Think of ten films that you have seen over the last few months or so.

1. Think of ten films that you have seen over the last few months or so. List them and categorise them by genre. How did you decide on your categories? Starter:

2. GENRE

3. Saussure and Barthes Strauss Sign systems – semiotics (semiology) Structuralism Iconic, Indexical and Symbolic signs Binary Opposites Denotation and Connotation Narrative Theory Genre Postmodernism

4. GLOSSARY • Genre: The term used for the classification of media texts into groups with similar characteristics. • Iconography: Those particular signs that we associate with particular genres, such as physical attributes and dress of the actors, the settings and the ‘tools of the trade’ (cars, guns, etc.).

5. TASK: www.imdb.com - helpful link!!! What type of stories do the films tell? Where are the films set? What type of characters appear in them? What particular actors and/or directors are associated with the films? Have they been involved with similar types of film before? What is the ‘look’ or iconography of the films? What music is used?

6. What are the defining conventions of a genre? • For a genre to become established, certain conventions need to become identifiable in the general consciousness of the audience. The following factors should be analysed to identify familiar conventions or aspects of innovation • narrative structure • themes • characters (protagonists, central, minor and stock characters) • locations • iconography • use of lighting and other stylistic elements • use of specific actors/directors • music • language codes • dress codes • camera angles/editing style. • For example, Baz Luhrmann's editing in Romeo and Juliet (1997) makes the audience aware within seconds that this is no run-of-the-mill period drama, despite the use of the original Shakespearean language.

8. Research Task: Using the internet research the codes and conventions of Action / Adventure films. Some more useful websites: http://www.filmsite.org/filmh.html http://www.hurtwoodmedia.com/phpnuke/html/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=125 http://longroadactionfilms.blogspot.com/ www.imdb.com http://www.northallertoncoll.org.uk/media/action.htm http://www.filmeducation.org/secondary/concept/filmandgenre/docs/frameset.html

9. Research Task: Using the internet research the codes and conventions of Action / Adventure films.

10. Genre as a Critical Tool • It is necessary to categorise films, TV programmes, etc, by genre to enable us to understand how a media text is made, to be able to identify patterns such as ‘whether a programme is gender-specific’ and to enable us to make our own media texts. Limited: by new ideas, subversion. Sub-genre – e.g., in Horror: ‘The Village’ or Aliens.

11. Summary • Genres function according to sets of rules and conventions, which govern their capacity and range. They respond to these rules and conventions by developing formulas and patterns. Over time, these formulas and patterns may acquire not only typical, but even archetypal force, dominating ways of seeing, and of representing, the world about us. • Genre study analyses the systems of convention whereby genres establish recognisable patterns of repetition. It also, importantly, aims to understand that genres are not simply 'closed', but partly 'open' systems, which need to stay the same in order to survive, and also, for precisely the same reason, need to retain the possibility of change and innovation. • Genres have patterns of fixity, as well as patterns of change.