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Afrofuturism THE MAGAZINE FOR STUDENTS OF FILM AND MEDIA STUDIES SEPTEMBER 2018 ISSUE 65 AFROFUTURISM OH COMELY THOR RAGNAROK CHILDISH GAMBINO ASSASSIN’S CREED STORIES WE TELL TAXI TEHRAN TIDE ADVERTISING MR ROBOT Contents 04 Making the Most of MediaMag MediaMagazine is published by the English and Media 06 Media Studies: Centre, a non-profit making Why the Bad Press? organisation. The Centre Simon Gardiner began publishes a wide range of his teaching career at a classroom materials and time of crisis for A Level runs courses for teachers. Media Studies. Here he If you’re studying English explains why the subject at A Level, look out for is still going strong. emagazine, also published by the Centre. 08 Wakanda Forever! Giles Gough looks at how Black Panther deals with post-colonialism, plural representations and Afrofuturism. 14 This is America: Music, Politics and Protest Childish Gambino’s compelling take on violence 08 and race was a viral hit. Hip-hop is rediscovering its political roots, says Tom Gatti. 18 The Theory Drop: Hegemony The English and Media Centre In this new segment, we 18 Compton Terrace ask a teacher to unravel London N1 2UN a complex media theory. Telephone: 020 7359 8080 Here, Claire Pollard explains Fax: 020 7354 0133 22 26 Hegemony and Pluralism. Email for subscription enquiries: Illustrated by Tom Zaino. [email protected] 22 Tainted Love: Touring the Music of Sightseers Editor: Claire Pollard Mark Ramey plugs into Copy-editing: the Sightseers soundtrack Jenny Grahame to see how director, Ben Andrew McCallum Wheatley, uses music to Subscriptions manager: underscore meaning in Maria Pettersson 14 this dark British comedy. Design: Sam Sullivan Newington Design This magazine is not photocopiable. Why not subscribe to our web package Print: S&G Group which includes a downloadable and printable PDF of the current issue? Tel 020 7359 8080 for details. Cover: Chadwick Boseman as T’Challa in Black Panther. Photo: Matt Kennedy ©Marvel Studios 2018 2 Contents 26 Oh Comely All 52 (S)ex Machina Ye Faithful Alex Garland’s sci-fi drama MediaMag caught up with Ex Machina certainly Alice Snape, Editor of Oh raises questions about Comely, a magazine that’s the looming artificial changing the way women intelligence threat, but it’s see themselves and the the underpinning issues of world around them. voyeurism that Ella Johnston finds most unsettling. 32 Are You Telling the Truth? 56 Pretty Fly for Roy Stafford examines issues a White Guy of reality and authenticity Kirsty Worrow asks if in Sarah Polley’s brilliant Thor Ragnarok is the first film, Stories We Tell. significantly progressive superhero movie. 35 Taxi for Panahi In this article, Sam Hiscock 60 Cyberattack: more explains why Taxi Tehran is than a paranoid fantasy, 48 56 essential viewing for those it’s the new normal. studying global cinema. Elaine Scarratt explores Mr Robot’s anti-capitalist 38 Tide to the Kitchen Sink theme, its unconventional If you want to understand representations and the a place and time, then impact of positioning look at their advertising. viewers in the mind of a Jonathan Nunns examines highly-skilled but mentally a 1955 Tide advertisement. unstable computer hacker. 42 Grace and Frankie 64 The Careers Download Caroline Reid explores sexual MediaMagazine interviews identity and relationships in Anu Gopalakrishnan about 60 35 mainstream entertainment. her role as a Creative Editor for Disney. 48 Aveline: Merchant, Slave, Assassin 66 Film Notes: Elephant Laurence Russell examines (Clarke, 1989) this unique and layered In this new feature, Symon character and asks why Quy explains the intentions games companies are behind Alan Clarke’s brutal, so afraid to write female social realist film, Elephant. and BAME characters. 52 3 Making the Most of MediaMag Examining the Hegemony Illustration It’s a Tide Ad Look again at the main Hegemony illustration In the Tide article on page 38, on page 19. In this image, Tom Zaino uses a classic Jonathan Nunns suggests that to understand Hollywood genre to highlight how much of the media a place and time, you need to look at its we consume is conceived, produced and controlled advertising. So why not use an ad or a by white, middle-class males. (Notice how women series of ads to practise analysing context? and BAME people are present but marginalised.) In most of your exam questions, you will Use Zaino’s structure to draw a diagram of a media be required to link texts to their cultural, text that you are studying or are interested in. Begin with social, political and economic contexts. conception: whose idea was it, In 2018 Tide spent tens of millions of dollars who wrote the script or original on a series of ads by advertising giants Saatchi & storyline? Once you have a Saatchi which were