The main social group to consider with our product is probably the difference in gender representation – we have made the female the victim and the male the intruder - a stereotype in itself. The girl is a typical victim in the way we have made her seem vulnerable (for example, the shot when she thinks she’s seen someone in the mirror and is momentarily frightened). Her costume consists of a dress and high heels which, again, make her appear more the girly, ditzy type than if she had been wearing jeans and a t-shirt. However, as a group we would argue that this was more to show the audience she had just been out with friends or at a party rather than to point to the fact she is a female victim (although that was also considered at the time of choosing costume). Her facial expressions add to the traditionally
feminine image in that she either seems confused or scared throughout, not acting logically and even laughing at herself at one point (when she feels foolish for thinking she’s seen someone in the mirror. Most of the shots of her are at eye level (though many are even point of view) because we expect the females of our audience to relate to her in some way and to feel the tension she would be feeling. Having said all this about her being the victim, however, for the rest of the film she is the protagonist (a fairly well-off, successful woman) which would put an entirely different spin on her character and if we were filming the rest of it we would alter the way we presented her to show she’s changed as a person since this night.
The male intruder is represented as being more focussed, stronger and far more threatening. Obviously we wanted him to be like this so that the audience would understand that he poses some kind of threat to the girl, rather than it appearing he was friendly. We did this with the music by starting it as soon as he entered the house as though it was his theme tune in a way – using the pace and the strong beat to punctuate his fast, urgent movements. The shots he is in are cut short and switch between different places rapidly. We left out unnecessary bits of movement between doors and around the room so that the audience were focussed on the action and so that the character seemed to know what he was looking for more (making him seem more intelligent than the girl). He is wearing dark clothing, to signify some toughness about him and kept most of his face covered for mystery. His movements are precise and steady (whereas the girl’s were uncertain and wobbling) to show a distinct
difference in the two characters. Another technique we used is to shoot many of the shots from a low angle (e.g. the second one in which he comes through the door and the part where he is packing the bag) as well as many of the shots being closer in than with the female character, so he filled more of the frame - making him look more intimidating to the viewers.
Another large social group we have targeted in this sequence is teenagers. The girl is supposedly 17/18 and has just returned from a party in a drunken state. This is a highly stereotypical representation, but is nevertheless true to the character and appropriate to the situation – it is a perfectly plausible reason for why she would be returning home late at night and not be aware enough of what’s happening to use common sense. We showed that she was drunk by using a series of point of view shots
with a handheld camera, where we literally just stumbled around whilst filming to give the desired effect. In post production we also added an iMovie effect called ‘ghost trails’ which gave the slower dragged out movement. She also walks unsteadily and looks generally not completely ‘with it’ and aware of what’s going on. The least obvious of social groups to discuss is that of white middle class Britain. We have only really shown this in the décor and size of the house, the girl’s costume and the fact the family seem to have a lot of material possessions. But this social group, in this section of the film, has still been represented as being fairly careless (girl coming home so late, the parents not being there etc.); however we have only really chosen this group as the focal point as that is predominantly the audience for the film and they need to be able to relate.
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