She’s The Man POSTER
Genre:
The poster conveys the typical genre trope of the hybrid
genre, romantic comedy.
The audience can deconstruct this as a result of the title
‘She’s the MAN’. The title is a play on words as the most dominant character
placed at the centre of the other characters, literally does become a ‘MAN’.
There is insight that
the poster is for the promotion of a romantic comedy genre film, given in the
form of the overly ‘complicated’ tagline.
The words highlighted in bold- “wants” “likes” “dating”
“crushing”- connote the ideas of romance and immediately the audience is able
to identify the ideas with the conventional views of romance. The terminologies
used create a sense of personal identity within the audience, as they are able
to easily recognise and therefore empathise with the characters and their
emotions. Also the positioning of the characters continues the idea of romance
because the characters are extremely close to each other.
The comedy aspect is expressed in the ‘absurdity’ of the
whole charade and the fact the tagline has not been completed (the punctuation
of an ellipsis has been used) denotes that there is more to the story and the
untangled mess these characters have placed themselves in. This helps to reel
the audience’s intrigue into consuming (watching) the product.
Narrative:
The poster corresponds with Claude Levi-Strauss’s narrative
theory because there are binary opposites in terms of gender evident in the
long shot image of the main characters. The poster embodies Strauss’s idea in
the form of the main character that is the central image and a female. There is
opposition between the genders, as the central female- as displayed by the
tagline- is a female disguised as a guy in order to prove that females are
definitely capable of achieving ‘goals’ (in terms of sports) that are typically
associated with males. Also there is a separation, therefore physical binary opposition
between the first and last character who conform to gender stereotypes. The
fact that both characters are adhering to their gender stereotypes is
highlighted by the distance between them, created by the presence of the other
more dominant characters. Feminism and Masculinity are at repelling ends in the
poster.
The audience could come to the conclusion that Todorov’s and
Freytag’s theories are being challenged, because the tagline begins with the
disequilibrium and climax, instead of the equilibrium and exposition, this therefore
creates interest within the audience as they contemplate how the problems and
issues faced by each character would be resolved- instead of the audience
waiting breathlessly for the climax and disequilibrium, they wait instead for
the denouement.
Representation of
Gender:
The male and female characters in the background (their
positioning reveals to the audience that they are not the central character and
this connotes that they are likely to play a minor role in the film) conform to
the gender stereotypes held by many people.
This is shown in the appearance and strong stance of the
male who is wearing no shirt, allowing his well-toned body to be seen therefore
attracting a majority of female audiences. The reason the male character coincides
with the gender stereotype of males is because he is used as a sex symbol and
employs the idea of masculinity, his stance also reveals his personality to be
that of confidence and dominance. The male is also balancing a football on the
tips of his fingers. This action shows that he is familiar with the sport and
the fact that it is a football- a game commonly connected with males- show the
audience that he is likely going to be a stereotypical male.
On the opposite side of the poster is a ‘stereotypical’
female. This idea is represented in the semiotic use of the mirror prop, which
connotes to the audience that this female is aesthetically aware of herself, and
is therefore vain. The female appears to be reapplying her make-up once again
expressing to the audience the vanity and self-awareness of the character and
the fact that she would rather observe herself than have direct address with
the audience- this illustrates to the audience the selfish personality of the
character.
Audience:
Due to the visual age of the characters seeming to be teens,
the target audience is likely to be teens. The poster and therefore film would
appeal to an active audience described by Blumer and Katz because it represents
the ‘hap hazard’ love life of a teenager consequently creating personal
identity and relationship with the audience.
The poster seems suitable for young children because despite
the hybrid genre of rom-com it does not have excessive or any use of nudity and
abuse.
It is an appealing poster to the target audience because it
has bright attractive colours as well as clothing and issues that many
teenagers can clearly identify with. The poster appeals to both gender types
because it has physically striking main characters. Due to the characters being predominantly
white, the poster would appeal more to those of similar ethnicity, most likely
due to the idea of personal identification.
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