). The movie plays with the conventions of a scary movie, refferncing the conventions of dumb, vulnerable women being attacked within the script, making you aware that the film knows its meant to sacry, and suggesting that the convention might change. The scream became very popular, and the sign of the scream mask became sybolic and has been used in paradies many times. It is reconized both as scary now but also as funny- it has been made fun of so many times, the meme is now amusing. However, the fascination did have bad effetcs- there were several killings by people pretending to be a scream man, who found that the blurring of vioelnce onscreen and off screen meant they were distanced, desensitzed and unable to see wrong in their crime.
These scary movies are paradied by "The Scary Movie" which has been described as the "death of Horror" as it uses every single convention of horror and laughs at it, along with dierctly paradying scenes from popular horror movies, thus reducing their fear. An example is using the scene from signs with the corn feild. The scary movie use the long track to create tension but also to make the actor look stupid as he walks funny. The scream of the child is broken due to him peeing, and the final "sign" left by teh aleins says "attck here" breaking down enigma. In other times, the use of paradoying the scream by having a girl alone in ahouse with a phone, but by emhasising her dumbness, sexuality and her self referential name (she plays herself) this is amsuing. Some people claim that this laughter at violence can lead to a distance from violnce and inablityt o distinguish violnce as real and bad- caused a moral panic.
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