Evaluation of Our Representations

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Stereotype of teenagers in press

Use of smart clothes within our films

Smart clothes in 'Oceans Eleven'

• In our film we try to avoid teenage stereotypes of hoodies and baggie trousers for our main characters, and we tried to aim for a mature look, this comes across in the misè-en-scène of the characters costumes, with all the main characters wearing Smart clothes, such as a suit. This is similar to the heist film ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ where every main character wears smart clothes such as suits throughout the majority of the film.
•  This was to keep the characters equal but still seem different from one another. It also means they seem more believable as con-artists than the age of the actors might suggest.
• Although our characters are 'villains' because they carry out scams, as is typical in heist films, they are represented as being less 'bad' than many of the other characters, therefore the audience wants them to succeed. So in some ways, this is a more positive representation of young people as they are showing initiative and beating adults at their own game.

James Singh as our hacker

Hackers in the background wear more casual clothes

• Adorno argues that in art forms and therefore by extension heist films (which tend to have many characters) that having stereotypes offers directors a short hand, when representing characters, and it allows a person viewing the film to understand and predict certain characters more easily.

• This is fairly common in heist films, which tend to have a leader and ideas man, a technical expert, a charmer, a pickpocket and a love interest (a good film example of this would be ‘Ocean’s Eleven’). Within our film we have used these stereotypes because they are very distinct from one another, and this helps to define the roles each character plays.

• An example of a character stereotype would be James Singh’s as the hacker/ technical expert. This character tends to stand out from the others. These characters tend to be dressed in casual clothes but we tried to maintain some element of smartness to his costume.  This is a believable teen representation as young people are often stereotyped as being addicted to technology.

Teen hackers in Underground

• In other films the stereotypical hackers/ technical experts are presented as being physically weak characters but make up for it with their mental skills. There costumes appear more casual to the rest of the group, this is to make them stand out. An example of this would be in ‘Die Hard 4’ which has a large amount of hacker/ technical expert characters.

A predominately male cast in 'Reservoir Dogs' 

The mysterious man showing power against the boss

James as the 'damsel in distresses'

• When looking at male roles, the representation of men in media tends to focus on strength, power, sexual attractiveness, physique and independence. Ros Coward argues that the concept of ‘masculinity’ is stereotyped very rigidly in media, she also believes that too many critics focus on the stereotyping of women within media and, that male representations are limited as well and that they fall into four basic categories in film in particular:

The rookie – Seeks approval from father figure

The victor – defeats completion physically, mentally, romantically

The bonder – Male friend ship is vital

Overcoming fear of losing their masculinity – often romantic

 

• This applies to our film because although our film is not entirely male it is still primarily male dominated and because of this some of the characters are stereotyped. As Adorno said heist films tend to have many stereotypes because it allows many characters to be defined in a short space of time and this can help drive the plot. This is similar to films such as ‘Reservoir Dogs’ which is has a primarily male cast.

• The boss is stereotyped as being the victor and fears losing his masculinity to those more powerful than him.

• The mysterious man is stereotyped as being the victor and is also represented as being strong and powerful.

• Not all male characters are represented as powerful; James Carrey’s character is represented as the ‘damsel in distress’ this is unusual because this is seen as a female stereotype. This shows how roles are created firstly because of the needs of the narrative. While genders may traditionally take certain roles, if they are not available, the role is not cut, but is given to the more unexpected gender.

• These stereotypes are useful because both of these characters have the least amount of screen time and these stereotypes allow them to be defined very quickly.