Conventions of chosen Genre (Summary)

Conventions of chosen Genre 

My group and I have chosen drama as our genre for our coursework. I will be summerising its main conventions in this post. A drama film that I have chosen to analyse is "The boy in striped pyjamas".

Dramatic films represent serious real-life situation in which the audience can relate to. They do not tend to include forms of fantasy in the plot. Films categorised under the "Drama" genre also tend to show a lot of emotion and events at their best and worst som the purpose of the film is to move the audience emotionally as the character developes during the journey. In addition to this, there also tends to be plots with a twist and tradegy. Another conventions of a drama film is connecting to the audience on a personal level by showing how the character has overcome difficulties.

Some sub-genres include:

• Social dramas
• Mental Illness
• Race relations
• War drama
• Relegion drama

In the opening scene, there is a quote behind a black screen followed by minor key sounds. The quote states "Childhood is measured by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows". The key word here is "grow" which suggests that the protagonist is going to be going through some harsh events (highlighted from the word "dark") so that they can learn and grow from it.

Later on there is a high establishing shot that shows the city and the dull atmosphere as shown from
the bland beige and brown colours. The wide angle also shows the red Natzi flag which suggests that the plot may inlcude controversial relationships. As the classical music gets louder, we then see four children playing around, pretending to be aeroplanes.We realise that these kids are German, as Jewish people were treated very badly during that time.

However, the music quickly fades out as a low angle shot shows the Jews being taken to concentration camps as they are forcfully pushed into the back of the wagon. The low angle shot suggests that the Jews have little or no place and it also shows that they are inferior to the higher archy of the Germans.  The colour scheme of this film is very dull, the most colours that are shown are brown and beige. This shows the conservatism druing the Holocaust era in Western Europe in which they discriminated against Jewish people which they thoughti t was the "right" thing to do.

The sub-genre of this drama is a war time tradegy. This is shown by the mise-en-scene in the film which includes the soldiers with guns. thw wagon and the clothes the people were wearing which would not be considered an everyday outfit.