In week 9, we exploded genre by deciphering the ‘bottle-drama’ and discussing whether it can in fact be classified as a genre or not. We watched a bottle episode of Community and the film Coherence(James Ward Byrkit, 2013) We answered a number of questions, which I decided to jot down as me and Brydan will be incorporating the bottle drama into our final project.

What is a bottle-drama?

  • Common in T.V. Bottle episodes normally occur when production team runs out of money as they are low-budget
  • Single location
  • Onus then on scriptwriters, cinematographers and editors
  • Very script heavy.  Bottle Dramas have intense, emotional moments
  • Rear Window is one of the most famous instances
  • Often quite theatrical/Shakespearean… a clash of ideas/clash of personalities

What are it’s characteristics?

  • One main location, or focus
  • Minimal cast(two-hander OR small ensemble)
  • Focus on dialogue to establish character and carry story
  • Small space: defined by cinematography and editing
  • Performances
  • Very often performances happen organically… filmmakers shouldn’t be afraid of improvisation

Is bottle a structure, rather than a genre?

Does the economic strain cause the genre, or are the tropes independently generated?

  • Bottle drama is a magnet for other genres
  • Bottle films do not hold enough of their own conventions, rather they enable other genre conventions to be magnified
  • It is a story TYPE that can utilise other genres

 

I look forward to experimenting with other genres through the bottle structure in our final project for this semester!