Waterloo Road Exam Practice

In class today we watched a clip of waterloo road and did an exam practice using the representation of age.

Representation: Age

Setting
this clip is set in a school this means that the ages will be the students and the teachers there isn't much of an age gap between them but the difference in the way they act is completely different and how they get treated differently throughout the clip shows how age affects most thing in life.

Themes
The themes in this clip aren't very obvious but there are some there. Friendship is a theme because there are friendships between both teacher and students this shows that both age groups find it easy to make friends however they cant be friends with each other. Another theme is power, this theme is carried throughout the clip because the teachers have the most power this is because they are older and know they are in control.

Icons
The important icons in this clip are the school itself as it represents different age groups very well. The camera is an important icon because it shows how each of the three different age groups responds to it being broken. 

Narrative
A normal day of teenagers in school.

Characters

All the characters in this T.V clip are all so different, some are kind, some are horrible, some dress inappropriately, some dress appropriately. The main character in this clip is the girl who is angry because everyone is talking about her mum and dad not getting back together and she loses her temper and has a go at a boy who has nothing to do with it and you can tell he is scared but he cant do anything because she has trapped him.

Textual Analysis

Camera
The camera follows the teacher's movements throughout the scenes where they are talking about 'the happy couple' this shows that the adult is respected more in this clip because it shows that the students will follow his rules and will show he is in control as he is older. One of the shots pans into the scene and toward the caretaker and skips past the student this again shows that the teacher is in control and the student has to be told what to do. When the students talk to each other the camera is using the 180 degree rule or is level when they are talking to each other this tells us that none of the students are above each other and they are all treated equally. Throughout the clip it has a few close up shot but these are only on the students this shows us that the students can be spoken to from however distance but the teachers have to have a good distance between who they are talking to because they are older and are respected more than the students. Another shot that is interesting is when the two students are taking the mick out of the teacher when he is wearing clothes that a teenager would wear although he is being laughed at by the students the low angle is still on him so it shows that the teacher still have the most respect in this clip.

Mise en Scene
The main difference between older and younger is their clothes the students dress quite messy and don't care how they look but the teachers wear smart clothes and make an effort this tells us that the teachers are more superior. The camera in the first scene is used as a prop to show how the different age groups react to the camera being broken and who is really in charge. The light is quite dull throughout the clip this tells us that the students are very misbehaving and there is always something going on. We know this because of all the different actors we see in on small clip this tells us that the school is very busy.

Sound
The click of the fingers and the 'tuts' made by the older teacher in the first scene shows he is more important and can make the students and younger teachers feel small. In the scene when the girl traps the boy in the class room the music starts to speed up as the boy begins to lose his breath but as soon as the teacher gets there he reassures the boy and the music slowly fades out. This shows that the teacher is known to sort out the problems at school and is more powerful than the students. The two boys at the beginning speak in whisper as they know they have done something wrong and know they will get into trouble. They talk in the whisper to show how small they really are. When the teacher catches them he starts to talk loud which shows he has the power.

Editing
The shots are cut quite sharp this makes the clip more realistic and tells us that school isn't as straight forward as it seems there are always bumps in the road. The scenes cut from character to character this shows us that there are a lot of different students that go to the school and it gives us a feeling of a real school. It could also tell us that although there are so many students they don't all talk to each other which also represents a real school. All the students receive the same amount of screen time this tells us that because they re all the same age they all have the same amount of importance. In the class room scene you see the teacher controlling the class this tells us that the teachers hold a lot more power than the students. In the first scene the older teacher says to the younger teacher 'you did take out insurance' the shot then cuts sharply to the younger teacher face to show that she did not take out insurance. This tells us that although she is a teacher she is still too young to think about taking out insurance for the cameras. This shows she is irresponsible even though she is a teacher.