14: Analysing Conventions in High School and Youth Drama's

Mise en scene, Camera, Editing and Sound

Youth Drama- La Haine

The Youth Drama film La Haine uses the camera in a way that resembles a documentary style film at the beginning of the introduction. This captures the audiences attention as it also hold the semantic field of police, riots, violence and rebellion. No close ups are held at the beginning of the intro due to the fact that they have chosen to convey no sense of emotion that may disrupt the ambiance of the scene. Editing in the intro is slow in order to show as much action and violence as possible. When the actual filming starts many more shot reverse shots and match cuts are used in order to present a more personal view into the riots at that time. Mise en scene consists of police, riot gear, dogs, casual clothing for protesters, weapons, cars and estates. These indicate a very personal and intricate point of perspective to the riots for the audience. The sound that has been implemented can be seen to be the non diagetic sound of a rock song about the riots, synchronous sounds of explosions simulating violence and diagetic sounds of news broadcasters referring to the riots.

High School Drama

The lighthearted and comedic High school drama Mean Girls usually uses camera in the introduction to display close ups, medium shots and over the shoulder shots to demonstrate the protagonists or secondary characters facial expression. In addition to this a point of view shot is used from a very low angle at the beginning of the intro in order to emphasize the immaturity of the protagonist and how she is treated as a child. The sound used throughout is a quirky and uplifitng sound trap enforcing the joyous and bouncy nature of the protagonists first day until it becomes ruined where the sound track slows down much more and the notes become much more suspended and extended. Editing Is sharp and of medium pace while occasionally tipping into fast in order to correlate with the bouncy sound track heard in the background. Finally, mise en scene is seen to be colourful and stylish for teenagers causing the outfits worn by some very different to others. The setting of the high school reflects this factor.