All forms of media have an incredibly strong power over people. The light that the media sheds on different people is then indicative of how they feel about hem. Uneducatede and sheltered people turn to televisoion and movies for a lot of their knowledge. Their opinions are also very easily formed and molded based on the images and stories they see because these are things they have no real life contact with. For example, imagine somebody who lives in the rural country farmland of America, with no contact to the Big City. When they watch the REAL WORLD: New York, their opinion would be formed solely on the television show.
Due to this strong powerful effect that media has on socieity, they have a responsibility to hold up that htey dont always keep up on. Characters in sitcoms, for example, play to the lowest common denominator and play into stereotypes, often. For example, a show that ticks me off is WILL AND GRACE, for the most clear exampl eof this problem. The f;amboyant characters represent the behavior of a small amount of homosexuals and plays into the strereotype poorly.
There are a number of films, that I really enjoy and consider my favorite movies. The reason for liking these films is hard to decipher and I am not completely sure, what it is about their themse or plots that I enjoy, so muich. The closest thing, I can relate to all of them is the way that they have the viewer rooting for a character to succeed, who is not a good-guy. A film that makes the viewer hope that a criminal IS, in fact, able to succeed through the bank heist and make out with hundreds of people's well-earned money is strong.
As young children we were taught in films to love the good-guuy and hate the bad-guy-who was always so horriblke and bad. The moviues that I enjoy, Blow, Casino and Goodfellas are all examples of films that antiquat you with the characters as the guys you suppoirt. The full turn-around is when you don't want them to be arrested by the bad-police! This is a total alteration of what our society teaches us.
The reason this is able to occur is becasue of how the movies are put together and how they introduce the characters. Both Blow and Goodfellas, begin with a story of the two main characters, George Junge (Blow) and Henry Hill (Goodfellas) , explaining how they got to where they are and will soon be. George Junge, tells us the story og how his family was always teetering on poverty and shows us the time he decided he would "do whatever he had to do to never be poor". Henry Hill, tells how "there was only one thing I ever wanted to be in life- a gangster" and then we see him growing up in the neighborhood dominated by the gangsters. The only guys who could do whatever they wanted and had money when others were poor.
With that background, the film almost justifies their behavior to deal in illegal bussiness to get by. With the proper explanation alsmost anything can be justified and weaseled out of. In film, a movie that makes you root for an evil violent character has acheived the ultimate success.
Everyday, millions of words are written that represent the day's news stories. These stories are often times published and the world learns of their ocurances. The stories are put through a filter that decides what we get to see and hear about and what we are kept oblivious to. The filter is so strong at times in other countries that it is known as censorship.
Although, this might sound like some type of a conspiracy theory, the truth is, that what news stories get publicity and which do not is very political. A lot of people's lives and money go into the publication of different news stories over others. For example, the way that the entire, story of kidnapping developed and blew-up as a mainstream news stpory. The story of a young-rich-white girl from Utah that was abducted, exploded and reached mainstream news in a big way. At the same time, hundreds of young minoritoes are abducted by family members or kidnapped every year, and their stories get little to no attention from the media.
A similar story, came from the summer's great attention on shark attacks. The stories documented every single slight encounter humns had with sharks in America and turned it into a story of dire consequences and great attention. The images and headlines that adorned the covers of the New York Post and Daily News, heralded this the summer of the shark and that it was no longer safe to go in any waters! When the trusth of the matter, was that shark attack statistics had not risen, at all, that summer. The entire story, was just a well marketed and interesting liefds, to tell the people.
The reason things like this are capable of occuring is becasue of the attention and interest catching ways of the media. The large type fonts on the cover of inexpensive and unsophistacated sources often atttract and speak to the lowest common denominator of interests and care about selling their stories not reporting their facts.
This year in New Media class I had an exellent experience in all aspects of the class. The initial conversations about theory and the explanation of film was actually very interesting and helpful. Especially, the conversaton and explanation of how to film a conversation between two people. That type of conversation is what got my analyzing all of the film i saw on telelvision differently, as well as, movies.
