Long tail theory

My understanding of the Long tail theory is how the big budget films are being shown in popular cinemas like cineworld which don't have enough space to show other films with a lower budget. This results in them making very little money commercially and how distort the figures are in revenue from films today. It also shows how the internet today has unlimited space to show films which benefits the viewer.


Inception:

Budget:

 $160,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

 $62,785,337 (USA) (18 July 2010) (3792 Screens)

Gross:

 $292,568,851 (USA) (2 January 2011)

Blair witch project:

Budget:

 $60,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

 $29,207,381 (USA) (1 August 1999) (1101 Screens) (wide release)

Gross:

 $140,530,114 (USA) (7 November 1999)



Here is a clip of the longtail theory explained in full:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-hS9pZ-0oY 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Yku0GTrcuw

  

homework

Technology has changed overtime and it has given a new insight and opportunity to both create and change identities etc. the film catfish shows the women created a facebook account using information about a young model when infact she was totally different, this shows that media technology can affect identity. e.g someone shy can act really confident via facebook/bebo etc. normal identities are being changed by the use of media like facebook and people are becoming fake and changing due to facebook etc. Facebook can help people overcome confidence barriers and communicate with people they otherwise would not, however it can negatively affect people with the fake accounts etc.   

"How far does the representation of a particular social group change over time?"

The representation of British families have changed dramatically over the last 40 years. This is backed up by Marcuse's theory that the mass media carry the representation of how we interpret youths to be like. For example, in An Education Jenny has to ask her parents for approval when wanting to do any activity. This is shown in the scene where she has to beg her dad to let her go to the opera with another bloke. On the other hand, in the Inbetweeners the respect and attitude towards elders and parents is a complete contrast. This is backed up in the scene where Simon is in the his bedroom with Tara and his Dad walks in. Simon immediately swear at his father demanding him to leave promptly whilst using very little manners in the process. By this being shown by media this proves the theory of Marcuse that people stereotype youth through mass media without knowing them personally. In conclusion I believe that mass media has helped change this representation of youth families as people watching the shows will make a prejudice judgement towards youth through media and youths will feel this behaviour is acceptable as it is shown to be the norm through media projects e.g Inbetweeners.   

• Add more detailed analysis about the examples

review of past paper

This person analysis a lot but could go into more depth. They also use good examples. They also repeat a lot of terminology and most of it makes little sense.
Terminology- 6 (level 3)
Example- 16 (level 4)
Analysis- 17 (level 4)

What impact could your Case Study have?
Some teenagers could be offended  by some of the derogatory terms used, especially to do with homophobic insults. Being gay is portrayed as a bad thing, for example many jokes are made about Neil's Dad.  This means that  people who aren't gay may think its acceptable to use these insults. Gay people however may be scared to show their sexuality. A lot of the episodes focus on the characters loosing their virginity, this could make a teenage audience feel pressured.

Do you think the images should be censored?
We don't think the images should be censored because everything is shown in a comical way. There are no really serious issues such as drug taking or violence. Anything that does happen is often fairly censored anyway. Most teenagers are familiar with the themes in The Inbetweeners.

How far do you agree that the Case Study can change someones behaviour?
The programme could change the way some people view sex and change their morals. They may think it is acceptable to behave the way the characters do. People could pick up on some of the jokes and use them in everyday life.


Do you think films/TV should be banned?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grotesque_(2009_film)

The film Grotesque was banned in 2009 for explicit sexual torture.
With these explicit films we think there should be strict ID regulations. People should know what the films are about and a new rating should be made to show they contain extreme violence, sexual torture ect.

Exam Prompts for Collective Identity

3- What are the social implications of different media representations of groups?

-Fish tank
-Inbetweeners
-An education
-Correnation street (no representation of ethnic groups in the 70s, More of a classic white society and Eastenders sows a more generalized view of the type of people in Britain)

Encourages social groups to act like the movies do, e.g. when the little kid is smoking and drinking in fish tank.
The image Fish tanks shows of Britain is a broken world where teenagers are corrupted by greed and drugs and alcohol, a lack of a father figure could be the causes of the family dysfunction, as well as rebellious children attitude. The incapability from the mother to look after her children is shown by the fact that she is at the pub at every opportunity and that she cares more about her social life then her children.
This films collective identity is a negative view on the modern lower class of british society, the kids run wild and the parents seem to not even care. People Who are not from Britain would stereotype British people in this negative way.

Inbetweeners is based mainly around a middle class public school, the implications of this film are much different to the implications in fish tank, The students are more smartly dressed and have much nicer homes then the flats you see in Fish tank, out this still shows Britain in a bad light because the actors in it are rude, this is also more of a comic view of Britain rather then a serious view that you would find in Inbetweeners and An education.

Blog Task

1. Are there any cultural or fashion movemnet taking places in Britain now, that you think would be strong enough to form a collective identity.

Currently there are a number of cultural and fashion movement taking places in Britain for example Emos and Goths who wear black clothes, black or very dark hair, where make up and eye shadow even males and in general everything about the way the choose to show to others is very dark. Also young people mainly males in London choose to be in a gang and wear iconic clothes such as baseball hats, hoodys and sneakers/ trainers.    


