Evaluation 1-In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real
media products? 

The Title                                      

The title uses forms and conventions of real media products, with the colour grading of the bright white word art being harshly highlighted against the darker tones in the background. ‘Se7en’, ‘The Prestige’, ‘Inception’, ‘Quarantine’ and many more are examples of 'mainstream products' that use this technique as it helps the audience quickly distinguish what genre the film is and subsequently appeals to fans of the thriller genre. 'Ctrl, Alt Delete' was one of the titles I initially came up with and was influenced by the sinister 'Cybernetic ' narrative by using the 'keys' of a computer; Ctrl(control), Alt (alter), Delete. Our group came to the conclusion this would be the best title as it fits nicely with not only the narrative but with the thriller genre as well because of the negative connotations associated with the notion of unwillingly being 'controlled', your environment being 'altered' and you being 'deleted' from memory. The blue electrical pulses challenge the conventions of a typical two-tone black and white thriller title as our film also has subtle tones of science fiction, also the electrical pulses further reference the narrative as the hacker's lethal weapon is technological and fuelled of course by electricity. 

Genre and how the opening suggests it

The thriller genre has concrete conventions that are difficult to negate for example, a stereotypical ‘chase sequence’ which consists of an antagonist ‘physically stalking’ and killing their victim. This is respectively used in almost every thriller. However we adapted our own unique take on this repetitive aspect of the genre by having a ‘digital chase’ of which our antagonist (The Hacker) virtually stalks and kills his victims therefore developing on a rather outdated convention.

 Moreover the conventional narrative structure of a thriller classically goes against Todorov’s theory of a ‘well established’ narrative pattern  with, equilibrium then disequilibrium and finally a new-equilibrium, however thrillers usually begin and end in disequilibrium. An example of this is in Inception at the end the main protagonist 'Cobb' spins the totem the camera shows it wobbling making it inconclusive whether he’s still alive or in a dream.  Ctrl, Alt delete’s opening uses this disjointed but conventional narrative approach by starting the opening sequence in ‘disequilibrium’ and suggesting that the conclusion will allude from a ‘new -equilibrium’ meaning there’s no resolution for the audience. This is illustrated as ‘The Hacker’ places his latest conquest onto the ‘victims wall’ and then places Charlie’s photo onto the logistics map making him the new prey. Lastly the non-diegetic soundtrack used every time  it jump cuts to the Hackers den is sinister in tone and the tempo increases as more of the plot is revealed making the audience feel unnerved this also follows suit of the more generic Thriller film.

Setting & Location

We as a group decided on having three very different locations so we could demonstrate numerous camera shots ,unique lighting and also by having more of a variation it makes more interesting viewing for the audience. Firstly by having the antagonist in an unknown, claustrophobic and dark setting with the only lighting coming from an ‘artificial’ source (the computer monitor) this visually impairs the audience. Also the secluded nature of the den suggest that the hacker understands the horrific nature of his sadistic actions and in -turn wants to hide in the darkness this makes the audience further question our antagonist persona and geographical location. 

The other location is contrapuntal to this as our protagonist’s setting brings the audience back to reality and into a ‘false sense of security’ through the use of soft ‘naturalistic lighting' and a typical suburban household, helping create a bridge in the narrative from the ‘nocturnal world’ of the hacker to the ‘diurnal world’ of Charlie which is equally as disturbing for the viewers as it brings a sense of reality to the fictitious enigma that is ‘The Hacker’.

The third and final location was a busy shopping centre, although there were lots of people walking around whilst filming and this made us worry that they may look directly at the camera making the take unusable but that wasn't the case and it actually made it look like we had a bigger budget, with lots of ‘extras’ ‘pretending’ to shop. We achieved a sense of the protagonist being all alone even with all these people around through the use of numerous ‘CCTV’ aerial shots tracking Charlie as he shopped. 

 

Costume and Iconography

Costume:

Casual attire for the protagonist including; a white shirt and pyjama bottoms and secondly a blue jumper with grey chinos. This helps convey to the audience he’s just an ordinary teenager and therefore making it easier for them to empathises with his situation and the fact he’s being watched the creepiness is heightened. Mirroring the main protagonist in ‘The Truman Show’ Truman Burbank played by Jim Carey who wears similarly casual attire and is also unknowingly being monitored.

 The hacker is shown to be wearing an 'anonymous mask' , all black jeans and a hoodie. The mask was inspired by the film V for Vendetta which was used in a similar way ,to hide his identity and making him into an enigma adding lots of unanswered question for the viewers to pounder upon and the colour black has negative connotations such as dark, evil, witchcraft which thus plays on the conventions of a more modern thriller.