broadcast during the Super few names, Google around Bowl, one of the most expensive advertising slots and see if you can get an idea on U.S. television. The slot alone cost $15million of their gender, ethnicity and without factoring in production costs, talent etc. class. (Look at their education The ad starred David Harbour who plays here: did they attend a private Jim Hopper from Stranger Things. Google or grammar school? Are they ‘Tide Ad Super Bowl’ to watch it now. 18 university educated? If so, is it The advert is made up of a sequence of ads for Russell Group, was it before the 80s when fewer people went immediately recognisable products presented to University? See if Wikipedia lists their parents’ jobs etc.) in familiar and/or stereotypical ways. There are Do the same research into the director and, if you more than 10 ads being ‘parodied’ here. Watch can find it out, the commissioner at the channel. it through and see if you can identify what the Then look again at the text itself. different products are that are being advertised. • Does it show the dominant group (white, How do they reflect Western society? Can you middle class, male) to be more powerful or identify any cultural or political even just more visible in the texts? ideas that are representative of • How are women depicted? American or British society? • Are there plural representations of gender, class and Now think about the final bit race or do they rely on stereotypes that could cultivate of dialogue: ‘So, does this make negative ideas about different social groups over time? every Super Bowl ad a Tide For further reading, have a look at this profile of Donald ad? I think it does, watch and Glover aka Childish Gambino (see Tom Gatti’s article on see.’ By including this line, they page 14) in the New Yorker. He says ‘blackness is always extend their message across seen through the lens of whiteness – the lens of how 38 the ads that follow, hoping that white people can profit from that moment’. He relates whenever the audience spots this to 12 Years a Slave which is the story of black slaves, bright clean clothes in the other ads, they’ll think made by black people but in a white system with a white of Tide. Is this post-modern advertising genius paying audience in mind. Glover’s comedy drama series, or is this representative of a more aggressively Atlanta, is created by black people for a black audience. capitalist attitude? Discuss it with your class. Try and track down a few episodes and watch them. Are You could also use this approach to examine the the representations in Atlanta more positive or plural as context of some of your set exam texts, especially a result? Do you think the fact that it was made for FX if you’re studying media texts from the past. You (a subsidiary of Fox in the U.S.) affects the content? could use print ads in much the same way. 4 The MediaMag Production Awards 2018 Better than Ever! and music videos were still by far the most popular form, and clearly much enjoyed by the filmmakers. So what to look for in judging music videos? Nik’s comments here were hugely useful – they’re all about story-telling, even the most non-linear and abstract ones, and they don’t have to be all about sophisticated effects and high-end kit. Ultimately our favourites were those which used props, costume, space and attention to visual detail to generate high-energy, quirky original performances – see Sweet Dreams by students from the Latymer School, for example. Pace and skilful editing are crucial, and our Best Editing Award also went to a music video, White Noise, which combined narrative, eatwave conditions and unreliable trainlines varied locations and lively animated effects. did not deter a stream of student filmmakers, Other more general issues were the narrative their families, friends and teachers from significance of a strong soundtrack, the power of making the trip to BFI Southbank from humour (see our winners The Freeze and the National Hall over England for our favourite afternoon of Sleep Campaign), the role of really well-planned the year – and what an afternoon it was! cinematography and lighting (Incognito was an This year we were privileged to recruit the film producer amazing example), and again, the importance of a Nik Powell as our chief judge. Nik’s slate of brilliant films clear storyline, both in fiction and documentary. and his entrepreneurial expertise, coupled with 14 years of After a brilliant showreel, our filmmakers and families experience as the Head of the National Film and Television celebrated, socialised, selfied and networked over liquid School, made him the perfect fit for the job, and his refreshment in the BFI’s Blue Room – a joyful end to an comments on each shortlisted production were spot on.
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