Media Theory!

 Theories of Media 

HI BLOG!! As part of our media context essay, we are instructed to incorporate Media Theories in relation to our case studies.  We were given a paper listing various Media Theories and theorists. When developing our film case study, as part of the sections to research, we were asked to research a Media Theory that relates to the film and explain how it relates. For our film opening, we are tasked with selecting a media theory we'd like to incorporate and explaining why we have chosen it for our intended purpose. 

After further thought and research, my partner Jake and I agreed that the best Media Theory to include is the Active Audience Theory. The Active Audience Theory by Stuart Hall claims audiences are not passive recipients of media content but actively engage with, interpret, and create meaning from it. This theory emphasizes the role of audience members in shaping their media experiences, highlighting their ability to select, negotiate, and resist messages based on their own backgrounds and contexts. In other words, audiences are more likely to want to consume media where they feel as if they can interpret what comes next or feel engaged. We are going incorporate this with our plot idea with the idea of this mysterious figure. You may be asking yourself how a mysterious figure is going to make the audience feel as if they can interpret the scene, well heres how! During this part of the scene, a woman is going to see a figure in the distance of the parking lot, but it will be backlit, so you will not be able to see the face, only the silhouette. This builds that eerie suspense, with the woman being all by herself in an empty parking lot with a creepy figure under the street light, which will allow the audience to start thinking about what could possibly happen next. Will the figure attack her? Will it start creeping closer? Is it someone she knows playing a prank? This is an example of Active Audience Theory, which is getting the reader to feel engaged in the film, well, in our case, the opening. 

Here are some images of what we are trying to acheieve of this figure that is meant to get the audience engaged.