5 Chosen Media Texts
Chosen text: Film
Film- Deadpool
Media issue/debate- This was the first r rated superhero film to be made that was from the Marvel films family. The Marvel brand and franchise of movies were already dominating the box office, and several films have been made sing their content and past comic-book titles, turning them into films. 20th Century Fox had brought the rights for the X-men characters (which included Deadpool and Fantastic Four). The studio had attempted to put Deadpool on the big screen but wanted to do it in the more traditional way, pg 13. Many fans were outraged with the studios performance for the character and demanded an r rated film (as this is the kind of rating that the character from the comics is based off of. Making a superhero film, that was already doing successful, but making it completely different from the other superhero films was a big risk. 20th Century Fox finally gave the script a pass and it was at the time where the film hit theatres where it was announced that Deadpool was the first R rated movie to break such records. This showed the risk that the studio took and actually paid off.
The public who were unaware of the characters comic portrayal were outraged when taking their children to go see the film as they believed they were watching a traditional superhero move. The film had gained world wide coverage as it was the first film in the Marvel universe to be of an R rated content and had done so successfully at the box office.
Chosen text- Film
Film- Doctor Strange
Media issue/debate- After the successful phase 1 and 2 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), Marvel had lined up a slate for the next 10 years worth of Marvel movies and Doctor Strange is one of them. Considering the comic material in which the majority of these films are based off of will obviously follow the classic ideologies and traditions such as white ethnic characters etc. After the first trailer for Doctor Strange released on YouTube many fans and non-fans were concerned and angered by the level of 'white washing' that the studio had taken in terms of their casting choices. What is white washing? Well white washing is when actors who are originally from a non-white ethnicity and are given to white ethnic actors to take up the role. The controversy had started when Tilda Swinton was given the role to play a Tibetan role which was originally (in the comics) played by an Asian Tibetan man. Many fans believed that the studio and team had ultimately white washed their cast.
The importance of having a Tibetan man play the monk in the story was what fans wanted. They wanted the film to be as close to the film as possible and where disheartened when they found that Tilda was casted to play this role, which (in their eyes) was immoral. The studio and director had to go out of their way to explain the necessary casting choices and said that, the comics where very stereotypical back then, and would be seen as reinforcing such stereotypes in today's society by having and Asian man play the wise and poor person. People still felt that the character was white washed as they believed that the studio wanted to replace the character with a white person.
This debate has now open doors for other Marvel films such as Guardians of the Galaxy and Spiderman Homecoming to have a diverse cast. The new Spiderman movie has now taken this debate into consideration and has begun casting many individuals from different ethnicity.
Chosen text- Film
Film- The Interview
Media issue/debate-
In 2014, this was a highly anticipated comedic movie to launch theatres at the time. The film involves mockery at the North Korean dictator and ultimately parodies-es him. In light of the film about to release, the Korean dictator had hacked Sony Studio's database by putting the film online for free in HD. This event was a shock to the film industry as this was the first time such major hacking has even occurred. It is said that the dictator disliked the idea of a film being made which was built to make fun of him, and thus resulted in his crew hacking into Sony's database and putting the film online. Millions of people watched the film for free on various sites and the studio had lost billions due to this hacking. This hacking had made the film a huge loss and to this day, Sony are still trying to recover some of their money through other parts of their business.
The idea of mocking the dictator had influenced him into attacking Sony for attacking his life. Sony had to sell of its rights to other properties in order to make the money back. It was this even that lead to their pried possession, The Amazing Spiderman franchise to be sold back to Marvel, but with a deal. Sony couldn't bare to lose their golden ticket, and so they agreed to allow Spiderman into the MCU. This deal had made back some of the money that Sony had lost due to the hacking,
Chosen text- Documentary film
Documentary- Amy
Media issue/debate-
After the passing of Amy Winehouse, Director Asif Kapadia was accused of misleading audiences with the footage he used of Amy within his film. One of those people who believed that the film was misleading was Amy's father. He went to say that the film had portrayed him as a negative person as their was a scene of both Amy and her father arguing and he believed that this gave their relationship a negative view in the public's eye. He didn't lime the scenes in which the director had used for the film and there was a lot of debate whether it was personal or not. These debates had caused the films release to extend further and it later released in theatres in July 2015.
Chosen text: Music video
Music video- Ill Manors (by Ben Drew aka Plan B)
Media issue/debate-
The musician Plan B had made a film before making this music video. His film is based around the political stand point of the London riots. His film was widely received by many Londoners particularly the youth. The problems was, was that although he said on many cases that he didn't support the riots, his music video kind of look like it. The music video seemed to show the negative side of the youngsters as they are seen taking drugs and doing violent acts. In addition, he is seen attacking the prime minister in his video, which can open doors of him being seen as a bad role model. The debate is, whether he supported the riots or not as his film and music video kind of give a negative representation of the youth whereas he is saying that they aren't.
Other chosen text that I am interested in are:
- Straight Outta Compton- Film
- 'I'm in love with the coco'- Music video
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