Daily Blog 3/14

Mr. Rivers started class today by reminding us of some podcast things. First, he reminded us that if you would like to, you can start your pre-production podcast prep before class that day, so as to get more time to prepare and not be crunched for time. He also reminded us to coordinate with our group mates and make sure that we are all watching the same movie, so the podcast can go smoothly. Make sure you can begin to record you first podcast this Friday (3/16). Also make sure you have listened to another groups podcast. Comment with your first name, last initial, and period number on their slide page on google classroom. Make sure to also be working on your Be Reel blog, which has been reduced to only 1 this marking period, due to snow.

The IWBAT for today was to "apply genre as objective vs Subjective categorization of narrative". The second IWBAT was "identify how structural patterns develop genre". For the first IWBAT, Mr. Rivers decided that he wanted us all to suffer, and hence showed us the trailer for The Emoji Movie (That shouldn't be in quotes, it implies it is intellectual property, intellectual is the wrong word). After subjecting us to the experience that was that trailer, Mr. Rivers asked us to deliberate as to whether The Emoji Movie was a comedy, or a tragedy. The class mostly sided with comedy, as a genre. While many, including myself, questioned the comedic merit of this film, the main takeaway from our questioning was that while the emoji movie may not be funny, it tries to be, and that alone makes it a comedy in terms of genre. the writers OBJECTIVE purpose is what delineates a genre, not the audiences SUBJECTIVE reaction.

Mr. Rivers then went over Conventions, or what we know as patterns across texts. To demonstrate conventions, he had us look at Shakespearean comedies, and look specifically at the ending. Without much guidance, we were instructed to find groups with similar ending, and 2 very large groups formed, the largest being with a marriage. Mr. Rivers elaborated that marriages were extremely common, and set the CHAOS in the beginning of the story into a sense of ORDER, an important convention in plots of stories in general.

Overall, these techniques gave us a new tool to use when analyzing film and distinguishing genre. By allowing ourselves to see past SUBJECTIVE feeling when looking for genre, the OBJECTIVE genre that the author intended is much easier to see, and thus allows our podcasts to be significantly easier, as well as future film analysis as a whole.