Wednesday 8 May 2013

Q. How typical are your texts of their genre?

    Fishtank is a social realism film. Typical conventions of a social realism film are such as; real locations. Fishtank was filmed on the Mardyke estate in Tilbury, Essex. This area is reknown for crime and anti-social behaviour, the use of a real location like this portrays real life and gives the film even more of an authentic feel. Also, the use of non-professional actors is a convention of the social realism genre. Just like that in the 1969 film 'Kes', all characters were played by non-professional actors, and this is also a convention used in Fishtank. Katie Jarvis, who plays Mia was picked to play the character after the producer of the film saw her arguing with her boyfriend on a train platform. This keeps it low budget, and people can relate to her as she has a common accent, is working class and has that 'rough' look which could not be achieved through the use of educated, young actors as this kind of teenager would not be typical of the area and lifestyle of characters in Fishtank.
   The use of profane language is another typical convention of social realism. In the opening scene, Mia says on the phone 'I was pissed off, ring me back you bitch'

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