PAPER 1 Section B exam questions

a) What is meant by a mainstream film ? [2]

A mainstream film is a film which is made by a major film company and costs a lot.

 b) Briefly explain what a media conglomerate is. [2]

A company that owns numerous companies involved in mass media enterprises.

 c) Explain two features of independent film production. Refer briefly to  I, Daniel Blake to support your   points. [6]

One feature of an independent film is that they have a low budget and aren't supported by any major film studios for funding, their production value is low like the least amount locations and not expensive actors. Another feature is that they get many small film studios to help fund for the film because they are small studios that don't have much money so they have to ask multiple studios until they get their budget, using other small studios to fund keeps the film independent as its not helped by a major film studio.

 In Question 3(d) you will be rewarded for drawing together knowledge and understanding from across your full course of study, including different areas of the theoretical framework and media contexts.

 d) Explain how economic contexts shape mainstream films. Refer to Black Panther  to support your points. [15]

Economic contexts will always shape mainstream films and these are a few points on why. First of all, funding is one of the economic contexts that will change any film as if an independent industry was making a film, it is harder for them to be funded as they don have a good reputation or popular enough to be funded. On the other hand, Black Panther is made from a major film industry so it is easier to be funded as Marvel is known for successful films and are very popular for their superhero franchise compared to other independent industries and its a problem in the film industry where Marvel are dominating the industry with all these successful films whereas independent industries struggle to be funded. This is linking to ownership, how a film is good or not depending on who made it, usually mainstream industries are more successful on their films as there more popular. Just like Black Panther, it was successful mostly because of the reason it was made by Marvel however, Marvel's reputation has gone up as they are owned by Disney who are also very popular. Disney are really trying to maximise their audience with using vertical and horizontal integration meaning that they own similar companies like Disney but they also own other variety of companies that aren't so similar but is a very good way at becoming very popular, this helped Black Panther on its success as it expanded the variety of viewers of the film. This is supported by David Hesmondhalgh's theory that the largest companies or conglomerates now operate across a number of different cultural industries to maximise their audience.

Research - Magazine

I have chosen to analyse the magazine TV times as they are similar to my made up magazine called 'Context', they are known for their access to television actors and their programmes. On the front cover of TV Times, they usually have the main character or multiple characters from the show that they are talking about, like this:

I believe these are characters from Emmerdale and they use close up shots to show clearly who it is so fans of Emmerdale know immediately that it is Emmerdale. It's the same for other shows as well where they use close up shots of the actors or people in a show for their front cover to easily tell people what the majority of the magazine is about without having to read anything yet. On their front cover, red is used for the most important things like their logo "TV Times" and below which says "40 BIG autumn shows", red is a clear colour contrasting with the rest of the magazine, red is also used for a little box where it says "Exclusive preview" with yellow writing which contrasts well also. Behind the red sub title at the bottom is pictures linking to the subtitle to show a few of the 40 shows. However not all of TV Times magazines have multiple topics on the front cover, some of them have only one show and only talk about one show which is what I'm doing with my magazine front cover. 

TV Times is a British television listings magazine published by TI Media and it was first published in 1955. They have a subscription process where you can pick a subscription type and have them delivered to you.  TV Times is advertised on TV on advert breaks, on radio and websites. 