Iconography:

in the Hackers den; previous victims pictures are displayed on the wall and crossed out in a red marker, Newspaper letters spelling out kill, death, evil ect. Cut-out and stuck to the wall similar to a hostage letter adding more horrible subconscious imagery into the viewer's minds also hiding the hackers personal handwriting makes him impossible to identify, a map showing the logistics of the city with various pins stuck onto it showing where the person being stalked travels to and from illustrates an evil but clever strategist, the Computer plays on the fear of technology becoming too powerful for example, remote controlled drones being able to drop bombs on Afghanistan from anywhere in the world, the computer monitor which acts as the only light source for the den, the anonymous mask which is lighten up by the monitor hides the hackers identity and the mobile phone which is symbolic of the phone hacking scandals widely publicised on British News channels and the rational fear for the British public they felt shortly after was exaggerated in Ctrl, Alt Delete with the phone being hacked and killing the victim.

Cinematography and Editing

Editing:

-continuity editing was used when walking through doors as a simple way of making the production look slick and professional and not comical which would lesser the tension and snap the audience out of suspension of disbelief. We learnt how to use this technique from our preliminary task.

-elliptical editing was also used an example of this is when Charlie was getting ready in the first scene we cropped the time of each take down in order to maintain a captive audience and still convey he’s getting ready, setting up the narrative with the required information but at the same time cutting out the boring parts.

-The precarious Jump Cuts back and forth between The Hacker’s den helped to maintain the link from the two separate ‘worlds’ the ‘nocturnal world’ and ‘diurnal world’ and also conjoining the two characters by conveying to the audience no matter where Charlie goes the hacker would always be watching and scheming.

-The black and white filter we used on the ‘CCTV shots’ was added in post-production along with the date and time in the corner of the frame this was simply used to add realism and differentiate between  the hidden webcams in the suburban household (in the first scene) and the public CCTV shots (later on).

-The Computer monitor had video imagery of Charlie waking up and getting ready superimposed onto it in the editing room to portray The Hacker had secret webcams hidden around Charlie’s house which were streaming a live feed back to his den. This would make the audience feel unnerved as we used a typical surrounding and technology that already exists.  

Cinematography:

First shot was a high angle from the left corner of the bedroom with Charlie asleep as the camera slowly zooms into a close up of his face. The use continuous use of high angles of Charlie was important to the narrative because it suggests that he is in a position of vulnerability. 

The second shot was a high angle shot from the right corner of the bedroom, panning across mapping Charlie’s movements and for the fist time suggesting the camera’s being operated electronically and that he’s being watched. We then had a tracking shot of Charlie making his way to the bathroom this made it look like he was being stalked making the protagonist defenceless as he isn't aware. 
Cuts to a Dutch tilt shot behind the mirror, this angle is disjointed signifying something's not quite right. After this we have an over-the-shoulder shot of the hacker monitoring Charlie the camera then begins to pan from his right shoulder to left giving the audience two different perspective of the keyboard and computer monitor. 
We then employed the first CCTV shots one of which was a clever high angle shot in an under path tunnel, we achieved this by screwing the camera onto a tripod and hooking it onto a low hanging sign making it look like a real CCTV camera and with the lack of natural light the shot had a dark and eerie atmosphere. 

The two shot of Charlie and the ‘victim’ was to add a twist to the narrative as the audience were expecting Charlie to get harmed. As the ‘Victim’ answers his phone call the camera pans across following him as he enters the lift as he begins to collapse it jump cuts into the lift and transitions into an extreme close up of the phone displaying that the caller id is ‘unknown’ suggesting that the anonymous hacker was behind the death. Finally we have a close up of The Hacker exchanging the victims picture for Charlie’s hinting that the hacker will move onto his new prey Charlie eluding from any resolution and leaving the audience feeling unsatisfied.

Narrative and how the opening suggests it

The opening suggests it’s a thriller with the protagonist being stalked by a masked antagonistic figure however, it both uses and develops on the regular forms and conventions of real media products by having a ‘digital chase’ rather than the overly repetitive ‘physical chase’ used in almost every Thriller film and thus creating a unique selling point for Ctrl, Alt Delete. Furthermore with the inclusion of the death of a disposable character at the beginning is also a common convention in that we used it to let the audience know immediately that the film’s a Thriller and acts as a cliff-hanger engaging the viewer making them want to continue watching without impacting the narrative’s direction because both main characters remain. Also with the protagonist awakening in the first scene  was inspired loosely by ‘28 Days Later’ with ‘Jim’ waking up in a post apocalyptic world that’s been destroyed by a devastating viral infection. Similarly in Ctrl, Alt Delete Charlie wakes up and he’s being spied upon unknowingly by a masked villain straight away showing that there’s a disruption to normality and in effect beginning in disequilibrium.  

Title font and Style

The fonts style is ‘Cooper Black’ which is similar to the keys on a desktop computer but we edited it so that the word art’s slightly blurred suggesting a malfunction/technical problem with it, which is a direct reference to the theme of the film and the argument  being there’s a problem with the rapid advancement in technology.

How characters are introduced

The introduction of the main protagonist is in the very first frame with a high angle shot of him sleeping, this immediately puts him in a defenceless position. Then it jump cuts to the antagonist whose subsequently watching the protagonist sleep, ambiguously establishing his intentions are to stalk him. The main protagonist is shown in a two-shot to introduce the first victim of The Hacker and by the protagonist bumping shoulders with him it draws the viewers attention to the victim just before his phone is hacked and he is murdered.