2. Argue ways that you could relate each theorists argument to one of our case study. 

A scene from kidulthood when Trevor, moony and jay get started on in ally way at the back of oxford street and one of them pulls out a knife to defend him self. this action can reflect on a lot of kidulthood viewers and also the way they talk and dress. many young viewers can relate to the situation and behave in the same way after seeing the film.   

the music in kidulthood is mainly hip hop, grime and gangster rap, which is very violent, sexual and discriminative towards surtan

Fish Tank.

1) Initially do you think Mia sees Connor as a father figure?

I think that Conner is a father figure for Mia, his is because he helps her with her problems, gives her money, talks to her in a nice way and also looks after her for example when her foot started to bleed and he put a bandage on the foot. 

2) What does the film make you think about the current state of British families?

Over all i think that the film doesn't show how all of the families behave. However I think that a lot of British families are in this current state, especially the ones who live on council estates.

3) Now you have seen the film, have your opinions of the characters changed?

review of fish tank

In this film, Andrea Arnold has demonstrated her mastery and fluency in the social-realist idiom, and simply makes it fizz with life. Having now watched Fish Tank a second time, I am more exhilarated than ever by Arnold's idealism, and in a movie marketplace where so much is vapidly cynical, this is a mistral of fresh air. Arnold finds a way into the fashionable notion of a "Broken Britain", but in place of the pundits' dismay and contempt, she offers tenderness and hope. If Ken Loach were ever somehow called on constitutionally to nominate a successor, it would surely have to be Arnold. She's got the grit; she has Loach's humanism and optimism and she has a happy knack of getting great performances out of her cast, particularly from Michael Fassbender, who proves that he's not just sex on a stick – he's complexity and vulnerability on a stick as well. Added to this, Arnold and her cinematographer, Robbie Ryan, conjure some glorious, almost Turner-ish images of the Essex countryside, with its racing summer skies.

1. Fish Tank
2. Production year: 2009
3. Country: UK
4. Cert (UK): 15
5. Runtime: 124 mins
6. Directors: Andrea Arnold, Andrea Arnold
7. Cast: Harry Treadaway, Jason Maza, Katie Jarvis, Kierston Wareing, Michael Fassbender, Rebecca Griffiths
8. More on this film

At the centre of the story is newcomer Katie Jarvis, playing Mia, a tricky, lairy 15-year-old in trouble with the social services for breaking a girl's nose after a contretemps in one of the windswept municipal canyons lying between tower blocks. She has inherited from her mum, played by Kierston Wareing, a stroppy insecurity and a nascent fondness for the booze. The family dog is actually called Tennent's. Mia has a feisty younger sister, Tyler – a scene-stealer of a performance from Rebecca Griffiths – who is always winding Mia up with shrill threats to "tell on her". There is no dad in the picture. Mia has just one interest in life: urban dance, and she isn't too bad, but the moves she practises are moody, introverted and subdued, rather like the dancer herself.

Their torpid lives are disrupted when Mia's mother miraculously gets a new boyfriend, Connor: and Fassbender gives his best performance yet. Connor is funny, sexy, confident and utterly relaxed where everyone else appears clenched with resentment. Noticeably articulate, Connor appears to come from a marginally more middle-class world and he is also, tellingly, a breadwinner. Mia rifles through his wallet while he's upstairs with her mum and instead of immediately nicking the cash, she gazes fascinated at his payslips: a man who actually works for a living. How many of those has she ever met?

Without consciously realising it, Mia is hoping that Connor could be a father-figure, and both sisters are secretly thrilled when he takes them all out for a drive in the country, and shows them how he can catch a fish with his bare hands. While her mother and sister cringe on the riverbank, Mia wades out into the cold, slimy water to help him and Tyler squeaks: "Is it minging?"

No, it is not minging. It is sensual and exciting, an exotic experience such as Mia has never known. And it marks the decisive point at which Connor and Mia's relationship drifts past being that of a quasi-father and daughter. Connor even takes an interest in her dancing, and casually lends her his expensive camcorder to tape an audition for a local competition, trusting that he will get it back. "You dance like a black," he tells her, with studied, flirtatious insolence. "I mean it as a compliment."

Mia has an enormous, poignant capacity for love, but she has never received any, certainly not from a damaged mother, whose one moment of intimacy with her daughter comes when she ferociously tells Mia that she was thinking of having her aborted. So she has no idea how to express or manage love and it is her muddled, suspicious longing for the safety and comfort of a father's care that makes the situation so explosive. As for Connor, it is far from clear how much baggage he has: he moves in to Mia's mum's flat because he says his own mother has thrown him out and often has to take calls from his "mum", but what is really going on? It becomes all too clear that if Mia has her own issues about family, then so does Connor – whose secrets are shabbier and more poisonous than either Mia or her mother could have realised.

The situation heralds an unwatchably tense finale as Mia's adoration turns into anger and then a determination to survive, to outgrow her surroundings, and to forgive. Arnold shows us that what makes the relationship between Mia and Connor so transgressive is not their obvious sexual attraction but their quite genuine, if thwarted and delusional longing to be father and daughter.

Jarvis has given a wonderfully honest and open performance to be compared with David Bradley in Kes, or Émilie Dequenne in the Dardenne brothers' Rosetta. Her relationship with Fassbender is what gives the film its beating heart.

this review gives the audience an excitement to watch the film. The review praises the main character for her performance in the film, being an unknown actor she equipped herself very well. Also the review praises the director for the whole film saying she is renowned for getting the best out of her cast.