rewrite of essay

How does postmodern text differ from regular media texts? Rewrite.

Post modernism is a style or concept developed from modernism and a style or concept in the arts that is characterised by a distrust of theories, grand narratives and ideologies. They differ from regular media texts as they can be playful and nostalgic. Furthermore a postmodern text focuses on the idea that value and meaning can be subjective and accept that things can be fragmented.

Regular media texts are generic and clear cut which means that things can be categorised easily into its specific genres. The Mighty Boosh differs from regular television shows due to its extreme blurring of the boundaries. In all the episodes Vince is constantly mixing fashions from different time periods and cultures. For example in one episode he styles his hair in a green punk rock moeikan and wears a pink feather boa and pearls from a burlesque culture. The blend of styles burs the boundaries between high and low art and also represents his fragmented and hyper identity. Vince’s style also comments on the distrust of grand narratives as his fragmented identity shows how society is defined by media cultures and everything is media simulated.

The show is also different from regular media due to its intertextual references. It relies on its audience to recognise and understand the references to enhance the comedic effect. In one episode Vince gets on stage and begins dancing in a costume that Mick Jagger once wore. The audience needs to be aware of the star’s personality to understand the humorous gesture and to view the scene nostalgically which also makes them part of the joke and making them a media literate audience.

Postmodern texts also differ from regular media in music videos. Lady Gaga’s telephone music video is highly cinematic and lengthy, which leans itself as a short film; however it has a sole purpose to promote itself and being a music video. This it is postmodern as it rejects rigid genre description. The video also features lots of intertexuality and has a high influence to Quinten Tarritino, this is postmodern as it does not come up with something completely original but borrows the best parts and makes it her own to make a purposeful point, pastiche. Influence from Kill Bill is evident with the ‘Pussy Wagon’ in many shots as well as the homicide narrative; the message is to take revenge on people who have wronged her. The intertexuality of Diet Coke, Beats by Dre and Wonderbread also hints to the mass consumer culture which our society is emerged in, a hyperreal society.

This references a distrust of a grand narrative which is also featured in films such as the Matrix by Andy Whacowski 1999. The narrative follows a relationship between a man and a machine and how its existence is virtual which masks the real reality. It differs from regular films that are realistic and believable, on the basis of science and religion, as there many scenes in the film such as ‘Bullet Time’. The scene is CGI constructed and Andy is able to control the uncontrollable, such as slowing down bullets and controlling space and time with his mind, this creates a hyper real situation as it is not possible in reality.

There is also intertextual references to Baudrillard’s book, ‘ Simulacra and Simulation’, it is featured as the book is pulled out with a huge metal front and bind and has dust all over the book, signifying that the book is important. Neo also references the book, “the real world no longer exists because everything is virtual”. This differs from regular texts as it pays homage to the book and the film recognises that everything is simulated and the movie itself is simulation. 

Regular media also like to embrace knowledge and use it to explain situations, post modern texts like to play with irony and accept that there can be no truths. Blade Runner by Ridley Scott makes it hard for the audience to identify the main protagonist. The supposed main protagonist Deckard is portrayed as senseless to violence and kills innocent people. The artificial clones are filled with emotion and passion as there are scenes where the clones are hysterically crying over the death of someone. The questions what it means to be human and the audience are unable to use their knowledge to understand and the film offers no answer either.

Grand Theft Auto is classed as postmodern is due to that fact the gamer imagination is immersed into the gamer world and there are no rules or ‘norms’ There is also a flow within the game where the tasks are harder but achievable and when achieved there is feedback which allows the gamer to feel pleasurable. Within the flow and immersion the gamer is put into a state where being ‘lost’ in the game world leads to an enhanced state of hyper reality. Blurring the boundaries of reality and the gamer could become confused with the right and wrong in reality / society. Especially when all the games are based on real cities, for example Vice City is base din New York, Los Santos is based in Los Angeles. All the locations that they are base in are all conventional locations for gangster films. There is a also a homage paid to these gangster films and the conventions as in GTA the narrative where you survive based on your own intelligence, strength and skill to escalate through the rankings of gangsters.

Postmodern media differs from the regular texts due to its ambiguous views and ability to reference and focus on differences. I believe that postmodern media will continue to use intertextually references to pay homage and to create new meanings and question grand narratives until the point where audience have to question themselves and their own beliefs and values. The media will also make it complicated to decipher between different genres and classification will be impossible. 

Games and Postmodernim

Grand Theft Auto as Postmodern Text

One postmodern theory is that we no longer operate under grand narratives theories and ideologies where everything is explained and everything happens through cause and effect and that we are too fragmented to work in this way.

One prime example of why Grand Theft Auto is classed as post modern is due to that fact the gamer imagination is immersed into the gamer world and there are no rules or ‘norms’ There is also a flow within the game where the tasks are harder but achievable and when achieved there is feedback which allows the gamer to feel pleasurable. Within the flow and immersion the gamer is put into a state where being ‘lost’ in the game world leads to an enhanced state of hyper reality.

People are in one of two minds of the game, whether they think the game is a master piece or they believe it should be banned due to the believable world it creates where intense violence, sex and crime are rewarded. Blurring the boundaries of reality and the gamer could become confused with the right and wrong in reality / society. Especially when all the games are based on real cities, for example Vice City is base din New York, Los Santos is based in Los Angeles. All the locations that they are base in are all conventional locations for gangster films. There is a also a homage paid to these gangster films and the conventions as in GTA the narrative where you survive based on your own intelligence, strength and skill to escalate through the rankings of gangsters.

