Doing a voiceover wouldn't give me as much control over my answers as I would like, so I concluded that I should answer this as a post.
1. How do your products use or challenge conventions and how do they represent social groups or issues?
Conventions
Instead of challenging conventions, I decided to use them to my advantage. This would allow me to have a better understanding of the codes and conventions since I could research on them further due to the wide variety and availability of data and explanation as well as tutorials on the internet.
My product is a Short Film, and the conventional use of a Short Film is to convey a meaningful narrative, a message or raise awareness for something.
Keeping that in mind, I decided to build a narrative around the issue of negligence, abuse, and bullying that arise in the contemporary society.
I initially thought of covering the three main typed of Bullying:
Mental
Verbal
Physical
And then I would evaluate if my narrative could afford to cover all three types.
My genre is drama, and it uses emotional music, closeup shots to show expressions and emotions, and, generally, a slow-paced development. I incorporated these in my Short Film as well:
The movie opens with a message that tells the viewer to let someone know if they are suffering, this is without music so that it implies the seriousness and asks for the attention of the viewer, subconsciously. This is a very important message and so is conveyed in a similar way:
The music fades in after this message with the production company logo, and other credits which lets the audience know that the movie has begun:
The intro for the movie plays, which displays the name of the movie, 'Reciprocate' and a slogan "behaviors are learnt" which hints towards the narrative of the movie, so do the dominoes falling. These three elements combined together create a strong introduction for the movie:
An establishing shot then follows which shows a teenaged guy sitting and playing in his house, and his brother comes and asks him. This scene sets the tone of the narrative, that the story is about two brothers at their home:
After a while (shown by the cross dissolve to black), the younger brother comes back and asks to play again. The elder brother pushes him back while ending the insult with "you suck at the game anyways". This establishes that the younger brother is being verbally and physically bullied at home by someone he would look up to, someone he expects to be his protection:
The next scene shows the room, Kumai tries again to join Brohi, but he very rudely brushes Kumail off, indicating that he doesn't welcome Kumail in anything:
The next scene shows Kumail crying in the balcony, alone. This is a very powerful scene, this scene shows how Kumail lacks any support at home, and this also proves the fact that he is mentally abused as he cries thinking about what has happened and they affect him emotionally:
The scene then dissolves to Director's credits which established that the pilot part of the movie is over:
The next scene is Kumail dressed up as a goon, with spiked gloves and the same clothes he would wear at home:
He bumps into Rohail, but keeps walking as if nothing happened even as Rohail falls, he doesn't even apologize:
When Rohail gets up to confront him, he beats him up:
This scene shows that he is very vulnerable at home, the very place people consider a safe place and is constantly abused by people he would expect to protect him. This leads to him learning to be violent and unapologetic, which is depicted in the sequence.
The movie rewinds to the point where he asks Brohi if he can play, but this time Brohi is very affectionate and even gives him his game to play:
The same goes for when he asks Brohi if he can watch with him, and he very affectionately says that he can:
The last sequence shows the same area where Kumail bumps into Rohail, with the same thing being repeated, but instead of fighting with Rohail, Kumail sits down with him and checks for any injuries and even welcome him to his home, despite the fact that he is going out, he changes his route and comes back home and apologized to Rohail. This is because he had been treated fairly and compassionately at home:
The ending of the movie follows a Message-Quote type of ending,
The next screen has a message that holds true for most of us, it makes the audience think about the movie and how it affects themselves and people around them.
The movie ends with a quote that asks people to be the best versions of themselves, to be kind to each other:
Social Groups
The movie deals with the teenagers, although the issue is widespread amongst all the age groups, this movie depicts the teenage group because I felt it would be appropriate to cover the similar age group to myself as I have a better understanding of it than any other age group.
A very common issue we see and often times witness around us is bullying, the movie depicts the issue and tells how the behavior of people can affect and influence the personality of someone else.
The Social Group shown in my movie is a pair of brothers. This drives the narrative towards a household atmosphere and shows how some people are victims of their own beloved ones.
Technical, Written and Symbolic Codes:
The technical conventions I used in my movie are the use of camera and music.
Scenes such as these establish the place of the movie:
During the start of the movie, a slow, sad, piano music accompanies the scenes which create a very sorrowful atmosphere, and it gets very tense when Rohail and Kumail clash. However, the music changes to a happy version of the piano when the 3rd and 4th sequences start, telling the audience that this is a positive vibe.
A very clever use of music, in my opinion, is when 3rd sequence starts, the same tense music is used at the start which creates the same goon-like depiction of Kumail, but as he helps Rohail, the music changes back to happy.
One more very important use of music in my movie is to drive the continuity of the movie, I made sure there were as fewer breaks between the tracks as possible so it doesn't break the attention of the audience.
For my written codes, I used blank screens with messages on them, as well as a background video that accompanies the title of the video. The dominoes falling gives the message that some things are like ripples in water, they spread from one another, this is accompanied by the tagline 'behaviors are learnt'.
The symbolic codes are some of the most powerful ones.
The glove that Kumail wears hints towards his bad character, the ironic T-Shirt that he wears that say "Earn Respect" and to "Take a Stand" are phrases very opposite to his character, but the same phrases work for his character when he helps Rohail in the 4th Sequence.
The room scene shows the Brohi is very comfortable laid on his bed watching something on his laptop, and the room is not even organized properly. This shows the inner self of Brohi, a careless person that doesn't even have the ability to take care of himself, but in the 3rd Sequence that same person who doesn't care about his personal surroundings has the compassion to make his brother a part of whatever he enjoys, his 'personal space'.
Also, Kumail isn't seen wearing a cap in the 4th sequence, this shows that he takes the time out to put back his cap at home, change and be appropriate to the time (you don't wear caps at night) and takes interest in grooiming himsekf. He also doesn't wear the glove, because he is a good guy now.
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