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Sunday 21 November 2010

GENRE :D

Yes, I did put a smiley next to the title. And I capitalized the word GENRE. Hey look, I did it again :) I love genre. It's a word I've come to know and love and one that I've known for a long time now. Defining genres helped me through the days of Media Studies and Drama, and I am eternally grateful for this borrowed french word :') anyway enough of this mush. The lecture was better this week if not a tad long- but better none the less. I especially liked when Bill discussed how it isn't possible to trace a path in the history of genre- I completely agree. Genre seems to just do what it wants, there has been no real 'development'- although in more recent years most animations and games are multi-genre'd, partly thanks to film/game-making progresses which have enabled us to experiment with many things in the editing process. However, back in yester-year there were some films that were quite specific in terms of genre. Just check out the picture below.

Clint Eastwood is most famous for his old westerns, and there was very little else in his films that could be compared to another genre apart from 'western'. However in some cases (this being one) simplicity of genre is welcomed- over doing genre in some films can only end up churning out cheesy, tacky entertainment. Some games and films are all the better for their simplicity. The same cannot be said for Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, as shown below.
This film combines and mocks so many different genres that I couldnt physically sit here and explain each one, but in a nutshell: Film, comics and games. These are the mother genres, the big ones- Scott Pilgrim divides down into various other sub-genres but these three are the bread and butter. Films like this are made to be tacky and cheesy, its what makes them worth watching, and the various genres are what make this happen. Genre is the mother of media, without it we'd be very lost.

Oh yeah, there was some other stuff about how the digital world could be taking over the physical world, but we already know about that hoo-ha. In some ways yes, in terms of animation and games and how the , in other ways no. Simples.

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