Automatic Recognition of Film Genres

Film genres in digital video can be detected automatically. In a three-step approach we analyze first the syntactic properties of digital films: color statistics, cut detection, camera motion, object motion and audio. In a second step we use these statistics to derive at a more abstract level film style attributes such as camera panning and zooming, speech and music. These are distinguishing properties for film genres, e.g. newscasts vs. sports vs. commercials. In the third and final step we map the detected style attributes to film genres. Algorithms for the three steps are presented in detail, and we report on initial experience with real videos. It is our goal to automatically classify the large body of existing video for easier access in digital video-on-demand databases

Quasi-film commercials. Analysis of selected car manufacturer campaigns

When seeking original forms of expression, contemporary commercials often reach for the achievements of film making. That is reflected in references to the conventions of certain film genres, and the references to particular films. The goal of the article was to present selected examples of the relationships between commercials and film, which can be found in car manufacturer advertising campaigns (Toyota, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz). The analysis of the gathered study material enabled me to identify two forms of quasi-film commercials: a TV spot and a short film

The representation of conflict in the discourse of Italian melodrama

This paper is part of an extensive study of cinematic dialogue in a variety of film genres in Italian, which aims to address the disregard for the verbal plane that characterises film theory and, particularly, genre theory. Assuming a pragmatic and functional semantic perspective, it analyses the scripted dialogues in films against the backdrop of the literature on real life discourse. The focus of the paper is confrontational talk in Italian melodramas from early 1960s to the present. Conflict in such films is, to an extent, comparable to the cooperative sequential rebuttal of speakers' turns that typically occurs in comedies. However, melodramas are also marked by more incisive and subtle patterns of confrontation that can be summarised as 'disaffiliative dysfluency'. The forms of such break in the conversational flow are discussed and illustrated with selected scenes from a number of films

A 'manual on masculinity'? The consumption and use of mediated images of masculinity among teenage boys in Ireland

Most of the research on masculinity in Ireland stresses the influences of family, work and education in the construction of gender (Ferguson, 1998; Ferguson and Synott, 1995; Ferguson and Reynolds, 2001; McKeown et al., 1998, Owens, 2000). Although the impact of the entertainment media is regularly alluded to, there is a dearth of empirical work in this area. While it is generally agreed that mediated images play a highly influential role in young people's lives, both the nature and the scope of this influence remain unclear in the absence of concrete ethnographies of reception. This paper discusses the findings of a quantitative and qualitative investigation into Irish male teenagers’ consumption and reception of a broad range of media texts and discusses these findings in relation to the relevant literature. It points to the shortcomings of both 'hypodermic needle' theories, which claim direct media influence, and of some active audience theories, which posit consumers as impervious to ideological influence. Contrary to popular discourses which frame the media as an autonomous, regressive force that lags behind a more progressive reality, the findings presented here suggest that mediated fictions are part of wider 'gender scripts' (Nixon, 1996) that both inform and are informed by the social structures within which (male) viewers are immersed

The Evolving Human and Dream-like, Screen-based Media

With rare exceptions, film theorists have traditionally focussed on culturally symbolic criticism in a persistent denial of the biological function and benefit of film-going. There has been a recent reversal of this trend, however, with the development of a cognitive theory of film, which Nicolas Tredell describes as an approach whereby "A film can be regarded as a simulation of a (possible) real-life situation that engages the viewer’s intellect, emotions and body, and that involves a complex negotiation between fiction and reality" (2002: 259). One aspect of this attempt to include science in the understanding of film has been neoteric work by William Evans on the evolutionary aspects of film-going. He argues that "humans have evolved to prefer television and film to print media [… because] it seems real to us [and because] humans are hardwired to attend and respond to visual stimuli, especially when visual stimuli include other people [...] engaging in salient behaviour" (2005: 200-201). But this elegantly simple explanation of the evolutionary significance of film and other screen-based media needs further elaboration. Firstly, Evans fails to consider the evolutionary benefits that accrue from Revonsuo's 2005 theory of the threat rehearsal function of film-going, in that films are like dreams. Secondly, in emphasizing the reality of the screen's moving image, he neglects to consider why humans attend to unrealistic film such as animations, which I argue are even more dream-like than non-animated films, using the example of Walt Disney's Fantasia (1940). Thirdly, he omits consideration of the evolutionary function of a film auteur who is assigned the virtual status of tribal elder. Hence I make a tendentious claim regarding the evolutionary benefit of film-goers assigning the status of 'auteur' to an individual writer/director, despite the well known collaborative nature of film-making, and (dare I say) the out-of-fashion Barthesian notion of the death of the author. Regarding Disney once again, one notes the absence of certain genres of cinema in his otherwise heterogeneous body of work: he has never made a war film or action movie. Such exclusions, only apparent when the huge oeuvre he has helmed are considered as a single text emanating from an individual author, generate an understanding of the Disney worldview, in which family values are prioritised and prompts attitudes toward this auteurial individual akin to meaning-seeking villagers genuflecting to a wise tribal elder as he offers advice for survival of the species in the evolutionary struggle for survival of the fittest. In addressing these three omissions, my paper aims to gain credibility for a more comprehensive evolutionary theory of film