Friday, 27 February 2015

LO4: Task 5 - Legal and ethical of X-Men Origins Wolverine - Vlog 5 /w Script


Task 5 – Representation
The vlog prior to this; I talked about the marketing for X-Men Origins Wolverine and the way it was distributed to the consumers. In this final vlog, I will be talking about the ways that XMOW creates representations throughout the film. Representations also reflect ideologies and how people think through the media.

Representation
Representation is the way something is presented. Practically any subject can be represented in many ways. Media is currently the most common way of representing something; everything can be presented in a form i.e. gender, age, ethnicity, lifestyle/ideal lifestyle, class, communities, sub cultures and stereotypes.

Ideologies are created through the way media presents subjects such as stereotypes of how women are weaker than men; the only reason that an ideology exists is because women are more commonly portrayed to be weaker in media. Media often objectifies women and is represented as objects of sex and attraction (Mulvey 1975). The representation of men (Earp and Katz, 1999) as stated: ‘Equation of Masculinity with pathological control and violence’.

Media is a very large influence in current society and this is expressed in two different schools of thoughts:

- Hypodermic Syringe (Theodore Adornor, 1930’s) – The Hypodermic Syringe theory is where it is believed that the audience will take in everything they see in media quite literally and believe everything to be true. They just absorb the information and in a way, a more negative form of thinking.

- Uses and Gratification (Gauntlett) – The theory of Uses and Gratification is that people do not necessarily just absorb and believe the information but instead absorb and adapt around the information instead of literal thinking. Each person consumes media for their own purpose and gratification, mainly escapism.

Both of these schools of thought still follow the same principle in that the audience still absorbs the information. One well-known issue is using the information as a ‘copycat’. Copycats usually derive from moral panic in which a person or a group of people create an even bigger issue from a subject on media. An example of a copycat is a person committing a crime due to a game he/she has played and they believe that what they are doing is fine. Situations in XMOW can be quite impossible because of the nature of the movie and its futuristic themes. Sensationalism is an example of something that can cause moral panic; it is the process of creating an even bigger issue of something that already has a substantial amount of attention.

Legal and Ethical
With the internet existing, sharing is far easier than before. This also means that illegal downloading is a common occurrence. Illegal downloading is currently one of the main drawbacks for films since the digital transition and is one of the main parts that take away from profit. Illegal download however means that the film was successful enough to be gain attention for illegal downloading, although this isn’t necessarily true. Sales wise, illegal downloading and file sharing causes the majority of sales drop.

Copyright infringement is also quite an issue with media. Some forms of programs that use a peer to peer system is one cause of copyright infringement such as programs that use forms of ‘torrents’. There have been cases where the creators of these programs were filed a lawsuit against copyright infringement.  XMOW is no different to other forms of media as it is most likely that the film has also been downloaded illegally and/or shared publicly.

Media follows ethics like any other subject although it seems slightly more flexible in terms of being subtle. Topics with media such as journalism sometimes and more often than not, become overly sensationalised. However, entertainment media is different in terms of what ethics they follow and what they cannot do; they are given a rating depending on the type of content the film depicts. Subject of violence and sex and strong language can cause the age rating to go up even with the section of such subjects are small compared to the rest of the product.

Product placement is an increasingly noticed form of marketing tactic. Companies pay film productions to place a product of their choosing and is integrated into the film. This is to create attention indirectly as it is not necessarily the main focus of the film. However, it has a chance to create a lasting effect and can be used to remind the consumer of the product. Stereotypes are also another way for media to create representations that people remember easily. People tend to remember stereotypes more often as it creates influences in people’s perceptions.

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