Key Tracking Assessment

KTA1:

1. Pick one of the following genres:

• Science Fiction
• Horror
• High-School Teen Movie

2. Make a list of the genre’s generic elements, i.e.

• Typical Style
• Mise-en-scène : iconography, props, set design, lighting, temporal and geographic location, costume, shot types, camera angles, special effects,
• Editing : Fast paced, slow paced, etc,
• Typical Sound Design : types of dialogue, music, sound effects, etc.).
• Typical Narrative Structure (plots, historical setting, set pieces).
• Themes (the underlying messages, ideas, concepts the film deals with).
• Generic Types, i.e. typical character types (do typical male/female roles exist, archetypes?).
• Typical Studios, i.e. certain film studios are associated with particular genres.
• Typical Personnel (directors, producers, actors, stars, auteurs etc.).

3. Make a list of key film text from that genre.

KTA2:

1. Watch a sci-fi, horror or high school teen movie and identify its stages of equilibrium, disequilibrium and return to a new equilibrium.
2. Identify your own example of a genre film which pastiches another media text.
3. Identify your own example of a genre film, which parodies another media text.

KTA3:

Choose a Horror, Sci-Fi or High School Teen movie and analyse it in terms of how it reflects the key themes associated with its genre.

KTA4:

What elements of these posters (Star Wars: Clone Wars, Juno, Diary Of The Dead - see handouts and blog for images) allow you to identify the film’s genre?

KTA5:

Answer the following exam question: "Generic conventions provide a basic structure, but that is all. Every film is unique." Discuss this view. [45 marks]

KTA6:

Answer the following exam question: Explain how and why certain films combine the conventions of more than one genre. [45 marks]

KTA7:

Answer the following exam question: Discuss how and why film genres change over a period of time. [45 marks]