Contextualise films - the films would make more sense and have more meaning if I found out what had occurred during the periods just before, during and after they were made.
Music - in Pressure is has a music motif that is played several times throughout the film, and in Babylon music is important, try to find songs and lyrics could have some importance and add dimension to a presentation.
Key Character - David/ Blue - Distinct difference between him and Tony, an awareness of his culture signified by his love of reggae music, Rastafarianism and his dreadlocks.
Key Character - Beefy
Key scenes - Woman coming into garage, David wrongfully arrested, garage gets vandalised
Key Character - Tony, Britsh born youbg black man, finding it hard to get a job even tough he has all of his O Levels. Doesn't really belong sees himself as British but is faced with stereotypes on a daily basis, refered to as 'youslot', and he's man states "He's not like us he born here"
Key Character - Colin, Tony's brother who is into Black Power and unlike Tony he wasn't born in England, and views life in England much different to Tony.
Key Character - Tony's group of homeless friends, who represent what is to become of Tony by the end of the film
Narrative Structure - Linear, to follow Tony's story
Key Scenes and use of Micro Features
Kitchen scene at breakfast, food is used to show the opposition of the British culture and the West Indian, and Tony's alignment with Britishness and Colin's distaste for Britishness. The conversation between Tony and Colin show how different they are, also interesting the table both sit at either end as if divided, and Tony correct his brother's 'English'. Food is something that comes up again and again as Tony favours chips over West Indian food. Turning point in the narrative is signalled by him eating his Mum's rice and peas with pepper sauce.
Police interogation and the aftermath - shows how Tony is fed up of his situation
Home Affairs Committee
Inquiry into young black people and the criminal justice system
Memorandum of Evidence from The Children’s Society
Looking at the DVD cover for Bullet Boy, and analysing the image used
Analysis of still images from Bullet Boy and trailer
Black people were traditionally seen as inferior and were assumed to be "slaves". Their place in the society was that of a lower caste. They were not fully recognised as members of the human race and they were presented as people pushed into the background and margins of the society.
Theories:Propp will be a good theorist to use in my study as he talks about hero and villain and how black youths are presented as villains but also have been represented as protagonists and hero's.
Where to research:I'll be looking into the history of black people in movies as it has a big relevance to the modern society. I'll be asking why the black people are still being represented in the stereotypical manner, although the society and racial relations have changed dramatically over the past 40 years.
Antonio Gramsci's theory of hegemony is of particular salience to the exploration of racial representations in the media because of its focus on culture and ideology. Unlike Marxist theories of domination, Gramsci relegates economic determinants to the background and brings to the fore the role of intellectuals in the process
In order to see how hegemonic ideals of white supremacy hide themselves in current media, it is first necessary to illustrate the racist stereotypes which evolved in the media of a less liberal society.
Shaun Bailey, the prospective Tory parliamentary candidate for Hammersmith, says: "We are represented in the media horribly. Only terrorists are represented as badly. We are shown as sexy, dangerous and exotic. We are either guilty or victims, and if we are victims it is at another black man's hand. You've got entire TV channels set up to celebrate everything that is bad in our community. I despair. These portrayals make black men believe that's what they are."
The comedian and actor Richard Blackwood, who is 36, believes that to blame only the messengers is denial. "To a degree, media representations are accurate," he argues. "Not 100 per cent true but I don't like it when my race tries to act as if there isn't a problem. We black people know what our demons are."
Noel Clarke, the screenwriter of the critically acclaimed film Kidulthood, is equally candid. "These kids have been demonised," he says, "but at the same time you can't make excuses for their behaviour.
All these urban cowboys were black or mixed race.
The cab driver exploded with racist abuse: "Those black bastards are all the same, all criminals, half-mad druggies. Never pick them up. Why do you want to talk to them?"
Aside from Pressure’s obvious aesthetic merit, what makes this film important is the bold way it deals with institutional racism and police brutality without ever falling into the trap of treating such matters simplistically
Tony’s growing frustration with the institutional racism that prevents him finding employment that is commensurate with his academic accomplishments, leads to an increasing consciousness of his alienation from the bourgeois (i.e. also white) power structure, and he opens up to radical ideas.
The first place we see Tony attempting to get a job is with a firm of accountants. Here the would-be polite and well mannered boss interviewing him makes gaffs like asking when he came to England, and expressing surprise that his hobbies don’t include cricket. The accountancy workforce is shown to be all white and the viewer is not surprised that Tony fails to secure employment with this company. The Labour Exchange then send Tony to a small sheet metal workshop. The owner or foreman is working class, he states he left school at fourteen and doesn’t have any use for someone with Tony’s good academic qualifications. Some of this individual’s views are ignorant but he employs black workers.
While there are limitations to Rosso's depiction of how racism functions (his treatment of institutional racism in "Babylon" could do with broadening out), his understanding of gutter level bigotry is nuanced and he shows through action that the only way it can be effectively challenged is by those it seeks to make its victims assertively defending themselves; by way of contrast, Meadows in his recent film "This Is England" (set at roughly the same time as "Babylon") depicts street level racism as breaking down due to embarrassment and confusion within a predominantly white gang, this obnoxious flight of fantasy on Meadow's part is naïve, unnecessarily sentimental and disingenuous. "Babylon" is unambiguously anti-racist, whereas junk like "This Is England" is not.
Babylon and Pressure articulated the mixture of hopelessness and defiance that was an inextricable part of the black British condition in the early Eighties - the riots, the New Cross massacre, Linton Kwesi Johnson's dub poetry, blues dances, skinheads, the stop-and-search or "sus" laws and the Special Police Group. The films also spoke about the transformation of mainstream Britain. Babylon highlights the pervasive cultural significance of reggae and can't be entirely separated from The Harder They Come and Rockers (another roots'n'culture caper movie emerging from Jamaica in the late Seventies).
The Lions have an English "crew" member, Ronnie. Ronnie has been weaned on ska. Ronnie loves Jamaica. Ronnie may be the first token white in British cinema. The Ital boys keep their equipment in a garage under a railway bridge. When the local fascists break in and smash up the sound system, discord replaces harmony in the multi-racial group.
Saul Dibb's Bullet Boy is a Black London film, the story of a particular manor, a particular yard. Yet its significance lies in the fact that it also transcends race. Bullet Boy's characters are not solely defined by blackness. We're dealing with a generations-old Britishness here too. Whether they eat chips or patties is now irrelevant (chips or patties was a monumental issue in Pressure).
