British youth & Collective Identity

For our exam in June we are learning how British youth are represented in media.

How are images of the ‘British’ used to market films?

• ‘a green and pleasant land’- idealised visions of Britain
• ‘heritage’ cinema
• Literary adaptations
• ‘urban fairytale’

UK films are used to reinforce patriotism for domestic audiences, whilst UK films are used as a tourist marketing strategy for foreign audiences.

Heritage cinema

• This is the term used to describe a particular style of costume drama.
• Heritage cinema presents the past as a ‘spectacle’, ‘museum aesthetic’, where the past is displayed for visual please.
• The past ad our relationship with it, is not questioned or criticised
• The films are ‘half in love with fancy frocks and immaculate cutlery’ for instance, mise-en-scene becomes more important than the narrative or the characters
• Presents a very patriotic vision of Britain
• The films are usually set in Victorian, Edwardian or inter-war years, focussed on upper middle classes
• They are often and adaptation of literary works
• Romanticised view of the past ‘bygone golden age’
• Popular when British national identity is questioned in WW11 and 1980s

Urban Fairytale

• This is the term used to describe romantic comedies of the 1990s
• Typical love story conventions; mismatched couple who don’t immediately get on, obstacles in the relationship that are eventually overcome (often with a close nit group of friends)
• Set in contemporary London, lots of tourist landmarks, middle class neighbourhood, and ‘sanitised’ vision of urban life.

Case study: Four weddings and a funeral (1994)

·        Made $4.4million in US, made $245 million worldwide

·        Made Hugh Grant a star

·        Idealised images, conforms to US markets of the stereotype of the British- ‘Anglophilia’

·        Reinforces nostalgic vision of Britain and British values to a domestic audience due to the escapist/positive representation of modern Britain

Gritty Realism

• Opposite of Heritage Cinema- critical of British life, not reinforcing patriotic values
• Challenging to audience’s comfort zone; inflicting portrait of harsh reality of modern Britain
• Often shocking examination of the dark side of human behaviour: explicit sex, violence, drugs etc
• Deals with social problems (drugs, poverty, violence, child abuse) explicitly but with complexity
• Often focuses on working or ‘underclass’ characters

Why are these images of Britain successful?

They rival to ‘saccharine’ sentimentality of Hollywood films due to their daring and shocking nature. They enforce Liberal Art, which are the house audiences who like cinema to challenge their preconceptions and comfort zones. The images also make middle class audiences feel secure by contrasting characters lives. Critically, the films are more ‘serious’ enjoyed by more ‘intelligent’ audiences.

Post Heritage Cinema

• Claire Monks’ phrase for historical dramas that don’t just ‘display’ the past, but ‘interrogates’ the past and our relationship to it
• Questions how the past is represented
• Explores contemporary themes in historical setting