research on books:

what i found out...
Strinati, Dominic (2000) : An introduction to studying Popular culture. London: Routledge

that the gangster film is mainly associated with American gangsters.

1. was first laid out during the 30's.


2. the first gangster movies made are Little Caesar(1930), Public Enemy(1931) and Scarface(1932), still used as common examples of the Gangster Genre,and also seen as the classical movies of this particular genre.


3. The gangster film itself has subgenres and many features to be explored, such as the production of the movie, relation to hollywood and the studio system,the narrative and the ideology of the movie and how it is related to the "American Dream".


4. Gangster films are about Law, order and crime which are also features of the other genres such as crime or police genres, but this particular genre focuses on gangsters and their stories. (how and why they got into crimes, success as Gangsters, their lives, the power they had, etc...


5. Gangsters movies are usually aimed at a wider audience and a society in order to warn them from the crimes that are happening, throughout the character of the gangster.

The gangster film and the Hollywood system:

1. the Gangster film is the product of the growth of the Hollywood studio system.
2. "the ways in which the studios were organised to produce films can be seen as determining factors on the final pattern or form of the individual film" Ryall (1979:28), the Hollywood system has limits on the films being produced, however the gangster film has been shaped as the product of the Hollywood system.
3. according to Hollywood, the gangster film could combine realism and popular culture because it has been very popular throughout the years and more films have been made following this type of genre.

Ideology and the Gangster film:

1. Warshow (1964:84): the gangster is a product of the city and the gangster film is a the product of the imaginary city created by cinema "the real city produces only criminals but the imaginary city produces gangsters" which means that the gangster speaks out for the American people and rejects the qualities and the demand of modern life.
2. "the gangster is what we want to be and what we are afraid we may become." and this is expressed through the character of the gangster.

RESEARCH FROM THE FIRST MEETING:

Here are the following links that i found on the first three areas of research:
VIOLENCE:
the following link is from the guardian and has some true stories about the violence that is happening in britain, news stories which mainly include gun crimes, crime statistics which will be really useful for our studies. the quote used in this article is "The rise of knife and gun culture is about boys", this is related to both of our studies because it is about crimes and violence of boys.
the other link which is also related to violence is about parents complaining about the violence that is shown in movies and how children are affected by these movies, and that these movies are mainly watched by younger audiences, and also talks about how directors are using younger characters in order to appeal to younger audiences so they will watch those violent movies.
this link is about the differnt types of violence that is used in movies and againn relating to real life and how it is affecting other children and also includes some statistics.
this website is about violence and realism adn is investigating on a novel but explaining the issues of the violence genre.

PRIDE
the other issue that we decided to research on is Pride because both of our texts use this type of issue and how the characters are refusing to be humilated or bullied by other people, such as n my text 50Cent tries to do anything in order to revenge from the murder of his mother.
Definition of pride.

YOUTH CULTURE
The following article is about anti social behaviour( youth crime and gang culture) that is happening in Britain.
“ We have got to analyse what is going wrong here. Is it a general state of British society?The night London gangs brought murder to a club And I think it isn’t. It is about a specific problem within a specific criminal culture to do with guns and gangs."
Tony Blair
“ Surely no one imagines we can stop crimes like this simply with better policing or better gun control? The problem lies within families and communities — and so does the solution."
David Cameron
The other link is about what is causing the youth crime and what is the government doing against it.

2nd blog meeting with my blog buddy:

Me and Farah have decided to start researching on the following three areas, after our 2nd meeting:
Subcultures:
we decided to research on this topic because both of our texts have types of groups which comes under this category, which are black and white males.
Binary opposition:
both texts use this theory which is really important to both of our studies, that is the reason to investigate more on this theory in details.
Disaster movie:
This is used in both of our movies, which follows the Todorovian narrative (equilibrium,disequilibrium and new equilibrium) because in both texts there is something which is destroying the narrative and making that narrative non linear, so we decided to research on other disaster movies that we can quote when writing our studies.

