Media Studies - TV
Resists


Media Language Page 14
EDUQUAS

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  • Murder
  • Planning/committing the crime
  • Secrets revealed
  • Double-cross/betrayal
  • Arrest
  • Fights, beating up suspects
  • Gunshots
  • Car chase
  • Street chase
  • Trial
  • Verdict
  • Finding clues
  • Collecting evidence
  • Forensic analysis
  • Reading the rights
  • Interrogating suspects
  • Questioning witnesses
  • Doorstep challenge
  • Searches
  • Stakeouts and tailing
  • False accusations, framing & bribery
  • The red herring
  • Confession
  • Autopsy
  • The line-up
  • Stunts
  • Illegal activity
  • Sexual tension
  • Crime as disruption
  • Sometimes this has already occurred
  • Investigative narrative
  • Intellectual puzzles and enigma codes throughout
  • Narrative positioning with detective/investigator as hero on a quest
  • Binary oppositions of justice v vengeance, personal v professional, cop v killer
  • Denouement – alternative scenarios
  • Flashbacks to crime
  • Narrative closure offers Todorovian resolution for audiences
  • Quest structure (investigator as hero on journey to find killer)
  • Restriction/de-restriction of narrative
  • GFX - particularly title sequence
  • Closed frames
  • Can be gritty or glossy - UK/US, dependent on production values and budget
  • Clear mise-en-scene
  • Handheld camera
  • Tracking shots
  • Music to suit mood and pace – parallel or contrapuntal
  • ES of setting
  • Verisimilitude
  • Low key, often chiaroscuro lighting
  • Slow panning shots
  • Hard focus
  • Police/crime jargon
  • Guns
  • Blood
  • Evidence markers, bullet proof vests, torches, crime tape, tweezers, microscopes, gloves, dust suits, fingerprints, clues, drugs, cars, sirens, uniform, newspapers, notebooks, handcuffs, weapons
  • Urban (or idyllically rural)
  • Night
  • SOC
  • Interview room
  • Office
  • Morgue
  • Courtroom
  • Back alleys
  • Abandoned warehouses
  • Locked rooms
  • Thematic - the quest for and nature of justice
  • Morality
  • Guilt
  • Sociological debates
  • Nature/nurture
  • Sacrifice
  • Mortality
  • Sanity and mental health
  • Man over-reaching - playing God by taking a life
  • Duty v personal happiness
  • Domestic v professional
  • Conscience
  • Notions of order/chaos within society
  • Often eponymous hero - Frost, Vera, Scott & Bailey
  • Antisocial, disillusioned, world-weary detective (Morse, Wallander) - dark past/fatal flaw (hubris)
  • Rookie cop
  • Disillusioned old-timer
  • Partners (unlikely) (Scott & Bailey, Rizzoli & Isles, Lewis & Hathaway)
  • Maverick cop in conflict with authority
  • Anti-hero (Dexter)
  • Irascible boss
  • Corrupt authorities
  • Suspects – likely and unlikely
  • Femme fatale
  • Crime lords
  • Supervillain (intelligent)
  • Suffering villain
  • SOCOs
  • Pathology/forensics officers
  • Hero/heroine cop
  • Victim with a past
  • Criminal psychologist/expert
  • Informant
  • Quirky DI - (Monk, Columbo)

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