GCSE Media Studies, Action Adventure, SOW, Yr 11, OCR

1. ACTION ADVENTURE RECAP
LO: To recap knowledge of narrative
structure
To understand the terms ‘spectacle,
jeopardy and suspense’

2. What is a hybrid?
What is a sub-genre?
Target audience of AA films?

3. List all the words you associate with a
hero
HERO

4. What theory can we link to AA films?

5. Narrative structure
There are 5 stages to any narrative.
• What are they?
• Who came up with the 5 stage narrative
theory?

6. Character types
• List the 7 character types which occur in any
narrative.
• Who identified these character types?

7. Point of the narrative
Levi Strauss identified the key term which refers
to the conflict which drives the narrative.
• What is this key term?
• List 3 examples of conflict

8. Jeopardy and
Suspense
Speed and
motion
Action Adventure
Conflict and Combat
Spectacle

9. CGI
Fighting
Fast tempo
Special Effects
Exotic location
Hero and Villain
Damsel in distress
Explosions
Epic
High Speed Chases
Sound
Camera work
Threat of injury/death

10. Spectacle
• Special effects are becoming an essential to
any modern Action Adventure film
• Sometimes hard to spot because the
technology is now so good

11. Types of special effects
• Models and miniatures – scaled down realistic
representations of buildings or vehicles (e.g.:
Star Wars, Harry Potter)
• Make-up – transforms actors – scars, blood,
alien creatures etc.
• Physical Effects – Stunts and pyrotechnics

12. • Camera Speed – slow or
fast motion
• CGI – Computer
Generated Imagery now
makes everything
possible (Avatar)

13. Task
Make a list of any Action Adventure films that
you know which use the following special
effects, provide examples :
• Scale models
• Make-up
• Stunts
• CGI

14. Conflict and Combat
• The fist fight – common in early films - now also
includes martial arts
• Combat can be hand to hand, involve lots of
different weapons or mass battles
• Fight scenes can be comic in tone with no one being
seriously hurt OR realistic portrayals of mass deaths
e.g. Gladiator
• Which films use light references to violence and
which ones are more graphic?

15. • Speed and Motion –
chases, races against time and
escapes are common features
• Speed is mainly associated
with fast moving vehicles (e.g.
Speed, Bourne Identity etc.)
• This is created by the editing straight cuts every second.
• Non-diegetic sound - Fast
paced music also adds to
create a sense of speed and
motion.
• Diegetic sound adds sense of
urgency (e.g.: wheel spins etc)

16. • Jeopardy and Suspense – scenes often end on
a cliff hanger set around the hero having to
escape a threatening situation.
• To create suspense the characters need to be
someone we can identify with and care
about.

17. Watch
• As you watch – make notes on all the key
terms we have identified and recapped in
today’s lesson that are featured within the
clip.