Sample exam questions for Popular film and emotional response

 Here are two example questions from the Popular Film and Emotional Response unit. Follwed by two more sample questions


1. ‘One of the great pleasures of popular cinema is surrendering to the film experience and allowing ourselves to be emotionally manipulated.’ Discuss this statement with reference to the films you have studied for this topic.
From the examiners report...
The best responses did the following:

• A detailed and sophisticated knowledge and understanding of the films studied, particularly their affective characterisitcs
• A sound appreciation of the variety of ways in which emotional response in the spectator is generated – with the ability to offer detailed analysis of different ways in which the popular film examples chosen manipulate response
• An ability to develop an argument that focuses very directly on the pleasure of surrendering to manipulation. A variety of examples will be very effective in demonstrating this. The detail of the argument may be on whether we “allow ourselves” to be manipulated or controlled by the mechanisims at work within the film.
• The argument may be extended, burrowing deeper into questions of complicity and questioning wheter in fact, we have the capacity as spectators to simultaneously stand inside and outside the experience.

2.’Emotional response to a popular film is dependent on the ways in which we are made to identify with particular characters.’ How far has this been your experience?
Again, from the examiner...

• A detailed and sophisticated knowledge and understanding of the films studied, particularly their affective characterisitcs
• A sound appreciation of the variety of ways in which emotional response in the spectator is generated – with the ability to offer a detailed account of character construction and the wyas in which systems of identification are set up.
• An  ability to develop an argument demonstrating the extent to which identification with character is a key component of the pleasure the spectator takes from the film viewing experience.
• This argument may be extened by means of comparison with other factors that determine the spectator’s emotional response, including detailed reference to macro or micro features of film form.

More sample exam questions
1. Explore possible reasons to explain why a second or third viewing of a film can actually increase the emotional response rather than lessen it.
2. How far is the emotional response to mainstream films triggered by specific techniques used by the filmmakers?

Wall-E

Look at the little star-gazer....you can just feel him saying 'there must be more to life than compacting garbage' *sigh*

Make sure you read all of this - test to follow next week on characters, references, box office, critical success and emotional response.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WALL-E

Read this interview with Andrew Stanton - it's in a number of parts so follow the links
http://www.suite101.com/content/andrew-stanton-on-walle-a56451

Good review here, some succinctly made points and deals, to some extent, with audience response:
http://www.moviezeal.com/wall-e/ - make sure you read it...

Once you've read all of the above, write a comment to this post outlining your own PERSONAL RESPONSE to the film. Give a couple of specific examples of the scenes you responded to most and WHY. Make reference to the FILM TECHNIQUES that are being employed to make you feel that way. Include any quotes form your reading or notes, where relevant.

Audience response - some reading

Read this article from Jump Cut.
http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/onlinessays/JC04folder/AudienceResponse.html
Some fairly high level stuff here. Concentrate on the 'Catergories of Audience Response' section. Don't worry too much about the sections on Othon as an example of a self-reflective film.
We will look to apply some of this to the films we study in this unit.

Exam basics - FM4

Just a clarification of your final exam for Year 13 Film Studies...

It is called: FM4 - Varieties of Film Experience - Issues and Debates

It is two and three quarter hours long. 

You answer three questions, one from each section. 

The sections are:

Section A: World Cinema (Secialist Study 1: Urban Stories - Power, Poverty and Conflict) 35 marks

Section B: Spectatorship Topics (Popular Film and Emotional Response) 35 Marks

Section C: Single Film - Close Critical Study (Fight Club) 30 Marks

So, 165 mins to get 100 marks total.

Rougly divided you should spend 55 mins each on sections A and B and spend 50 mins on section C. This leaves 5 minutes for reading and proofing. Clearly you need to plan your essays in light of the question you will tackle and then write the essay so this needs to be taken into account. However, don't spend more than 10 minutes planning! Try to aim for 5. 

Remember that you will have a choice of two questions for each of sections A and B. For section C there are two 'General questions' but also one 'specific question' - you choose one.

Spectatorship topics: Popular film and emotional response

Team America World Police - "Putting the F back in Freedom"

Post viewing tasks:
Investigate a range of responses to the film. Read reviews, interviews and analysis of the film from both sides of the argument.
Use the readings given in class and the links below as a starting point. Find your own resources and prepare a case from your side of the argument.

http://www.movieweb.com/news/trey-parker-and-matt-stone-talk-team-america-world-police

http://www.flakmag.com/film/teamamerica.html