We decided that our teen angst film for our media coursework will be called Baby on Board.
We chose this name as it is a typical sign for a parent with a baby in a car, and we felt it would be relative to the film produced.
The unique selling point of Baby on Board is that it is a British, low budget film, set and filmed in the UK. It has a twist on typical teen angst films as it portrays life accurately, as it is based on characters that are realistic and that you could meet in your school or in the street.
The target audience of Baby on Board is teenaged girls aged 12-18. We chose this target audience as it involves our age group, ad so it will be easy to make the film appeal to them.
The main character, Jessie, is played by Courtney. She is the most popular girl in her school and has a perfect life, until she gets pregnant and loses it all.
Her boyfriend Jake is to be played by Danny Barnett. He says he will always support Jessie, but will that change when he finds out he’ll be a father?
Jessie’s best friend Emily is played by Ellen Ryan-Gill. She has always had an eye for Jake, and would do anything to get with him.
Other than the three main characters, there are other social groups portrayed throughout the school, such as the chavs including Bianca, played by Chloe,
and the geeks such as Gertrude, played by Rachel.
Also there is a teacher who will be played by Mrs Twydell.
The plot outline of our film is that the most popular girl in school, Jessie, gets pregnant at the hottest party of the year. When she comes to tell her boyfriend, Jake, he gets mad and breaks up with her, leaving her with nobody to support her with the child. She loses her friends and family on a downward spiral through the schools social groups, going from the very top to the bottom. Her back-stabbing best friend Emily gets together with Jake, leaving her with nobody in the world. Even the geeks are above her. She quits her school, not being able to bare going back there again. At her new school she meets Robbie, a new, nice guy who makes her feel special. They get together and the baby is born, and they all live happily ever after.
The generic conventions of a teen angst film we have are:
- · “Evil” female character
- · Different social groups
- · Set in a school
- · Girl as the main character
- · Party scene involving alcohol and sex
- · Teenagers as the main focus
- · Theme of growing up and betrayal
We also included some conventions of a film opening sequence such as:
For the party sequence we decided to use fast, upbeat music to fit the stereotype of a teenaged party, and to show that the teenagers are living fast paced lives. If we choose to use music underneath the voiceover in the title scene, then it will be slow, calm music to connote stillness, and create a vast change in mood between the classroom and the party. We chose to use our Media classroom and D2 as the settings for our film. This is because the settings fit the purpose of the film, and are easily recognizable as the rooms they are supposed to be.
We presented the above information for the class and the feedback we got was:
- Don't read as much from the paper
- Use more media terminology
- Go into more detail about certain aspects of the presentation such as generic conventions.
