Transcript Key Aspect: Categories

Teaching Argo for SQA Media
Rick Instrell
Deep Learning
[email protected]
Version 2.0
10 September 2013
Association for Media Education in Scotland
Integration of Key Aspects of Media Literacy
TEXTS
CATEGORIES
• purpose, medium, form, genre, tone
LANGUAGE
create
create UGC
• technical & cultural codes & their interaction; motivations
NARRATIVE
• organisation of content; structure, plot, narrative structure
INSTITUTION
use/decode
MEANING
REPRESENTATIONS
• ownership (commercial,
public service, alternative)
• stereotypes & non-stereotypes; dominant/oppositional
ideologies
• finance (budget, income
from sales, subscription,
advertising; license fee)
AUDIENCE
• target audience
• uses & pleasure
TECHNOLOGY
• personnel, deadlines,
resources
• technologies of
production,
distribution &
consumption
• controls (legal and
regulatory compliance,
market)
• differential decoding
(personality, gender, age,
class, ethnicity, interests,
nationality, )
• producers
CAPITAL
select
SOCIETY
• social, cultural, economic,
political events, lifestyles &
ideologies
influence
TIME
2
Marketing: Poster and DVD Cover
3
Marketing: Official Website
4
Marketing: CD Cover
Photograph of US hostages in 1979
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Marketing: Book Covers
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Key Aspect: Institution
Q. Who produced the film and how has this shaped the
film?
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Institution 1: Director - Ben Affleck
Ben Affleck: “Yes, I would say I'm a moderately liberal guy. I mean,
there are things that I agree with the Democratic Party Yes, I would
say I'm a moderately liberal guy. I mean, there are things that I agree
with the Democratic Party. There are things I don't. For example, I'm
not a big gun control guy. I believe in all the bill of rights, including
the Second Amendment. I'm not a party guy one way or another. I
don't believe in subscribing to that. I still believe in people more
than I believe in parties per se. But how I arrived at my beliefs, I was
born and grew up here [Boston]. And this is a obviously heavily
Democratic town, a big union town. Labor played a big part of that.
My father was a janitor. My mother was a public school teacher.”
8
Institution 2: Smokehouse
• Smokehouse Pictures is a
partnership between
George Clooney and Grant
Heslov
"...the liberal movement morally, you know, has stood on
the right side of an awful lot of issues. We thought that
blacks should be allowed to sit at the front of the bus and
women should be able to vote, McCarthy was wrong,
Vietnam was a mistake.”
George Clooney
Left-right: George Clooney,
actor/director Ben Affleck, Grant
Heslov
9
Institution 3: GK Films
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Produced by film production
company GK-Films
UK producer Graham King has
worked as producer on Martin
Scorsese’s Gangs of New York,
The Aviator and The Departed
Co-owner Tim Headington, a
Texas oilman worth $1.5 billion
Graham King
10
Institution 4: Warner Brothers
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•
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One of ‘big six’ film
production and distribution
companies (Columbia,
Warner Brothers, Walt
Disney, Universal, Twentieth
Century Fox, Paramount)
Warners subsidiary of TimeWarner
Make and distribute
mainstream multiplex movies
Argo Official Website
11
Institution 5: CIA
• Producers had the cooperation of
USA’s Central Intelligence Agency
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•
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Since 1947, CIA responsible for centralized intelligence
organization aimed at correlating, evaluating, and
disseminating information affecting national security
Information collected assists military, government, and
legislative leaders in decision-making
CIA is sanctioned only to work abroad
Covert operations have included paramilitary activities and
propaganda campaigns aimed at destabilizing and
influencing opposing regimes, even during peacetime
Covert operations need approval of the President
12
Institution 6: CIA OPA
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CIA’s Office of Public Affairs (OPA) has the responsibility of assisting
moviemakers, writers, and television producers
Began cooperating with Hollywood in the 1990s to help reverse its
image in film and television, since they usually depicted the CIA as a
rogue, immoral organisation with a penchant for assassination and
failure
Those who wish to use CIA resources or premises, understand they
must depict the Agency sympathetically
This leads to self-censorship, motivated by financial and creative
gains (rather than sheer ideological ones) and plays a role in the
shaping of motion picture content
Researchers who consult with the CIA are often given a
whitewashed version of its actions, where valid criticisms are
downplayed or even ignored.