10 KEY WORDS:

Bridging shot: a camera shot that shows a passage or a change of a location which connects one scene to another.
This is used on the intro of my movie, where the location of the movie is shown.
Crime fiction: a television genre with the use of narratives and representation which are causing the change in social,cultural expectations.
This can be related to my movie because it is giving us a view or a representation of some black males.
Folk devil: a term used by Stan Cohen used to describe groups in society which are causing problems or threat to the society.
In the movie the gangsters which are seen as causing threat and problems in the society.
Gangster: the gangster genre, the use of gangsters in the movie and forming up gangs.
Hero: the protagonist of the movie, the main character that the audience identifies with.
This term will be used a lot in my study, as in the movie we are identifying with 50Cent who is the hero of the movie, and the whole movie is based on him.
Levi Strauss: the theorist that mentioned the binary opposition.
i will use this theory in my study because i will relate it to 50Cent being the hero and the other gangsters that become his opponents, this is shown when he was shot nine times.
New man: term used to describe a new type of masculinity.
This term will be used in my movie because most of the actors that are in my movie are black males.
Patriachy: male domination of political, social and economic values.
This term will be used because it is showing how 50Cent is ruling over the gang and how gangsters are becoming so patriarchal by ruling over.
Point of view shots: shot taken from a point of view of a person.
As this movie is a biography of 50Cent, the point of view shot is commonly used in the movie to make us identify with the character.
Sound effects: a sound which is added to a film which isn't digetic.
This type of effect is used in many scenes in the movie, mainly when there is a use of guns.

10 LINKS:

• This website investigates more on the Gangster genre (the history of gangsters and how they are represented in movies, what crime/things they are getting involved in), i can use this link when writing on the different genres of the movie and one of then is a gangster genre.


• The following website has some points about the representation of black people in movies, which might be useful to my study as i am studying about the representation of black youngsters, it also includes examples of other movies which can be mentioned on my study.


• This website is about the gangster and crime genre, and it also gives some examples on some movies that have been in successful in this genre, this therefore is going to be related to my text in the gangster genre and in the crime genre, because my movie is about gangsters and the crimes that they are getting involved in.


• This article is a true-life article about young black males that have been called gangsters, because they are black youngsters, it is can be used in my study to show the racism issue that has been brought up against black people, and that might be the case that it is causing this people to form gangs and start fighting in order to get money etc...


• This link is about the rap music becoming successful and how most of the reap music singers are being attacked, which is related to my study because i can relate it to 50Cent and how he was shot in the movie,mentioning 2PAC, Snoopdogg, 50cent etc...
• The website is about the representation of black young people and what problems that are happening to them.
• This is an interview about 50Cent speaking about his movie and about what have happened to him in the past.
• A review about the movie "50Cent Get rich Or Die Tryin".
• The following website has an interview with 50Cent and his relation to gangsters.
• this website is about the representation of black young males.
  

BLOG BUDDY H/W: 19/11/07

Today Me and my blog buddy Farah discussed the three next areas that we are going to research on, apart from masculinity we found out the other topics that we both are going to touch up a lot when we are writing our studies.

• Violence: both of the movies use violence in different ways,such as crimes which is one of the topic that we both have to use at some point.
• Youth Culture: is the other topic that is also important to our studies, i will definitely have to use it because my topic mainly concentrates on youths, specifically black people, and also Farah will be able to use it because she concentrates on different types of hooligans and one of the groups are youths.
• Pride: is an issue that both of us are going to discuss in some respect, how in Green street these people(hooligans) don't want to be chased by the police in whatever they are doing and they are fighting back, and in my text where 50Cent is being shot many times and has enemies following him everywhere, but he doesn't give up and mainly when his mother was killed he stood up and fought back.

blog buddy research on mascunality:

this website includes a list of books which are about represenation of males whch will be helpful for both of us, because we are both doing research on males in general.

