2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our opening sequence used the typical conventions of a strong British Soldier. We needed to convey that he was emotionless, strong, demands respect and enforces power. We attempted to express these through the following:-

Scripting – We used the little dialogue that we have in our sequence to give the audience an insight into the characters personality and the way in which he runs things. We decided to show him bossing the less authoritative forensics around. We also showed the forensics to be very down to the point, speaking in official terms and only speaking when necessary, which shows that it is just a job to them and that they are lower down in the social hierarchy, unlike the soldier who speaks into his radio to another officer.

Costume – As the soldier is the main character in the opening, we needed to make sure that his costume made him instantly recognisable as a soldier. We achieved this by using a camouflaged outfit and boots. We also used costume to signify that the forensics are forensics by having them wear full overalls and masks.

Props – As with costume, we needed to make sure that the soldier is instantly recognisable as a soldier so we used the gun and the helmet to allow the audience to see straight away what he is.

Action - The shooting of the unknown person within 30 seconds of the opening by the soldier shows his lack of emotion and that he is quick to make decisions, 2 typical traits of soldiers in films.

Our sequence doesn’t really include many social groups as. However, as the main character is male, which is generally seen as strong and build for the role of a soldier. This was basically a necessity for our film to make sense as there is a universal image of soldiers and we needed to conform to this to make it obvious.