Some scenes in Argo shot at CIA HQ which means that the CIA must
have given approval to a film which gives an essentially positive
image of the CIA
13
CIA’s Entertainment Industry Liaison
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Institution: Ratings
• rated by the MPAA as R for language and some violent
images
15
Key Aspect: Categories
Q. What kind of film is Argo?
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Key Aspect: Categories – Form/Genre
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American-made mainstream feature film 2h long
Budget $44.5m
Purposes: inform, entertain, make profit
Based on true story (based on Joshuah Bearman’s "Wired"
magazine article and "The Master of Disguise" by CIA
operative Antonio Mendez)
Events changed to make them more exciting
Generic hybrid
 Docudrama
 Spy movie
 Thriller
 Caper movie
 Comedy (satire on Hollywood)
17
Key Aspect: Categories – Genre 1
• Docudrama: blend of fact and fiction to dramatize
events and historic personages
• Documentary elements: opening 2 min montage giving
historic context; closing credits with photographs of
real persons alongside the actors playing them
• Dramatic elements: Story simplified to make it more
exciting:
 Most of tensest moments did not happen e.g.
•
•
•
Bazaar scene
CIA bosses trying to kill plan
Escape at airport (plan went off perfectly at 5 in the morning)
18
Key Aspect: Categories – Genre 2
• Spy movie: government agents on a covert mission
against enemies of the state
• Us (good) v Them (bad)
• ‘Them’ can be Nazis, Soviet Russia, Terrorists
• Sub-genres:




Fantasy
Spoof
Realistic
Critical (questions the activities of the work that
spies/states do on behalf of ‘us’)
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Key Aspect: Categories – Genre 3
• Thriller genre
• Q/A narrative with narrative resolution at the end
• Suspense is generated by audience anticipation of 2
possible outcomes:
1. Immoral but likely outcome
2. Moral but unlikely outcome
(Carroll, 1996)
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Key Aspect: Categories – Genre 4
• Caper movie
• Narrative: improbable task has to be completed by
mixture of ingenuity, deception, bravery, luck
• Structure of caper movies:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Challenging problem
Presentation of scheme
Planning and preparation
Carry out scheme
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Key Aspect: Categories – Genre 5
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Comedy satirising Hollywood
One-liners which sometimes demand a knowledge of the US
film industry
 Lester Siegel: “If I'm going to make a fake movie, it's
going to be a fake hit.”
 Lester Siegel: “You're worried about the Ayatollah? Try
the WGA.” (Writers Guild of America)
 Tony Mendez: “You really know Warren Beatty?”
Lester Siegel: “Yes, I do. I took a leak next to him at a
Golden Globes party once.”
 John Chambers: “Target audience will hate it.”
Tony Mendez: “Who's the target audience?”
John Chambers: “People with eyes
22
Key Aspect: Language
Q. How are images and audio used to
• tell the story
• express themes and conflicts
• engage the audience
• express different settings and situations?
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Key Aspect: Language 1
Different treatment for locations:
• Iran (actually Istanbul, Turkey): documentary grainy texture
to film stock ; shot with handheld camera to convey tension
and instability; some super 16mm and super 8mm film used
to suggest protesters’ own footage
• Iran (preparation scenes in house): handheld coverage with
2 cameras
• Hollywood, LA: used style of 1970s US film; camera placed
in uncomfortable position and zoomed in for coverage
• Washington: clean crisp image; constantly moving camera
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Key Aspect: Language 2
Scored by Alexandre Desplat
• Not wall-to-wall underscoring e.g. no music at start because
it is realistic (get full melody at end when the Americans
have escaped)
• Traditional Persian instruments in first half
• Also ‘wailing woman’ cliché
• Ostinato percussion used to anchor action scenes
• When piano and orchestra is used music is more American
and comforting (e.g. get full melody at end when the
Americans have escaped)
Also use of period source music e.g. Led Zeppelin’s When the
Levee Breaks
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Key Aspect: Language 3
Top Persian and Middle
Eastern musicians used for
soundtrack for non-US
settings:
• Sussan Deyhim: Persian
female vocalist (jazzy
scatting and lament)
• Dimitris Jimmy Mahlis:
Oud
• Kudsi Erguner: Ney flute
• Bijan Chemirani: Ethnic
Percussion
• Derya Turkan: Kemence
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Key Aspect: Narrative
Q. What is the narrative structure?
Q. What are the storylines?
Q. How does the plot seek to engage the audience?
Q. How do the storylines work out?
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Norms of Hollywood film
Bordwell and Thompson (2011) say most mainstream
Hollywood films obey five norms:
• Goal orientation: the main characters want something
• Double plotline: 2 lines of action one of which involves
romance
• Four-act structure: 4 acts of 25-35 min with 3 turning points
(set-up-complicating action- development-climax)
