Critical Investigation: Project proposal

Working title

To what extent does the film 'Bad Neighbours' represent teenagers in a negative way and what is the impact of this? 

Angle
What impact are films such as Bad Neighbours having on young teens?

Hypothesis
I believe teenagers in this generation are portrayed negatively. Furthermore, I think films like Bad Neighbours influence teenagers to behave in a certain way. 

Linked production piece
For my linked production I'll be working with aliza&alayna to produce a music video. 

MIGRAIN

• Hollywood production. 
• Distributed by Universal Pictures and Produced by Point Grey Pictures.
• American Comedy. 
• Conveys the dominant representation of teenagers (negatively).
• Dominant ideologies.
• Linear narrative. 
• Appeals to mainly the younger generation
• Psychographic groups; mainstreamers. 

SHEP

Social:

• Audiences expect teenagers to be conveyed in a negative way. 
• As an audience, we have accepted these values and ideologies of teenagers being portrayed in a negative manner. 
• As a society we are led to believe that teenagers a reckless, misbehaved people. 

Historical:

• Before society today teenagers weren't seen as reckless or misbehaved. 
• Teenagers weren't seen as so socially confined. 
• Teenagers weren't so open to throwing big parties and consuming drugs and alcohol. 

Economic:

• Many companies target teenagers, as teens are more open to spending their money.
• Teenagers spend their money more so, due to 'peer pressure'. 
• Additionally, teenagers spend more of their money for their appearance to try and stay up to date with the latest trends. 

Issues/Debates:

Representation and stereotyping - this links to my study as the film portrays teenagers in a negative way, and maintains the dominant ideologies of teens. 

Media effects - this is an audience theory that tends to see the audience as passive and seeks to measure how exposure to particular aspects of media content can influence the behavior of the reader or viewer. 

Moral Panics - this relates to my study as audiences are often surprised and shocked by the way teenagers behave, and believe this is what the actual truth is of what teenagers are actually like, this therefore creates a moral panic. 

Ownership and control - this links to my study as ownership and control portrays what the media releases and allows audiences to view, and throughout the film it only conveys a negative representation of teenagers. 

Regulation and censorship - the practice, exercised by elite groups in authority, of monitoring and controlling media content by removing, suppressing or classifying elements deemed offensive or subversive for moral, political, economic, social or religious reasons. 

Theories

• Audience theories - the groups or individuals targeted by the producers as intended. (David Lynch)
• Genre theories - psychological and cultural aspects of behavior associated with masculinity and femininity, acquired through socialisation, in accordance with the expectations of a particular society. (Ann Gray and Chrisitine Geraghty)
•  Liberal Pluralism - the view that where a society is compromised of a wide range of social and ethnic groups with different values, political and ideological beliefs. 
• Hypodermic Needle Model - this fits into my study as this theory states that people are influenced by the content they see on screen. 
• Uses and Gratifications:
  Diversion: escape from everyday problems
  Personal Relationships: using normal teenage scenarios on screen
  Personal Identity: teenagers seeing themselves reflected on screen

Research plan (media texts, academic texts and websites)
Media texts
Bad Neighbours

Other media texts
- 21 Jump Street. 
- Project X.
- American Pie. 
- 17 Again. 
- 21 and over.

TV documentaries

• BBC One - Smoking in films 'encourages teenagers to take it up' - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-14971560
• BBC News- How teenagers keep reinventing language - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13445487
• YouTube - Under the Influence (1986) -                                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgi47LOZO4M
• YouTube - Teens Influenced by Film -                                      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f63zup0AANI
• YouTube - How social media is affecting teens -                        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QWoP6jJG3k

Academic texts/books

• Teenagers and Substance Use: Social Networks and Peer Influence - by Deirdre M. Kirke 
• Teens Under the Influence: The Truth about Kids, Alcohol, and Other Drugs-- how to Recognize the Problem and what to Do about it - by Katherine Ketcham, Nicholas A. Pace
• Peer and Family Influence on Adolescent Drug Addicts - by Hina Qazi
• Youth and Media - by Andy Ruddock
• Language of the Gun: Youth, Crime, and Public Policy - by Bernard E. Harcourt · University of Chicago Press 

Internet Links

• Teenager obsessed with TV killer Dexter stabbed and dismembered girlfriend - https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/oct/02/teenager-steven-miles-murdered-girlfriend
• Porn's influence is real. Sex education is the answer - https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/27/porn-influence-real-sex-education-online-fantasies
• Media 'influence' adolescent sex - https://www.theguardian.com/media/2006/mar/22/pressandpublishing.broadcasting
• Drink and drugs are to blame for violence in the young - https://www.theguardian.com/society/joepublic/2011/jul/14/alcohol-drugs-fuel-youth-violence
• Talking about bad girls - https://www.theguardian.com/film/2009/mar/22/heathers-mean-girls-hairspray
• The influence of driver distraction on the severity of injuries sustained by teenage drivers and their passengers - http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001457507001029
• Mother's Influence on the Sexual Behavior of Their Teenage Children - http://www.jstor.org/stable/352480?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents