MIGRAIN

Media Language
Use of black and white, different shots throughout, black outs-creating enigmas, its fast paced, uses her sword to show how much power she has, use of chapters, dramatic music used.

Institutions
The institutions for 'Kill Bill Volume Two' is Miramax Institutions. They are a very well known instituions and have produced many successful films such as 'Chiago' and 'Pulp Fiction'.

Genre
The genre for Kill Bill is action. It can also be classified into to many other genre's, drama, and thriller. However, its not your average action film as you would stereotypically expect a male to be killing and avenging people, but its a woman instead. The audience are in shock and thrown of balance as they are watching something that they did not expect, as it not very often they see a woman in control, there are some films where a women has more control over men, for instance 'Charlies Angles'.

Representation
In the text Uma Thurman is represented as powerful, dominant and in control. Men are shown to have less control compared to other actions films where u would expect to see the man as the main character. However, even though the main character is white we also have ethnic minorities represented as well. Vivica A. Fox ‘Vernita Green’ a black woman is represented as powerful and superior. Women are represented with much more power and independence today, they prove that woman can just as much can do the same as men.

Audience
The main target audience for this text would be the middle class, ages 18-27. Males and females would be the target to this text. It is targeted at males because of the genre, action. Also, because of the main character Uma Thurman, as they feel attracted to her. However, females also feel they can relate to main character as she is a female who has more power then men: they feel they are just as good as men and have the same control.

Values and Ideology
Actions films are usually a male based film however Uma Thurman breaks the action ideology, as women have the upper hand and represented as strong and more control. She sends a positive message across proving that women are just as better as men and there is less of the patricharcal society. However, even though Uma Thurman shows a independent strong female, she is directed by a male director Quentin Tarantino. It is likely that male directors portray women characters different from how women directors portray women characters, simply because it’s harder for them to relate to the characters.

Narrative
The narrative has chapters which are spread in a two part series, Kill Bill volume One and Kill Bill Volume Two. Kill Bill is divided into ten chapters, five chapters per volume. As is common in Tarantino films, they are not arranged in chronological order.

The Bride" (Uma Thurman) was the deadliest assassin of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, until the day she decided to leave the business, and assume a new identity and get married. But it was on the day of her marriage that her old "friends" - O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu), Vernita Green (Vivica A. Fox), Budd (Michael Madsen), and Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah), and her boss, Bill (David Carradine) - find her and assassinate the entire ceremony while Bill shoots her in the head, putting her in a coma. After four years, the Bride awakens from her coma and starts her revenge.

10 more key words

Art House - A cinematic production generated by aesthetic and cultural production values rather than commercial consideration.

I wasn't too sure whether i could clearify Kill Bill in the art house genre, but it does have some aspects of a art house film.

Binary Opposition - A term used by Claude Levi-Strauss as part of his agrument that narrative are structured around oppositional elements in human culture, for example, good and evil, life and death, night and day, raw and cooked.

Normally, the dominant character in a action movie tends to be a male, and women tend to be passive and damsel in distress. However, in Kill Bill Uma Thurman is the dominant and main character, as you would expect the hero to be a man instead of a woman.

Feminism - Political movement to advance the status of women by challenging values, social constructions and socioeconomic practices which disadvantage women and favour men.

Kill Bill deals with feminism as women are shown as independent and with a higher status which is what feminst want to achieve: equal rights for women.

Male Gaze - The term used by Laura Mulvey in her essay 'Visual Pleasures and Narrative Cinema' (1975) to describe what she saw as the male point of view adopted by the cinema for the benefit of an assumed male audience.

Males find Uma Thurman attractive and would gaze upon her, as they may find watching a smart, attractive and desirable women in control appealing.

Hero - The principal male or female protagonist in any narrative, with whom the audience identifies and who exhibits moral virtues in line with dominant ideology.

The hero is an very important topic in Kill Bill as you tend to find men to be the hero/protagonist, however in Kill Bill its a women and the wudience are thrown off balance and shocked to see a women in power and a hero.

Subversive - Undermining of dominant idoelogy and values.

