Tackling Exam Questions

2007 Past Paper – Analysis Q3

With reference to Representation and at least two other key aspects, analyse the ideological discourse(s) of a text you know well.
How to tackle this question

Stage 1
Break down the question so you know what you’re being asked.

Media Analysis questions always have a key phrase(s) which is what they want you to respond to.

So you have to show your knowledge of Representations, Narrative and Audience but it must be angled towards the key phrase!

The key phrase in this question is ideological discourse

The thing to remember is that the way the question is phrased you should try to refer to ideological discourse in all the main sections of your essay (Representations Narrative Audience)

Stage 2
Now you need to think about ideological discourse and how it can be discussed in relation to Let the Right One In.

Ideology relates to the mindset/beliefs of the filmmakers. Quite often their deeper beliefs about gender etc are sub-consciously reflected in the film.

So DO NOT say that they put their ideological views in deliberately!

What is interesting about LTROI is that its representations are quite challenging. After all that is why we studied the film.

The representations challenge the Vampire genre and the audience segments and they also affect the narrative structures of the film!

How do they do this? Because the central character of Eli is a challenging female construct. The other central character Oskar is a challenging male construct.

Segments of the audience will find this a challenge to their own ideological discourse which may well see females and males as more traditional constructs.

Audience members might also find it challenging and pleasurable that the female construct of Eli drives the narrative.

She is the narrative disruption
She is also the narrative resolution
These are aspects of narrative change normally associated with male constructs!

Stage 3
Now it is time to tackle the writing of the essay.

Since the examiner has provided you with a key phrase with which to discuss the key aspects it stands to reason that you should reference this key phrase in your response

For example somewhere in your opening paragraph you might want to write something like

Let The Right One In is a film which takes the vampire sub genre in a new direction and which provides an interesting challenge to its audience in terms of ideological discourse..

Obviously Representations will be the first part of your essay since that is the main focus of the question so you will talk about ideology in that section (e.g. that the otherness is both a monstrous female and a female who provides redemption), making integrating points about the other key aspects where you can.

In the other two sections on Narrative and Audience you must also use the key phrase when you can. For example discussing narrative you might say…

Applying Todorov’s narrative formula to LTROI reveals interesting aspects of ideological discourse since the main female construct disrupts the equilibrium and although she is the otherness she also attempts to repair the disequilibrium.

For Audience you can refer to the key phrase of the question by looking at the ideological assumptions that the segments of the TA may have

The audience obviously comes to the cinema with their own needs and gratifications and ideological assumptions. Their reading and decoding of the film will be challenged by the representations and narrative which present a different ideological discourse to their own…