A Man’s Genre?
Overwhelmingly, on the big screen, until the 1990s, the heroes of these genres have been men.
The American “Men’s Journal” selected the “50 best guy movies of all time” in their Dec 2003 issues. The magazine’s writers David Chute and Mark Horowitz wrote:
“... great guy movies are distillations of the male experience, reduced to the essentials. For good reason nearly all of them tend to be about soldiers, athletes, cops, and every kind of loner. They are unapologetically male.”
A selection of those chosen:
Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) – war
The Seven Samurai (1954) – combat
Platoon (1986) – war
The Good, The Bad and the Ugly (1967 ) - western
Die Hard (1988) – action
Terminator (1984) – sci-fi action
Enter the Dragon (1973) – martial arts
“Action-adventure has brought men to their television sets more often than any other programming except sport” Paul Rutherford

this website has a good information about gender roles and mainly concentrates on males.

black males

farah's research:
Representations of Masculinity'Masculinity' is a concept that is made up of more rigid stereotypes than femininity. Representations of men across all media tend to focus on the following:Strength - physical and intellectualPowerSexual attractiveness (which may be based on the above)PhysiqueIndependence (of thought, action)Male characters are often represented as isolated, as not needing to rely on others (the lone hero). If they capitulate to being part of a family, it is often part of the resolution of a narrative, rather than an integral factor in the initial equilibrium. It is interesting to note that the male physique is becoming more important a part of representations of masculinity. 'Serious' Hollywood actors in their forties (eg Willem Dafoe, Kevin Spacey) are expected to have a level of 'buffness' that was not aspired to even by young heart-throbs 40 years ago (check out Connery in Thunderball 1965).Increasingly, men are finding it as difficult to live up to their media representations as women are to theirs. This is partly because of the increased media focus on masculinity - think of the burgeoning market in men's magazines, both lifestyle and health - and the increasing emphasis on even ordinary white collar male workers (who used to sport their beergut with pride) having the muscle definition of a professional swimmer. Anorexia in teenage males has increased alarmingly in recent years, and recent high school shootings have been the result of extreme bodyconsciousness among the same demographic group.``He [Charles Andrew Williams] e-mailed us and told us that he just wanted to come home and that it was just awful over there. They were teasing him, calling him 'country boy.' He didn't dress right, he didn't look right. He was skinny, they called him gay,'' she [a friend's mother] said. " Full Story HereAs media representations of masculinity become more specifically targeted at audiences with product promotion in mind (think of the huge profits now made from male fashion, male skin & haircare products, fitness products such as weights, clothing etc), men are encouraged (just as women have been for many years) to aspire to be like (to look/behave in the same way) the role models they see in magazines. This is often an unrealistic target to set, and awareness of this is growing. Read about the increasing influence of men's magazines here and here.Whilst some men are concerned about living up to the ideal types represented in magazines, others are worried by what they perceive as an increasing anti-male bias in the media. There is growing support for the idea that men are represented unfairly in the media - read a selection of articles here and here.
Masculinity in Crisis
Journalism of Gender Masculinity in advertising
http://www.mediaknowall.com/gender.html

BLOG BUDDY FROM OTHER CLASS:

my blog buddy from the other class is Neelema, because we have quiet similar topics which is about black youngsters and that is similar because we can both share the same ideas of how are black people in general represented in different societies and communities.
Neelema's blog is very detailed mainly the theories that she have included in the blog which will help me as well and will able to use them in my study, and also the text is quiet similar about the stereotyping of black males.

BOOKS FOR MY RESEARCH:

1. Sarita Malik (2002): representing black britain, black and Asian images on Telivision, Sage publications.
2. Robert Ferguson (1998): representing race, GB:Arnold Publications.
3. (2003):representing men, madness and mascunality in the media, GB: Arnold Publications.
4. Edited by Peter Marsh and Anne Campbell (1982): Agression and violence, Basil Blackwell Publisher LTD.
5. Pines Jim (1975): Blacks in film: a survey of racial themes and images in ameriacn film. London: Studio Vista.
6. Oscar H. Gandy, Jr (1998): communication and race. New York, Arnold Publications.
7. Lyn Gorman and David McLean (2003): media and society in the twentieth century. Germany: Blackwell Publishing.
8. Gill Branston and Roy Stafford (2003): the media student's book (third Edition). London: Routledge.
9. Tim O'Sullivan, Brian Dutton, Philip Rayner (2003): studying the media (third Edition). London: Arnold Publications
10. Rai Alok (1992) : Black skin, black masks, Framework 38/39:74-86

---BLOG BUDDIES H/W---

My class blog buddy is Farah, because my topic is about representation and her issue is about representation as well,and both of us are concentration on the representation of young males.

It will be helpful for both of us in a way because, we can talk about the representation of young people in different places and compare them.

The other blog buddy still needs to be agreed...