CRITICAL INVESTIGATION PROPOSAL

Text - The Dark Knight Rises
Media Debate - How content affects people
                         How is Violence Represented in films such as The Dark Knight Rises?

topics
- violence
- moral panic

Events -
-  James Holman guilty of mass massacre in theatre.
- natural born killers (historical text)

Natural born killers - This movie influenced a copycat crime in which there was a real life case for.One night there was two best friends who watched born killers and packed a gun with bullets and involved a brutal shooting.

James Holmes - This person went into a movie theatre dressed as batman in which he fired at the people inside the theatre. There is questions as to who let him inside the theatre and if someone is involved with this shooting. Also the mass killing has gone down in history as a tragic way to end people lives in which they thought they were going to watch a movie but they did not return.

Angle -
What impact has violent movies had on the audience. Has there been an influence in things like copycat violence. Copycat violence is shows in the news how many people get influenced by crimes and then

Hypothesis -
I believe that violent films such as The Dark Knight Rises have influenced copycat violence. This is because violence in films is getting extremely explicit where they show scenes which are too much for audiences. This then can trigger something in the audience minds in which they will try to re-enact these scenes. Also in films violence is seen as being rewarding which is another reason why people could re-enact this. One more reason could be the media coverage that is given to things like copycat violence.

Linked Production Piece - opening to a film
??  For my linked production I am going to be doing an opening to a film. The linked production will be on the Drama genre in which The Dark Knight Rises can come under as a genre.

Media Language -
Costume - When Bruce Wayne was living a normal life, he generally wore suits to show how formal and the wealth of himself. Also Bruce Wayne was the owner of Wayne Enterprises which meant he had to be formal. However when portraying Batman Bruce Wayne wore the bat suit.

Lighting - For a majority of the scenes that were outside , normal day light lighting was used. However some scenes that were shot inside , for example in Banes prison used low key lighting or minimal lighting was used. This might be to emphasise the effect by Bane to be as evil.

Propps - There were many props used for this big budget movie but the most noticeable props were the batmobile, bat bike and the nuclear reactor.


Institution -

This production was made in Hollywood.
This movie has a trailer, film poster, Nokia promo,
Viral Marketing Campaign - films website told fans to help gotham city track down hundreds of graffiti all around the world. For every piece of graffiti that was found and tagged on social media , Warner Bros released a frame of the trailer. Eager fans had the whole thing unlocked in a matter of hours.

Fans found the graffiti by Warner Bros posting the exact street address of more than 300 locations, including sites in Australia, China, Holland, and the US.

This viral marketing campaign was quite successful simply because of audience engagement and fans of the batman movies can have something to do which could build up to the release of the film. This then means that there was hype amongst fans which created awareness to other people on social media media who might not necessarily watch a batman movie.

The film was distributed to multiplex cinema so this would mean that this film is supposed to commercially do well. Also this film is meant to be for the enjoyment of mass media.

Genre - The genre of the film The Dark Knight Rises is Dram/Thriller. The reason for this as the genre is because there is a lot of action in which Batman has to do a lot of fighting. Also the reason for the film being a thriller is because I feel there are a lot of moments that would cause the audience to jump.

Representation - There are many representations within The Dark Knight Rises which we can notice. The first representation in the movie is of Bruce Wayne who is Batman. Bruce Wayne is represented as weak through out 75% of the film. The reason for Batmans weakness is become he hadn't been Batman for some time prior to becoming Batman and trying to defeat Bane. Also Bruce Wayne is represented as fearless, this is because there was a scene where Bruce Wayne was trapped in the villains prison and had to climb a wall to escape in which failed twice and could have died.

Another prominent representation was of Bane who represented in many different ways. The first representation of Bane was that he was seen as confident. The way in which Bane did things whether he was fighting or stealing from the stock exchange, there was no false sense of confidence. Also a dominant representation of him was seen as evil, this is seen when he caused destruction throughout the course of the movie.

One more representation that could be identified was of catwoman. This is a challenged stereotype in action movies as you don't not really see a woman playing such a lead role and with so much action. It could be said that she had more action scenes then batman himself. However catwoman was also seen as evil as she handed batman over to bane.