In thinking about what to do for my main video, my mind began to draw a blank. i had no clue what to do that would be, "kool" as I knew it had to be. In fact, I couldnbt even think of a bad video to do. next, as a group, we began to mold bad ideas into good and refine poor conceptys into finer ones. This brainstorming method lended itself to be how I got to the final project that I had.
Another affect of the New Media course has had on me is how i look at film. My main interests and comments on a piece of moving footage have to do with the amount of light or the camera placement. When I watch a fast moving televison show like, ER, for example, i am amazed at the skill of the camera placement and how they work up to 5 characters into one shot as they surround a patient. Next, i consider a show like Real World, which has actually very poor camera shots, but another amazing quality. Whenever i think about why they've chosen such a shaky camera shot, I realize that its for a reason. Of the many days that they shoot, editors then cut it down to a 30 minute television program-plus commercials.
As Ms. Reed wuold watch our videos, she wuold often say, "too long" which prompted us to cut that scene down because it was-too long-thus boring. This forces you to think abou twhy things that dont progress the video or are not visually pleasing are even in the video at all.
The other day, Colby came over and we began to shoot some of the early shots of our project. The work began by picking out a place that we both thought would look good on film and was easy to work in. The spot was then looked at, to see if we would be able to replicate the same amount of light that it had at the moment for the next tiem that we would shoot. At the moment, the room was filled with bright sunlight-it loked very good. It was nice, but I was nervous that we wouldnt be able to reproduce it the next time we weer to film. Although, we could always just open up the apature, to allow in more light or less light the next tiem filemd, i thought it would be safer to jsut close the shades and turn on a safe lamp.
So, we began to shoot on the area that the fiming would take place without actually having a computer or a person there. From this we got to see the way that it would look. Next, we took just some simple, shots of my hands tapping away at the keys. We then started to work on different types of shots like opening the aperture up and jumping in and out.
In the end, we got a couple of hints at how we need to alter the filming. So, even if we use none of what we filmed we still learned what we still need to do.
I believe that we as humans are constantly assaulted by the media and advertising. Especially in New York City, and so much so that we are in effect desensatized by the mass of the advertising. Everyday when i wake up on my way to school there are millions of images that I am bombarded by and my mind is forced to take in and proccess. The media afectds me intensely becasue of the overall volume of it that i am subjected to.
Everyday, i watch TV, and when i watch TV, I am shown advertisemrnts and promos for other shows and the shows that i like have crossocer speacials with the other shows that i ahte. Soon enough i am tricked into or honestly intrigued by the shows that Iu previously disliked, or had minimal interest in. When my family from overseas come to America, they are shocked by the amount of commercials ort adverts as they call them adn that we truly have almsot nho real television programs on.
Another way that advertising affects me is by hitting close to home by taking a piece of my culture and portraying their product an esential piece of it. For example, the ad campaign featuring every top athlete in proffesional sports sweating dropletts of Gatordae is intoxicating to the mid. That makes one believe a link between performance at a proffesional level and drinking a colored water. Now, Gatorade is a staple in a young athletes life becasue of how cool they think it is and more than cool, nescessary to play sports. Water is now laughed at and undesired among teen athletes.
Another way that Sprite has tried to advertise in a way that infects the urban culture is that it has linked itself with hip-hop and rappers. Fans of hip-hop then repond greater to a product endorsed by an idol than a simply informational fact ad about the beverage. Soon ebough, they have blurred the line ebetween what is your culture and what you use becasue of who you are and why your using Sprite at all!
My favorite movie by far is Boiler Room by Ben Younger. He was a young director when he did the movie and the film features all young, up-andcoming, actors. The fim tells the story of a struggling young man trying to succeed financially by joining a stock brocker firm known as J.T Marlin. Teh firm is out in Long Island instead of down in Wall Street, the men are loud, obnoxious, rough nad tumb instead of proffesional. They strictly drive Ferraris and Porshes and party hard. The movie opens with the main character, Seth Davis played by, Giovanni Ribisi, driving out to get an interview at J.T Marlin. When he gets there, he is welcomed by Jim Young (Ben Afleck) a senior in the firm who tells him the real deal on what uis to come. "We arent here to save the fu**in' manatees here, if you want time off become a 2nd grade teacher, If you work at this firm you will make your fist million in under 6 years..."
The movie appeals to me and other young men for a number of reasons. One, is the lure of money and aflashy things. The first character that the viewers see who works at the firm drives up in a yellow Lambroghini and spends a couple thousand in a back-door casino. This is without a doubt appealing to young people who are intrigues by nice cars, clothes nad other flashy things. On the other hand, I showed the movie to a friend of mine and he was unintrigued. Although, i had seen the movie countless times before I still got excited by the opening qoutes. "I once heard that IBM has more millionare secretaries than any other comapny. They took stock option instead of Christmas bonuses and boom. It just blows my mind...Notorious BIG, once said "your either slingin crack rock or you got a killer jump shot", everybody wasnt to make the easy buck, so I did the white boy version of dealing-I became a stock broker.
The movie is also exciting because of the lighting and intensity that is shown. Inside what is known as the Boiler Room, or the high energy room where all the action takes place of cold calls, and selling. Inside the boiler room it is loud an wild. Teh lighting is all an icy blue and the youngest new recruits are crowded in with the smallest desks possible. The lighing when al lof the new recruits meet Jim Young for the first time is just as exciting. There is a dimly lit room with a lot of backlighting on Jim Young. He stands at the end of a long conference table surrounded by young eager men. He tells them "...anmybody who says that money is the root of all evil, doesnt fu**in' have any, look at the smile on my face; ear to ear baby".
Overall, the movie takes more turns, when drug use, violence, in a small bar fight and shady bussiness actions take part. the overall theme of excess is eciting and interesting to a young male audience. Teh trickery is envigorating and entertaining.
Over the past years, a craze of programming has hit the Western World's television screens. The number of shows that exist exposing "relaity" to viewers has skyrocketed and exapanded in recent years across all the cable channels. A form of shows that could previosly only be related to gameshows, now has expanded greatly to include very complicated shows of many different types. Although, there are a number of shows curretly on the air, there is one genre currently dominating more than any other-"relaity television". The shows are gross-out, competitive, booty yielding programms that reveal a great deal about the contestants. I believe that the sworm of recent "reality television" hold both positive, as well as, negative aspects to it.
A show that rewards contestants for lying and cheating sets a poor example for so many viewers. True human nature comes out and is fully exposed within the peramiters of a relaity TV program. Although, everyone in the world may have feelings of lying, cheating, stealing and hate towards other people, never in life are you absolutely foced to live with them. The circumstances, bring out the cruelest qualities in a person, as they battle for the ultimate prize. Another reason why these character traites being exposed is bad is that these are real people. Often in life, we imitate the way we see other people behave In a sitcom, a character who behaves cruelly can be regarded as bad writing or unrealistic, but in reality TV, thye contestants are in fact real people, just like the audience who are behaving poorly.
One aspect of the reality TV craze that is positive is the fact that it has made ce;lebritierds of everyday people, liekr ourselves. By creating a star that can be related to by viewers you take away the chaos around the fampoius actor and allow yourself to analyze the show and the situatons tha she gets the character into. For example, creating a celebrity of an "average Joe" construction worker who makes $19,000 a year in FOX's JOE MILLIONARE, is genius. In a time when the stars of 'Friends" make $250,000 an episode and celbrities are treated larger than life. "The Beatles are more famous than, Jesus Christ" said John Lennon of the world's celebrity obbsession and thew power that are girven to them. a celebrity that anyone can relate opens doors for many people to watch the shoew and iamgine temselves in the same position. This creaets a double show; one wher viewers are interested in what ahppens and a second one in their minds of what they would do if they weer pout into that same position.
Overall, the reality TV, craze is positive and negative, dep[ending on what microscpe it is looed at through. The chaos surrounding the actors and stars of our time is almost sickening and it is postive to take away anything from that. A bad aspect of the shows are that the true emotions and character of people are exposed.