Mean Girls

Mean girls is a very stereotypical yet highly popular teen chick flick. 

The film is set in a large American high school and is all abut the life of a home schooled African girl called Cady Heron leaving a 12 year research trip to go to a mainstream American public school. When arriving she is welcomed by a darkly dressed girl called Janise and a very camp gay boy called Damian. They teach Cady all the "need to knows" about school life including who to talk to and who to not talk to. The school is catogrised into many cliques (stereotypical and judgemental groups of people each put into a category eg. Nerds, jocks, popular people.) this is very expected in  a typical chick flick, the scene and stories are relatable to the target audience. The cliques and popular scale in the film are a dramatic and exaggerated version of the people categorising we see in our day to day life through school and college. 

Janise and Damian warn Cady to stay away from a group called the plastics who are the three most popular and beautiful girls at school, Regina George being the most popular and using her popularity as a power to get the school running her way. The second down from her is Gretchen wieners, the prettiest girl with a very rich father. The final girl in the "plastics" is Karen smith, a blonde air head with very little common sense or basic knowledge. Despite Janise and Damien's warning to avoided the plastics at all costs,  the plastics take a liking to Cady and invite her to spend lunch with them. 
Due to Cady slowly becoming one of the plastics, Janise decides to hatch a plan to ruin Regina George's reputation and popularity by using Cady as the infiltrator.

When spending her night staying over at Regina's house, Cady is introduced to a book called the "burn book" which is a book containing photos of the students at school along with mean comments about each person. 

After Cady falls in love with regina's ex boyfriend Aron samuels, regina gets very jealous and steals him back at her halloween house party.Still continuing with janis's plan to ruin Regina's reputation, they come up with the idea to remove her attributes which help to make her popular by making her gain weight, seperating her from Aron and turning the other plastics against her, Cady finds that she has now taken place as the new most popular girl in school meaning she has now become just as evil and spiteful as Regina was and she also finds herself abandoning janis and Damian for her new found clique of friends. When Regina finds out about Cady's past attempts to ruin her life she puts mean comments about herself in the burn book and puts the blame on Cady. After a long time trying to stay out of the blame, Cady takes blame for the book and as the guilt fades she finds her old personality is back again. Whilst trying to apologise, Regina storms off into a road and ends up being hit by a bus causing her to fracture her spine. As a punishment, Cady is made to miss the spring fling dance to attend a maths competition however this doesn't stop her being elected to be queen at the dance, when collecting her crown she breaks it into pieces and throws it out to the crowd making sure that everyone has a piece of it. The film ends with all of the plastics finding new cliques and friends ending on a happy equilibrium. 

Chick flick are aimed towards teenage females, the use of pink is seen a lot during these films and the main characters are usually the same age as the target audience so that they can relate to the film and get a feel of realism with what they are watching. Some of the codes and conventions in every chick flick are the love interest with the main character, in this case we have Cadys love interest in Aron, another code and convention would be drama within a group of girls, this film is filled with girly drama, arguments and sly fighting behind each others backs. The drama's and conflict in the film create tension which draws in the audience. For comedy effect, we will often see either a very camp gay man or a ditzy blonde girl, this film contains both characters giving the film the a lot of humour throughout. 

Beauty and the Beast

A recent film that I have seen is Beauty and the Beast. This is a very well known Disney film, some people class Disney as its own genre due to all the typical codes and conventions ( codes and conventions are defined as certain apects of a film e.g. sound, lighting and iconography) that we see throughout the films. When watching a Disney film there are many frequent and recognisable characters that we expect to see. There is a very well known theorist called Propp who explains the names and roles of the most common characters in fairy tales; the princess, the hero, the villain, the helper, the donor.  

-In this case we have;

Belle (Beauty) the princess

 the Beast - the hero 

Gaston - villian 

Phillipe  (her horse) - helper

 the magical house mates - donor

At the start of Disney films we usually see a damsel in distress usually living with only one parent or step parent, a little further in the film the girl will usually set off on a task to then go on a journey to find out a lot about herself. There will then be a villain who gets in the way of the girls journey, in this case a man called Gaston is ruining Belles journey of going to save her farther from a mysterious castle by trying to gain her hand in marriage, unfortunately her quest to save her farther results in her then being locked in the castle in placement of him. Belles journey is joined by some house mates from the castle who are people that have magically been turned into living house objects such as a talking clock and a candle stick and help Belle to feel comfortable in the castle they also help by giving her important information she needs whilst living in the castle. Her horse Philllipe helps Belle get to where she needs to be and to get through a pack of wolves in the woods. The end of all Disney films results in happy endings with the girl getting the man she wants. Other iconic things that happen along the way involve curses for example the Beast was originally a selfish price who was cursed to be a beast until someone falls in love with him. Belle falls in love with him and breaks the spell resulting in him turning back into the handsome Prince he originally was.

The majority of Disney films usually conform to Todorov's theory to understanding the traditional narrative of a film or story. Todorov believes that they all begin with an equilibrium meaning that all main characters, settings and the storyline is introduced with everyone being happy, for example Beauty and The Beast starts with a typical small town filled with happy people with the scene containing Belle on her average day and also helping her father with his latest invention. The next stage is known as the disruption of the equilibrium which is where a villain will step in to disrupt the happiness of the main characters meaning that the full storyline will become clear, Gaston is seen harassing Belle by trying to woo her into giving him her hand in marriage, Belles father also goes missing and is stuck locked away in an old castle after going the wrong way to an inventions fair. The middle of the film is when the disruption has been recognised and tension starts to build whilst the hero attempts to find a solution to any problems caused for example Belle using her horse to go to the castle and take the place as prisoner in the castle in placement of the father. The final 2 stages of Todorovs theory are the hero making their attempt to repair any damage which usually ends in all issues being solved and a new equilibrium being put in place. In this case the beast discovers that he has fallen for Belle and she also discovers her love for him, to put things right the beast offers to release Belle but instead the power of true love turns the Beast into the prince he originally was, the magical house objects back to people meaning they can spend their life together.

This is a theory that Disney films follow as it is the most traditional way to tell a story and the audience know the film will end happily meaning that people will not be upset and can leave the film feeling happy giving them all a sense of escapism as to believing that all things will have a happy ending despite the issues faced.
A classic Disney film is hand drawn and made by animation. The bright colours and happy endings in the films appeal to the younger target audience they aim towards but also make it fun for adults to watch.