Audience - Throughout the film the audience would sympathise with the main character (Bruce Wayne). This is because Bruce looses all his money and assets. Also Bruce is presented as weak and the first scene with Bane meant that he had lost. The audience would have felt escapism as they can think about Gotham city for the course of 2 hours 40 mins and leave their stressed lives out. Also the audience might have felt personal relationships as they might have known someone  that


Ideology - The main ideology I noticed about the films was the message that anyone can be a hero. This was an ideology that was shown towards the end of the film where Batman talks to officer Gordon and says anyone can be a hero, even someone that puts a jacket around you. Officer Gordon had put a jacket around Batman when he was small in which Officer Gordon remembered.

Another ideology that was present in this films is that you don't need to be credited for doing something heroic. This again was  present when in conversation with officer Gordon and Batman said he did not want to let everyone know who Batman is even when officer Gordon wanted everyone to know.

One more ideology that was seen was of giving to the needy. This was presented as at the end Bruce Wayne was seen as dead and his house was made into a home for orphans. However Bruce Wayne was not dead.

Narrative - The narrative is a non linear narrative as there are a few flashbacks of Bruce Waynes childhood portraying that he was an orphan. There are also action codes. For example when Batman was thrown into a closed cage with Bane we could tell that there was going to be an encounter. Also Todorov's theory was seen as there was an equilibrium, disequilibrium and a restored equilibrium. The equilibrium was at the beginning of the movie where everyone was living their normal life, then Bane turned a nuclear reactor into a bomb which was the disequilibrium. The restored equilibrium was towards the end of the film where Batman takes the nuclear bomb into the sea and Bane is defeated.

Social -
- More people influenced by copycat violence
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Historical -
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Economical -
- Big budget film makes massive profits for film industry
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Political -
- Criticisms (violent movies such as these should not be allowed)
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Moral Panic -  These types of films are set to influence copycat violence where real people are affected.
Regulation and censorship - Most copycat violence crimes are done by older people such as people in adolescence and adults so regulation would not affect this topic of copycat violence.

TV documentaries -
No TV documentaries regarding copycat violence found


Internet Links
- https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jul/20/colorado-theater-shooting-dark-knight&sa=U&ved=0CBMQFjAFahUKEwiMz4GD_vPIAhXGPB4KHRdCC44&client=internal-uds-cse&usg=AFQjCNHuFMC9_SKBnTsOSmwnLdpoK2l6BA (Guardian)

- https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.theguardian.com/film/2012/jul/16/the-dark-knight-rises-first-review&sa=U&ved=0CAcQFjABahUKEwjW68ev_vPIAhVKcRQKHYEmAHE&client=internal-uds-cse&usg=AFQjCNFQdJr9LKbYUAXzJj7CIYU3jEHyaw (Guardian)

- https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.theguardian.com/film/2012/jul/09/dark-knight-rises-early-screening&sa=U&ved=0CBYQFjAGahUKEwjW68ev_vPIAhVKcRQKHYEmAHE&client=internal-uds-cse&usg=AFQjCNEJR3_eic3jJSDxMYtl-6horb32oA (Guardian)

- http://metro.co.uk/2015/09/11/new-colorado-theatre-photos-show-chaotic-aftermath-of-dark-knight-rises-shooting-5386183/ (Metro)

- https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=newssearch&cd=22&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCMQqQIoADABOBRqFQoTCOOvlcaA9MgCFUNbFAodwqwO-g&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mirror.co.uk%2Fnews%2Fworld-news%2Fmentally-ill-dark-knight-rises-6157000&usg=AFQjCNGnV2uJHNfi1aNnARSMB6tW9hYs9Q&sig2=WznV-8mHR2dh36zKnV1Pqg (Mirror)

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=newssearch&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CB8QqQIoADAAahUKEwjvldfhzPbIAhXGuRQKHYtlAKY&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bustle.com%2Farticles%2F117134-5-times-killers-mimicked-horror-legends-and-films&usg=AFQjCNFsrSt3XshUqsvupFTL48lQfJBwng&sig2=dcreoIrDMIVau9EhAX1s9g (Bustle)