Kill Bill is challenging stereotype of men being dominant and in control, as Uma Thurman is dominant throughtout the film, as she takes her revenge.

Symbol - A sign that bears no obvious visual relation to what it represents.

In Kill Bill Uma Thurman uses a sword to show how powerful and controlling she is.

Miramax - A film corporation founded by Harvey and Bob Weinstein in 1979, under the ownership of Wlat Disney Studio Entertainment from 1993.

Miramax are the institution thet helped create Kill Bill, as Kill Bill does have a art house feel, as it does use some of the conventions of a arti house film, such as flashbacks, non linear narrative, etc...

Non-Linear narrative - A aequential narrative which doesnt have a striaght beginning, a middle and an end, its interupted with flashbacks, etc...

Tarantino uses a non-linear narrative in Kill Bill, as we see a continuous flashback within both Volume One and Two.

Patriarchy - Male domination of the political, cultural and socioeconmic system.

Kill Bill challenges the patriarchy society, as a male is not the protagonist/dominant character in Kill Bill, and this also occurs in many other films such as' Charlies Angels'

extra research sites i found

WEBSITES

http://www.premiere.com/article.asp?section_id=5&article_id=1813
Women in Hollywood

http://www.empireonline.co.uk/site/incinemas/review.asp?FID=10077
Film review on Hero, which shows female characters being strong and fitting in typical roles and some not so typical

http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Guardian_Film_of_the_week/0,4267,1059290,00.html
Kill Bill Film Review by peter Bradshaw

http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Guardian_review/0,4267,1200653,00.html
Kill Bill VOL 2

http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/2152/mulvey.htm
Laura Mulvey’s approach of the feminist theory

http://movie-reviews.colossus.net/movies/k/kill_bill1.html
Kill Bill Vol 1 Film Review by James Berardinelli

http://movie-reviews.colossus.net/movies/k/kill_bill2.html
Kill Bill Vol 2 Film review by James Bernardinelli

http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2003/10/06/kill_bill_volume1_2003_review.shtml
kill bill vol 1 film review by Stella papamicheal

3 more research points

-me and vivek are going to to swap books that we have taken out from the liabary, with each other and find relevant key points from each others books, to include in our independent studies

-we are also going to carryout more internet research on female representation and try finding key therist on this topic

- we will also be aiming to go through each others blogs, to find deliciouse links , rextual analysis, key words etc.

research

what i found out book research.

http://www.premiere.com/article.asp?section_id=5&article_id=1813
Women in Hollywood

http://www.empireonline.co.uk/site/incinemas/review.asp?FID=10077
Film review on Hero, which shows female characters being strong and fitting in typical roles and some not so typical

http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Guardian_Film_of_the_week/0,4267,1059290,00.html
Kill Bill Film Review by peter Bradshaw

http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Guardian_review/0,4267,1200653,00.html
Kill Bill VOL 2

http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/2152/mulvey.htm
Laura Mulvey’s approach of the feminist theory

http://movie-reviews.colossus.net/movies/k/kill_bill1.html
Kill Bill Vol 1 Film Review by James Berardinelli

http://movie-reviews.colossus.net/movies/k/kill_bill2.html
Kill Bill Vol 2 Film review by James Bernardinelli

http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2003/10/06/kill_bill_volume1_2003_review.shtml
kill bill vol 1 film review by Stella papamicheal

book research

Author: Nick Lacey
Title: Image And Representation - key concepts in media studies
Publisher: Palgrave

Author: Steve Neale
Title: Genre and Hollwood
Publisher: Routledge

Author: Tim O'Sullivan & Yvonne Jewkens
Title: The Media Studies Reader
Publisher: Arnold

Author: Mandy Ross
Title: the Changing Role Of Women
Publisher: Heinemann Library


Author: Kevin Williams
Title: Understanding Media Studies
Publisher: Edward Arnold


Author: Gill Branston and Roy Stafford
Title: The Media Student's Book

Author: Buckland, Warren
Title: Teach Yourself Film Studies
Publisher: Hodder Headline Plc