• Dangling causes: an unresolved action in one scene will be
pushed further in a later scene
• Deadlines: time pressure is often used to resolve plotlines
Q. To what extent does Argo conform to these norms?
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Four-act narrative structure
•
Film scholar Kristin Thompson says most mainstream
Hollywood films have a 4-act structure with 3 turning
points:
(prologue)
1. Setup
Turning point
2. Complicating action
Turning point
3. Development
Turning point
4. Climax
(epilogue)
N.B. Prologue
and/or epilogue
may be omitted
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Four-act Narrative Structure in Argo
•
Applying this to Argo (115 min): 4 acts of 20-36 min
Prologue (in title sequence)
1. Setup
Turning point 1 (22:22) Mendez figures out plan
2. Complicating action
Turning point 2 (42:36) Plan gets go ahead
3. Development
Turning point 3 (79:11) Mendez disobeys orders and goes
ahead
4. Climax
Epilogue (plus end-titles)
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Q/A Narrative 1
One of the main problems for the filmmaker is:
how does one scene link to the next?
Nöel Carroll argues that mainstream films are constructed
using a Q/A structure in which there are:
• Major questions (e.g. will the hero survive?)
• Minor questions (e.g. who is this new character?)
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Q/A Narrative 2
Seven types of scene in Q/A narrative:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Establishing scene: introduces setting, character, actions
Questioning scene: posing one or more questions
Answering scene: answering one or more questions
Sustaining scene: continues and intensifies earlier question
Incomplete answering scene: partial answer
Answering/questioning scene: one question answered
which immediately poses another question
7. Fulfilling scene: scene which shows what was predicted in
an earlier scene
If scene does not fit the above it is a digression.
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Q/A Narrative questions
1. What are the main questions which engage our interest
in the Argo narrative?
2. How is suspense generated? (moral unlikely outcome v.
immoral likely outcome)
3. What other questions engage our interest in the Argo
narrative?
4. Identify different types of scene in Argo (establishing,
Q, A, sustaining, incomplete A, A/Q, fulfilling,
digression)
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Narrative codes
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Enigmatic code: the use of Q/A to engage the viewer
Action code: e.g. rapid storytelling by showing easily
recognisable part of an action
Semic code: connotations of image elements and of
music e.g. Persian instruments connote Iran and
piano/orchestra connote the West
Symbolic code: the way that conflicts and themes are
symbolised e.g. opposition of East/West in music and
in images
Referential code: references to general knowledge e.g.
source music, fashion, hairstyles, CIA logo, images of
Ayatollah Khomeini, Hollywood sign
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Key Aspect: Representations
Q. How are people, places and events represented in
Argo? (what is selected and how is it portrayed?; what is
absent?)
Q. Explain these representations in terms of institutional,
audience and social context.
Exercise
Use the internet to investigate what Iranians (in Iran and in
the West) think about Argo.
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Representations of the CIA
Q. How has the CIA been represented in film and tv?
.
36
Representations of the CIA
• CIA represented in film and tv in five main ways:
• As an organisation which:
1. Is intent on assassination
2. comprises rogue operatives who act with little
oversight
3. fails to take care of its own officers and assets
4. operates on morally ambiguous and perhaps
morally reprehensible grounds
5. Is bedevilled by its own buffoonery and hopeless
disorganization.
(Jenkins, 2012)
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Why CIA Image so negative?
• Reflects a number of highly publicised cases where
covert operations were made public (‘bad news’ is
more memorable than ‘good news’)
• Left/liberal political leanings of writers, actors and
directors play a part
• Belief by many creators that CIA does not respect civil
liberties
• The demands of cinematic storytelling: much easier
to cast CIA as bad guys because audience is used to
the stereotype and such an image can be conveyed
quickly in film by phrases such as ‘rogue CIA officer’
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Representations of Iran/Iranians
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Stereotyping involves general beliefs that we use to
categorize people, objects, and events, while assuming
those beliefs are accurate generalizations of the whole
group
Iranians are portrayed as unreasonable, evil, inept,
backward, …
Images of bearded, hysterical, violent, bearded
Muslims/mullahs/extremists
Tends to conflate Iranians/Arabs/Muslims and conflate
mainstream Islam with militant Islam
Ignores the fact that Iranians speak Farsi not Arabic
Ignores the facts that many Arabs/Iranians are not
Muslims
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Dominant Ideology
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Studies of representation of Muslims in the media identify the use
of a restricted set of recurring visual images (e.g. violent mobs
burning US flag) as well as loaded terms (‘Islamic extremism’,
‘Muslim fundamentalism’, ‘Islamic terrorism’)
This suggests that extremism is a feature of all Muslims
This stereotyping in news and features, in political speeches and
everyday life supports the ideas that:
 Islam is a threat to the West
 Muslims are deviant, irrational, violent
 Islam is antiquated
 All Muslims are the same
Acceptance of such ideologies may lead to a general public
acceptance of torture, drone killings, covert operations, oppressive
legislation, etc.