Magazine Front Cover

Black Panther as a Mainstream Film

Black Panther is poised to prove to Hollywood that African-American narratives have the power to generate profits from all audiences. And, more important, that making movies about black lives is part of showing that they matter. Black Panther has numerous genres of Action, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Superhero and Adventure. After the death of his father, T'Challa returns home to the African nation of Wakanda to take his rightful place as king. When a powerful enemy suddenly reappears, T'Challa's mettle as king and as Black Panther gets tested when he's drawn into a conflict that puts the fate off Wakanda and the entire world at risk. Faced with treachery and danger, the young king must rally his allies and release the full power of Black Panther to defeat his foes and secure the safety of his people. The main stars of the film is Chadwick Boseman, Michael B Jordan, Daniel Kaluuya and more, Black Panther drew the most diverse North American audience ever for a superhero film according to ComScore. African Americans made up the largest share of the audience, or 37 percent, followed by Caucasians (35 percent), Hispanics (18 percent), Asians (5 percent) and Native American/Other (5 percent). Black Panther is part of the Marvel franchise and does link to other Marvel films however it can work as a stand alone film. The two producers are Kevin Feige and David J Grant, Kevin Feige has been working with Marvel since 2008 and has basically produced every Marvel film and other ones too, David J Grant has been with Marvel since 2011 and has produced most of the films. Produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, it is the 18th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Black Panther had a budget of $200 million and made $1.3 billion worldwide. Black Panther was created with the help of Marvel comics where Black Panther appeared in one of the Fantastic Four comics however Marvel wanted to introduce Black Panther into their MCU first before re-acting the moments from the 1966 comics. Part of this success can be attributed to focussed cultural marketing. Kendrick Lamar was tapped to curate the film’s soundtrack, which included work from Lamar himself and a number of collaborators. Marvel and Disney also sought to advertise trailers for the film during television broadcasts of sports that have a strong African American following. There was even a Black Panther themed fashion show during New York Fashion Week which sought to make a positive impact ‘Welcome to Wakanda’ brought together noted fashion designers with proceeds helping Save The Children. Black Panther had its world premiere at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on January 29, 2018. Black Panther was released in the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, and Taiwan on February 13, in South Korea on February 14, and the United States on February 16. In the United States, the film opened in 4,020 theaters, with over 3,200 of those in 3D, 404 in IMAX, over 660 in premium large format, and over 200 D-Box locations. The film opened in most markets in its first weekend of release including a "cross-nation release" in Africa, a first for a Disney film. Black Panther grossed $700.1 million in the United States and Canada, and $646.9 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $1.347 billion. It became the highest-grossing solo superhero film, the third-highest-grossing film of the MCU and superhero film overall, the ninth-highest-grossing film of all time, and the highest-grossing film by a black director. At the end of Black Panther, there is an end credit scene with the winter soldier to show that he is still alive which is linking to other Marvel films that he is going to be in the other films, which he was in Avengers Infinity War and Endgame. On Marvels shop, they have lots of Black Panther march like Black Panther suit pyjamas/shirts and Black Panther gloves or stuff like Bottles and mugs. 

Research - Mockumentary

A mockumentary or docucomedy is a type of movie or television show depicting fictional events but presented as a documentary. These productions are often used to analyse or comment on current events and issues by using a fictional setting, or to parody the documentary form itself. 

One of the most popular mockumentaries is The Office, The Office is a mockumentary sitcom that was first made in the United Kingdom and subsequently remade in many other countries. The original British series The Office was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. Starring Gervais as the boss and main character of the show, the first broadcast was on BBC Two in 2001 and ran for 14 episodes. This mockumentary follows the everyday lives of the manager and the employees he "manages." The crew follows the employees around 24/7 and captures their quite humorous and bizarre encounters as they will do what it takes to keep the company thriving.

Mockumentary aren't only on tv shows, there is a film called Borat! which is about a Kazakh resident called Borat travels to the USA to make a documentary on the country. While on his mission, he learns that the USA is the same as his own country in many ways.  Borat! is a 2006  comedy film directed by Larry Charles and co-written and produced by Sacha Baron Cohen. Baron Cohen stars as Borat Sagdiyev, a fictitious Kazakh journalist who travels through the United States to make a documentary which features real-life interactions with Americans.

Statement Of Aims

My audio visual is a mockumentary called Bigfoot, it is like the normal documentaries about Bigfoot but with a twist, where Bigfoot is actually a person. The locations that I will be using are the woods for the first part to make it look like a normal documentary and then use public areas after finding out that Bigfoot is just a person. I will be using a variety of shots that suit the specific scene like wide shots in the woods or upper body shots in the public areas. In some mockumentaries, they use poor camera movement to make it look like what is currently happening seems real instead of having clean camera movements which makes it feel like a film and feels fake. So, to make my mockumentary look real, I will use some bad camera shots and movements so it feels unprofessional and more real, in addition, the characters in the mockumentary will wear their casual clothes and not pre planned clothing so it helps the feeling of being real. I believe that Levi-Strauss's theory of binary opposites helping forward the narrative relates to my mockumentary however Bigfoot and human isn't complete binary opposites but I think it is a big enough of a difference to help develop the story. Bigfoot is mostly focused towards the age group between 18-24 as  their age group usually have watched a real documentary about Bigfoot so watching this will be more funny compared to other age groups that haven't watched a Bigfoot documentary before. It is supposed to be silly with dry humour which I think will be most entertaining for my targeted age group as younger and older audiences probably don’t watch mockumentaries.