However there is a debate whether the game itself is postmodern or whether it is the gamer experience that is postmodern. GTA breaks the conventional gamer experience as it gives the player ultimate freedom, allowing them to do whatever they please in a 360 degree media coverage. Where conventional games only allow the player to follow a narrative and can only progress through certain tasks.

Assins Creed

Assisns Creed is a historically based video game. This itself makes is postmodern as it could be viewed as an erosion of history.  There is a constant confusion over time and space as it revolves around a man who is forced to relive his ancestors’ memories through a machine. This leads to a constant bricolage of mixing the old and new as the player experiences the ancestor’s surroundings and new surroundings for the actual character.  There is a breakdown of the distinction between high art and popular culture, ancient civilisations and action and adventure computer games. The time travelling also acts as a simulation / simulacra. The story line is based on fiction but they use real historical characters to simulate and create a hyper reality where the time periods are blurred. Hyper reality is also evident as players are able to play with others online. 

Peer Assessing Postmodern Potluck

When doing the postmodern potluck presentation I thought it well well as all of us had our specific parts and I felt we were informative and had the right information. The video could have been edited better however it did the job and you could hear us all.

Matrix Presentation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=565MxPxtLuw click to watch

matrix is postmodern

Matrix Essay

How is Matrix Post Modern?

The matrix is post modern in many different ways. Firstly the narrative structure is about the show of a dystopian view of the future by exploring Neo’s relationship with a machine and the human race is being controlled by a network of machines and their existence is virtual, masking reality. The theme is post modern because it distrusts the idea of the ‘regular world’. It also looks at the relationship between humans and technology, and in the film there is a lot of ‘hacking’ which references the cyber punks. The relationship between human and technology also looks at Baudrillards philosophy and the matrix is an allegory of the lives we are living and how it is heavily commercialised in a media driven society.

The sequence ‘Bullet time’ which has a strong use of CGI  shows things becoming really slow and Neo is given the ability to stop things that in reality would be inevitable, shows the irony and is hyperreal. Bricolage is also evident as it resembles a video game as there is text on the screen as the ‘baddies’ become on screen and information is being given to the protagonist. This is also referential to the director Wachowski’s other graphic novels.

There is also a genetic hybrid as it features a blend of technophobic science fiction, through its extensive use of machinery and futuristic devises. Such as the machines that plug into the individual heads and space ships that seem to be fighting off gigantic metallic virus shaped robotics. This is also referential as biological viruses are also shaped with a pointy head and several sprouting legs. Hong Kong Kung Fu movies are also featured a lot in the film which is most evident in the training sequences when the walls become traditional Chinese bamboo walls and it is the story of master and the person who is learning. There are a lot of combat and traditional sequences used.

There is also direct intertexuality towards Baudrillards book ‘Simulacra and Simulation (1981)’ which is a cultural and philosophical text. This is shown near the beginning of the film where Neo opens a metal and ancient looking book which happens to be the Simulacra and Simulation, where he takes a disk out. There is a second referencing to the book when Morpheus describes the burned Chicago as, ‘'desert of the real”. Morpheus shows Neo what Chicago actually looks like, burned and destroyed, and tells him that he has been "living inside Baudrillard's vision, inside the map, not the territory". This refers to Baudrillard's theory that "the territory no longer precedes the map, nor survives it. Henceforth, it is the map that precedes the territory - precession of simulacra - it is the map that engenders the territory". In other words, the real no longer exists because everything becomes simulated.

rewrite blade runner essay

How is blade runner post modern?

Blade Runner by Ridley Scott (1982) is set in 2019 in a futuristic and dystopian city the audience are immediately introduced to the neon lit city with flying cars, densely packed skyscrapers and giant sized advertisements. However juxtaposing this elegant view of the city through the use of low angled shots it is revealed that the city is clustered and dark, and has the sense of the 50’s with low key lighting and smoky alleys which stereotypically resembles old crime / murder and gangster films. This is the beginning of the post modern aesthetic and mixing of textual references as a neo-noir visual style.

Throughout the film there is constant hybridity with the mixing of the futuristic views, 50’s views, cultures and social statuses. The mixing of culture is shown when Deckard, an American in LA, is shown in a long shot in a middle of the street where many people are rushing past, low lighting and dominating colours of blue and greys are shown, excluding the stereotypical neon lights of red and oriental patterns. Deckard then goes and takes a seat at an olden day styled noodle bar lit by cheap florescent blue lighting, his surroundings are of oriental people and loud crowd noises. Through the Mise en scene we can see that Deckard is not of dominance especially when he orders his food in English and the man does not reply in that dialect, this shows that English is not a dominant language any more.

The blurring of boundaries is also evident in this film as Deckard kills a lot of innocent people and conventionally protagonists are supposedly hero’s this means that as an audience we could get confused as right and wrong is blurred. However Deckard is portrayed as someone who is very dominating and strong, he seems to be able to kill without any emotions, and the narrative then takes us on a journey and shows the change in him and how he becomes a better character and sacrificing his own life.

There is also intertexuality in the film and the most striking one would be the scene where Deckard finds something in a picture. In this scene the director deliberately uses the camera shots and editing to intensify and build importance of the scene by holding shots for longer on extreme close ups of his face showing emotion and concentration. The scene follows Deckard’s feet walking across a room, at low angle which could signify development and progress that is dark and has lots of oak furnishing, making the room look vintage. The camera then tracks upwards to show the ancient looking TV in mid shot which the audience then discover it is voice activated, making the scene postmodern as it shows again the mix between times. We then see a series of close ups and shuttering of shots from the TV as it revealed a woman in a mirror picture. Although this is significant in the narrative it is also an intertextual reference of the Van Dyke portrait, celebrating its unique attributes.