Key Theories Recap

Semiotics- Roland Barthes- The study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation.

Narrative theory- Tzvetan Todorov- All narratives follow a three part structure where they begin with equilibrium, where everything is balanced, progress as something comes along to disrupt that equilibrium, and finally reach a resolution, when equilibrium is restored.

Genre theory- Steve Neale- Genres all contain instances of repetition and difference, difference is essential to the to the economy of the genre. Neale states that the film and it's genre is defined by two things: How much is conforms to its genre's individual conventions and stereotypes.

Structuralism- Claude Levi-Strauss- Human culture, being the set of learned behaviours and ideas that characterise a society, is just an expression of the underlying structures of the human mind.

Theories of representation- Stuart Hall- representation is the production of the meaning of the concepts in our mind through language. The link between concepts and language enables us to refer to either the real world of objects, people or events, or to imaginary worlds of fictional objects, people, events.

Theories of identity- David Gauntlet- Building a stronger sense of self-identity through creative practices – in other words, through creating their own representations – and make meaningful networks and relationships through that creative work.

Feminist theory- Lisbet Van Zoonen- the media portray images of stereotypical women and this behaviour reinforces societal views. The media does this because they believe it reflects dominant social values (what people believe in) and male producers are influenced by this. This is a patriarchy (a society ran by men for men) which dominates and oppresses women.

Feminist theory- Bell Hooks- The intersectionality of race, capitalism, and gender, and their ability to produce and perpetuate systems of oppression and class domination.

Power and media industries- Curran and Seaton- Media industries follow the normal capitalist pattern of increasing concentration of ownership in fewer and fewer hands. This leads to a narrowing of the range of opinions represented and a pursuit of profit at the expense of quality or creativity.

Regulation- Sonia Livingstone and Peter Lunt- The guid lines that need to be followed with the production of a film. this rules do not apply very well to today's media due to the development of technology allowing us to view things that we maybe shouldn't.

Cultural industries- David Hesmondhalgh- Societies with profitable cultural industries (e.g. USA, UK) tend to be dominated by large companies, have minimal government regulation and significant inequality between rich and poor.

Cultivation theory- George Gerbner- The primary proposition of cultivation theory states that the more time people spend 'living' in the television world, the more likely they are to believe social reality aligns with reality portrayed on television. The images and ideological messages transmitted through popular television media heavily influence perceptions of the real world.

Reception theory- Stuart Hall- Media texts are encoded and decoded. The producer encodes messages and values into their media which are then decoded by the audience.

Genre codes and conventions

Genre theory

Genre fluidity 

Camera work- framing, composition, shot types

Lighting and colour

Colours are very plain and stick to a set colour palette. the colours are all very cold and could represent the fact that the robots are made from metal and would be cold to the touch where as humans are usually warm to touch. 

Editing

The opening scene shows all of the synths lines up. The synths are shown to be very uniform and static, further reenforcing the sci-fi genre. 

Narrative

Sound

The sound effects used in the show help the audience to better believe that the people are robots rather than humans. this helps the viewer to understand who is a robot and who is a human. the sound is futuristic and reinforces the idea that she is a robot and not a real person. 

Mise-en-scene

The eyes of the robot are able to change colour when she feels different emotions. this makes the audience aware that the synths are capable of feeling and are closer to humans than they thought. 

The use of the synth looking up at the moon is an example of binary opposition. thios is because space is thought of as vast and freeing where as the robots are all trapped in a warehouse like room.