Media Studies Key Points - Thriller Genre & Modern Family

Director of Psycho & Strangers on a Train

Alfred Hitchcock

Director of One Hour Photo

Mark Romanek

Audience for THRILLERS

Adults, male and female, middle to upper class, sophisticate, liberal

Audience for MODERN FAMILY

Pre-teens, adults, seniors, male and female, international, upper middle class, liberal sophisticate

The 2 ‘graphics’

Demographic and Psychographic

Sophisticate Liberal

Open minded, able to think deeply and follow complex storylines

Release: Strangers on a Train

1951

Release: Psycho

1960

Release: One Hour Photo

2002

Amanda Craig

British author: The classic trope of villainy is that villains never perceive themselves as such

Ambiguous Villain TROPES

Charming, loners, troubled childhood, heroic

Psycho Controversies

Sexuality, violence, toilet flushing, shower scene, late admissions

OLDER Thriller Films

Detective vs Villain 1930s to 1950s

RECENT Thriller Films

Get Out, Ready or Not, Spree

Slasher Films

Terrifier, Scream, Blood Feast

One Hour Photo SOCIOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS

Ideals vs Reality and Invasion of Privacy

Parasocial relationships

Pedro Pascal = objectified by female audience

Taylor Swift = Letters of sexual violence and bomb threats

NZ REAL LIFE SITUATION

Kidnapping of Marokopa children

Dad ‘I have a good heart and I mean well’

‘Hindsight is great because now I know there was a better way’

What is an ambiguous villain?

Good and evil, hard to recognise, intriguing, feed into natural curiosity

Pilot Ep

Introduces all members of ensemble cast, multiple story lines, child actors

When…

When good kids go bad - S3 EP2

Difficult realities of family life

Lily doesn’t want a sibling

Claire reflects on her controlling behaviour

Kiss…

Kiss and Tell - S10 EP2

Different character dynamics as they age

What is a sitcom?

Situation comedy, stereotypes, recognisable locations, central conflict, humour, happy ending

Ensemble cast

A large cast of characters with equal amounts of screen time and individual story lines

First episode of FIRST season

12.61 million

Last episodes of last season

10.17 million

Modern Family CREATORS

Steve Levitan and Chris Llyod

Half the…

Half the stories, if not more, come from our lives, those are the best ones

Reshape…

Reshape conservative perceptions on LGBTQ

Cross generational

Cross generational humour

When did the FIRST EP of Modern Family air?

23rd September 2009

When did Modern Family END

8th April 2020

When Good Kids go Bad SCREENING

14.53 million

PILOT SCREENING

12.61 million