Film & TV assessment learner response

1) Type up your feedback in full (you don't need to write the mark and grade if you want to keep this confidential).

WWW: Your answer for Chicken is excellent showing good understanding of the text and focus on the question.

TPF: In summary, timing is a major issue to focus on, revise postmodernism, add points and ideology to TV drama answer.2) Read the whole mark scheme for this assessment carefully. Identify at least one potential point that you missed out on for each question in the assessment (even if you got full marks for the question).

Question 1: 

• There are many examples of intertextuality: the main central image suggests a bridge between James Bond and Austin Powers (bond parody) with Tower Bridge in the background reinforcing London as a location

• The poster arguably provides a good example of pastiche: media products that imitate the style of another text, artist or time period. Although an argument can be made that Kingsman: The Secret Service is a parody (there are definitely suggestions of comedy) the poster as a whole asks to be taken seriously

• A range of different genres are suggested on the poster – e.g. the background is almost space (sci-fi); the silver symbol in the background alludes to comic books/Marvel universe; the woman on the left suggests martial arts or kung-fu movies

Question 3:

General points that support the assertion that representations in Capital and Deutschland 83 reflect the social and cultural context in which they were produced:All media production is conditioned by the dominant ideology, the value system and perceptions of reality

• All media production is conditioned by the dominant ideology, the value system and perceptions of reality
• The contexts of production are more important and influential than any intent of the ‘authors’ as it is impossible for the individual to transcend social and cultural contexts
• Television drama is powerfully influenced by dominant social and cultural attitudes to e.g. ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality

General points that argue against the assertion that representations in Capital and Deutschland 83 reflect the social and cultural context in which they were produced:

• All media products are constructions with only a partial link to reality, therefore social and cultural contexts are irrelevant
• Television drama draws on a long and enduring tradition of narrative and genre conventions; therefore drama itself as a form is much more significant than the social and cultural contexts of any individual production

3) The first question demanded a response using postmodern terminology. Write a definition here of the three main terms:

Bricolage: The juxtaposing of old and new texts, images, ideas and narratives to create new meanings.

Pastiche: This refers to media products that imitate the style of another text, artist or time period. Pastiche is an example of intertextuality and takes a positive view of the original source.

In contrast parody is similar but ridicules the original source (e.g. Scary Movie parodies horror).

Intertextuality: Intertextuality is when one media text references another media text – through genre, conventions, mise-en-scene or specific cultural references.

4) The second question was on the film industry. Write down two points from the mark scheme about Chicken's promotion and distribution that you didn't include in your answer. 

• Construction of the Chicken branding on the poster/DVD packaging etc. effective in communicating the genre and key selling points of the film – arthouse, social realism, beautiful cinematography, theme of nature etc.

• Chicken successfully used the film festival circuit to gather critical acclaim and build up positive publicity for the film. Film festival awards included Edinburgh, Busan, New Hampshire, Palm Beach and Julien.

5) Look over your mark, teacher comments and the mark scheme for Question 3 - the 25 mark essay question on your TV Close-Study Products. Write a complete essay plan for this question based on the suggested answers in the mark scheme. You can either use something similar to your actual answer or alternatively start from scratch. Make sure it is an extensive, detailed plan focused on the question (representations) and offering specific references to Capital and Deutschland 83 for each section. Try and cover the two texts equally if you can and aim to plan around 5-6 paragraphs in total.