In the early years of cinema, in 1950's America, people were obsessed with the idea of Science Fiction films. They had been introduced around this time, and people came to love them. They believed them; and became scared of potential UFO's and alien invasions, therefore the audiences wanted more. In fact, anything other than Science fiction would be seen as unnecessary; because Science fiction was the thing at the time, anything else would be unpopular, and irrelevant.
In the 1950's, a new American film was created. It was titled 'Creature from the black lagoon'. However, this film was created as a horror film. Therefore in this time, the filmmakers understood that this film may not be accepted into the film society, because it is not a Sci-fi. As a result, Universal decided the best option would be to market the film as a Sci-fi; not a horror. So they made it seem like the creature, or the monster in the horror film, was actually an alien who was invading the planet. The audience was invested in this as a result, because it fits under the Sci-fi conventions. Even though the film is a horror film, it was necessitated that it needs to be marketed as a Sci-fi film, in order to gain some popularity. The film then became an example of Hybridisation. This was also a successful example of re-genrification as the film did financially well at the box office, despite its real. In addition, film production companies had to consider the audiences and their needs. Universal were centered around horror films, but because these types of films were un-conventional at the time, they had to reconsider and turned to Sci-fi films, because they were so popular at the time.
In class on Tuesday the 16th, we had to use this idea of re-genrification and apply it to films we know, and would then have to present out ideas. My group decided to choose Baz Luhrmann's 'Romeo and Juliet', starring Leonardo DiCaprio. By standard tradition, this film is a romance, tragedy and love film. However, our group explored it further using our genre understanding so far, and we concluded this film can be seen as a thriller film.
We came to this conclusion for several reasons. One reason is the iconography with guns and swords; this makes the film seem more tense and also makes the audience think of the more violent scenes to come. We would also not associate guns and swords with love at first glance. Secondly, this film can also link to a Western film, due to the film being set in one small area, and the audience thinks, how far can these characters outrun the danger? In addition, director Baz Luhrmann includes soundtracks with suspense, the tone and also adds an exciting dimension to the film. Furthermore, to convey our idea that Romeo and Juliet can be seen as a thriller, George in our group created a short video trailer of the film as if it was actually a thriller film. To make it seem like a thriller, he used quick editing techniques, quick frames instead of extended shots, and fades to black, and along with a fast paced, tense soundtrack over it. Doing so made the trailer look tense, exciting and like a thriller film. You wouldn't of thought of the film Romeo and Juliet as a romance, tragedy love film by looking at this trailer. This is significant. Large film companies such as Universal and Warner Bros could also do this, doing so would create audiences expectations for the film, which is actually somewhat different to what the film actually is. For example Universal could show audiences our Romeo and Juliet thriller trailer, then the audience would build up expectations of the film to be a thriller, when actually it's a romance and love film. Genre can be misleading and cause the audiences to build up expectations when in fact the film is different. The overall term of genre evolving is 'Compartmentalised'.
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