My magazine is called Context and the front cover will have a bold title in white and masthead in yellow at the top in sans serif font to contrast well with each other. For the main picture of the magazine, I was initially going to have the official poster of Bigfoot which is a human footprint which has many messages behind it however usual magazines has a picture of person relating to the main topic of the magazine. So instead now I am going to have a picture of an upper body shot of me, it will have quotes around my head about Bigfoot, it will also say that I made the new mockumentary, what show it is on and what page it is on to read more. At the bottom half of the front cover will be smaller tv and film topics and what pages they are on so they can see more about them. There will be a cover price and barcode in the bottom left corner as they aren't really important and don't need to take up too much space. The front cover is still focused on the age group of 18-24 as the front cover is mainly about my mockumentary which is specifically for 18-24's but also the smaller topics on the front cover are topics that 18-24 yr olds would be interested in as well.

On the left page of the double page article will have a sans serif headline. The first paragraph will start off with the date and what channel the mockumentary is on and then a very brief explanation of the topics, characters and narrative. The second paragraph will be a behind the scenes feature where it has answers of the presenter from an interview, the answers will give an exclusive view of how the mockumentary was made and how difficult it was to make. The two paragraphs will be layout next to two pictures of a scene from the mockumentary. The other page will have the official Bigfoot poster filling up the whole page and at the top will have the title “Bigfoot” which is in the middle of the two pages. The double page article will give my targeted audience an exclusive view onto my mockumentary, the way the page is laid out is suitable for 18-24 because, a more messy layout with little text would be for younger audiences and a very formal layout with lots of writing is usually for older audiences so mine is in the middle so its right for 18-24 yr olds. 

Black Panther

Black Panther is a very successful film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the reasons are that it is the first black superhero film released from Marvel and can relate to Black Lives Matter. Also, at the end of Captain America Civil War (2016), the character Black Panther was revealed to have a film and Marvel fan's were anticipated for him and couldn't wait for his own film. Black Panther fits into the Marvel franchise as it continues the superhero genre and develops the MCU story as Black Panther's film linked to the film Avengers Infinity War (2018). All the previous points are the reason why Black Panther is so successful.

The Harlem Renaissance was an intellectual, social, and artistic explosion centered in Harlem, Manhattan, New York City, spanning the 1920s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after The New Negro, a 1925 anthology edited by Alain Locke. The movement also included the new African-American cultural expressions across the urban areas in the Northeast and Midwest United States affected by the Great Migration, of which Harlem was the largest.

The Black Panther Party (BPP), originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, was a revolutionary socialist political organisation founded by Marxist college students Bobby Seale (Chairman) and Huey Newton (Minister of Defence) in October 1966 in Oakland, California. The party was active in the United States from 1966 until 1982, with chapters in numerous major cities, and international chapters in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s, and in Algeria from 1969 to 1972 

Afrofuturism is a cultural aesthetic, philosophy of science and philosophy of history that explores the developing intersection of African diaspora culture with technology. It was coined by Mark Dery in 1993 and explored in the late 1990s through conversations led by Alondra Nelson.

#OscarsSoWhite is a hashtag used to call out the lack of diversity—especially people of color but also women and the LGBTQ community—in nominations for the Academy Awards, or Oscars. It has expanded as a call for greater inclusion of marginalized groups in all aspects of the film industry.

Video Game Timeline

Video Game Timeline

1st Generation 

1967: The Brown Box was the first commercial home video game console to be developed  which was made by a small team with a few games built in the console already.

1972: The Brown Box is now known as The Magnavox Odyssey and is finally released and sold 330,000 units in its lifetime. Also the first ever arcade video game was released, Pong is a table tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics, manufactured by Atari.

1974: The first racing arcade video game was Gran Trak 10. Maze Wars was another arcade game and was the first ever first person shooter.

1976: Atari releases Breakout, it was designed by the apple co-founders. BlackBerry has their own variant called Brick Breaker.

1977: Atari releases a video game computer system called Atari 2600, it was the most most successful video game console during its period. Atari also opens the first pizza theatre (later Chuck-e Cheese) a video arcade pizzeria. Nintendo releases Color TV Game 6 which has 6 variants of light tennis (pong)