Evaluation: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our media product uses already existing conventions that are portrayed in media products. For instance organized crime gangsters, which can be seen as one of the major driving forces within our production, we use this to our advantage as this is an easily identifiable trait in any media production. We did this through the use of costume, where we had our male actors (gangsters) to be dressed in suits and ties, this can be seen in many films especially American gangster films, an example would be 'Goodfellas'. We have our character go through the typical inciting incident of a deal gone bad as our protagonist now owes money or his life and his loved ones lives are at stake.


 Another convention that we use in our media product is also heavily used due to the suspense it can create within an audience,for instance the damsel in distress scenario which has been played throughout the ages in stories and in modern day media products. Although we use this convention we lightly develop on it with our own much more subtle rendition of the 'fem fetale'  where the audience witnesses the so called 'damsel in distress' turn into a double crossing sleuth as she makes her escape after having her mob affiliated boyfriend go through a hard time keeping her alive. This supports the convention of women in gangster films being seductive and greedy and usually the protagonists weakness as he tries to keep her happy. As she is the only female within the whole production this again conforms to the conventions of the crime world being predominantly male dominated. Music used within our media piece challenged conventions expected by our target audience, for instance they would have expected rap music in some scenes or more upbeat music which would set the atmosphere. Instead we went in the opposite direction and did not use rap music, but much more mellow music this created an unsettling atmosphere for viewers which again would keep their attention on the action within our production.

A convention that we also used was that of kidnapping the protagonists loved one, this keeps the action of our production in motion. Combining this with Todorov's narrative theory, it allowed us to place the inciting incidents strategically in order to keep the viewers engaged. In terms of location, the setting picked subverted conventions of British gangster films being set in the East end of London or certain parts of South London. Instead we set our film in Westminster with a relatively low crime rate in terms of gang related crime, this made for a much more interesting media product as it intriuges viewers as this is not your typical setting for a gangster film. Some settings within our media product do in fact follow conventions expected in gangster films, like having a warehouse to interrogate their kidnapee. This could be seen as a postmodern movement as drew inspiration from older works and incorporated them in our own production, we were inspired by Resevoir Dogs where they also have a warehouse in which they rendezvous at and where the story further progresses.