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Audience: Mainstream
Argo grosses (as at 10 September 2013)
• Domestic $136m (59% of worldwide total)
• Foreign $96m (41% of worldwide total)
• Total $232m
Domestic DVD sales $19.4m (over 1.2m units)
Grosses suggests strong US appeal
Very patriotic ending – typical of USA films cf. climax of Top
Gun
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Audience: Non-mainstream
• This audience prefers films which don’t use mainstream
content and style and are likely to dislike Argo
• Film is full of stereotypes and clichés
Q. Identify clichés of the suspense thriller plot and of
music.
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Audience: Left Critique
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Left-wing critics have identified Argo as a propaganda film
According to Herman and Chomsky the US media
‘manufacture consent’ to government policies and business
interests
Thus the representation of Iran/Iranians in US media can be
seen as creating general consent to US policy on Iran and
the CIA’s use of covert operations in combatting terrorism
So although Argo is set in the past it can be seen as
contributing to dominant ideologies which shape policy in
the present
Ben Affleck probably has not intentionally set out to make a
propaganda film but this is an unintended effect of trying to
tell an entertaining and engaging story
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Audience: Differential Decoding
• Preferred reading: enjoying film as intended by the
filmmakers – as a thrilling but heart-warming true story
of how CIA agent’s self-sacrifice keeps US citizens safe
from foreign threats
• Negotiated reading: enjoying the suspense but having
reservations e.g. about its distortion of history and
representations of Iran
• Oppositional reading: rejecting the preferred reading
and seeing the film as US imperialist propaganda (leftwing critics, Iranians)
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Technology 1: Specifications
Used for
widescreen
shots set in
Iran
Used for crowd
shots in protest
at embassy –
produces
pillarboxing
with black strips
left and right
when projected
Average shot length: 3.4s
45
Technology 2:
• Variety of film stock, lenses, lighting and digital
processing used for different locations (Iran.
Washington, Los Angeles) – see slide 24
• Preparation between director/star Ben Affleck and
cinematographer tested effects of stock/ lens/
lighting/processing before shoot
• 95% of film was storyboarded and shot-listed
• This meant that shooting time of 62 days for principal
photography kept to a minimum
• Budget allowed for some CGI
46
Technology 3: CGI by Method 3D
• Aerial shot of the Azadi Tower in Tehran created with
CGI
• 3D version of tower and surrounds, people, leaves on
trees, period cars, dirt on camera lens, etc. digital
effects
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Technology 4: CGI
• Actual flag burned too quickly
• So digital flag ‘burned’ and digitally combined with
foreground and background footage
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Technology 5: CGI
• In final escape the Swiss jumbo jet is a fully digital plane
with layers of shading, dirt and debris, light effects and
heat distortion to make it seem real
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Integration of Key Aspects
Exercise:
You have studied Argo in detail. Draw up a table with two
columns labelled ‘context’ and ‘text’. In the left column list
aspects of the institutional, audience, technological and
social context. In the right hand column identify ways in
which context shaped the Argo film text (i.e. its categories,
language, narrative and representations).
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References
Bearman, J. (2007) ‘The Great Escape: How the CIA Used a Fake Sci-Fi Flick
to Rescue Americans From Tehran’. In Wired, 24 April, 2007. Accessed
08/05/2013 at http://www.wired.com/magazine/2007/04/feat_cia/.
Bordwell, D. and Thompson, K. (2011) Minding Movies: Observations on
the Art, Craft, and Business of Filmmaking. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press. Visit their website and blog at www.davidbordwell.net
Bosley, R.K. (2012) ‘Creative Conspiracies’. In American Cinematographer,
November 2012, 52-65.
Carroll, Nöel (1996) Theorizing the Moving Image. Cambridge : Cambridge
University Press.
Jenkins, T. (2012) The CIA in Hollywood: How the Agency Shapes Film and
Television. University of Texas Press. Kindle Edition.
Mendez, A. and Baglio, M. (2012) Argo: How the CIA and Hollywood Pulled
Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History. London: Penguin.
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