Amy's Aice Media Blog: November 2020

What is Representation

Representation in Media is how groups of people and things are portrayed in a specific way to the audience. This has become a very serious and large problem that is just now being recognized and considered. It mostly affects the minorities and portrays them in a negative way or not at all to the audience, which leads to their views being altered in a bad and inaccurate way. Now, new groups are being considered for roles in media, giving them a more positive representation.

Ad 1:H&M

In the H&M ad, multiple races, genders, sexualities, body types, ages, and communities are shown. This ad portrays everyone in a positive and accepting way, letting people know they can dress however they wish to without being judged. This doesn't represent the stereotypes associated with our society, like men can't wear pink or skirts and women can't wear blue or suits. Everyone's fashion style is accepted and respected with society. They inform the audience "there is no rules in fashion but one: to recycle your clothes." The audience feels comfortable wearing whatever makes them happy and wants to recycle their clothes so others can represent themselves as well.

Ad 2:Axe body spray

The commercial for the axe body spray shows women in a horrible representation. The women are dressed only wearing bikinis and they run through the forest like wild animals who smell their next meal. There is a large majority shown in this commercial, which is white women. Throughout the entire viewing there is only about two black women shown, implying black women aren't the typical "type" for a white male. The commercial is aimed towards a male target audience and because of that they use skinny, primarily white women to catch the viewer's attention and portray these women as animals when a male uses axe deodorant. The film also uses slow motion in some of the running scenes and by having women running in slow motion, the male is attracted to look at the women's body's half naked. Axe used one race and a specific body type to persuade the audience that women would run to them like animals if they used this product, portraying women in a very negative way.

Horror Research

The popular genre of horror contains many eerie, gory, freighting, and disgusting elements that are used to inflict fear on the audience for entertainment. Horror is usually shown by using villain's, monsters, or threats that society is facing at the time. Halloween time intrigues many to go watch horror movies because of the fearing thrill it provides to the viewers. Horror isn't for everyone, but those who watch it are guaranteed to be frightened.

Contents

The main aspect of horror is to provide fear to its audience. Horror movies can leave viewers frightened about things they didn't fear before. For example, after watching the movie IT, viewers were left fearing any sights of a clown and red balloon, when before they had no reaction to either.

Horror films usually have the victim's or protagonist's lives threatened by villains, monsters, threats in a society, animals, or dolls to grab the viewers sole from their body.

Another important content horror movies include is a surprise or shock. The viewers wouldn't get scared if they anticipated everything in a horror movie. By including a surprise, their mindsets are completely turned in a different direction, producing fear.

Suspense allows for a horror movie to build up the viewer's fear and make them question, leading to a surprise in the end. Suspense is used vastly in horror films because it builds up the viewer's fear enough to provide them with a fearing thrill by the end of the movie. An example of suspense is when it was used in Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock. Marion Crane is showering all by herself in silence when suddenly a black figure starts to approach the shower curtain that is separating them. The viewer feels confused and scared as to what is happening and what is going to occur in the near future.

Production Techniques

Horror movies use many different production techniques that focus on darker visual and auditory elements. Uplighting, harsh lighting, and spotlighting lighting are all used in a lot of films to create harsh shadows and contrast to the subject. Different colors of lighting such as red and green are also used in movies like Saw, to establish a certain mood for the audience to endure.

Auditory is another category of techniques horror films use to establish a dark and spooky mood. Using sudden sounds like a door slamming or a floor creaking catches the audience off-guard, usually then followed by a jump scare. Faster paced music and sounds are used for intense moments like a victim running away from a killer, to increase the audience's' heart rates.

How is Horror Marketed

Horror films are aimed at viewers from ages 15-25. Young adults seem to gravitate towards horror films because they enjoy the thrill they receive from watching them. A younger audience is more likely to enjoy a horror film then an adult audience would. The majority of the viewers are males because gore and violence is more entertaining to the male gender then the female, although both genders watch horror films.

Horror films are marketed through trailers and posters. Trailers consist of teasing, giving hints that would intrigue the viewer, and building up a mystery. Most horror movie trailers include: strobe lights, sudden high pitch sounds , jump scares, low voice overs, and repeating sound effects, like The Dare by Giles Alderson. Posters advertising horror movies attract people by using visuals of the main character showing their emotion, either a villain or a victim. The posters have a darker toned background to create contrast between the main character and to create an impactful visual that engages the eyes of people.

Samples

Sample 1: Jaws

The movie Jaws directed by Steven Spielberg begins with a young women getting killed by something beneath the water when she goes out in the ocean skinny-dipping. The chief and mayor keep the shark attack discreet because it wasn't confirmed until there were more victims killed infront of the public. They hire someone and all head out on a boat to find and kill the shark. To their amaze the shark was ginormous and unlike any shark they have seen before. The shark was referred to as Jaws due to his size and power. After eating one of the men on the boat, the chief kicks an air tank in the sharks mouth and then shoots the tank to cause an explosion, which kills Jaws. This movie uses an extremely dangerous animal and doubles its size to create a monster. There are a lot of jump scares in the movie that are accompanied by a slow paced sound that gradually gets faster when Jaws is about to kill to add suspense. Many moments in the film include screaming, sudden fast movements, and blood, all contributing to inflict fear. Jaws made the audience fear sharks, when most didn't before. The visual for this movie illustrates the true size of the shark compared to the human it is lurking above.

Sample 2:Blumhouse's Truth or dare

A group of friends take a trip to Mexico and are then all lured by a man to an abandoned church where he suggest to play truth or dare. The curse of the game is then put on them and they have to do whatever the game says or they die. The characters then take turns doing dares that leads most to their death. This film uses a disturbing face morph when the players are asked truth or dare. This also adds a lot of suspense because all the players are normal at first and then their voice and face morphs when asking the question to another player. When a player doesn't do a dare in time or choose truth, they commit suicide in a disguising and horrific way, consisting of a large amount of blood. There are many times of sudden sounds and movements when the players are possessed. The audience is always in question to when a player will be asked and the timing of their death. This movie took a seamlessly safe game that most people have played before and turned it into a death game filled with jump scares and disturbing visuals.

Other Horror Movie Examples

A Quiet Place(2018)