Our short film, “Operation Superstar”, is a movie about two best friends who embark on a night out with the sole objective of being able to play their DJ set at a night club. Along the way, they encounter numerous events, that ultimately change the boys lives forever. Through our project, we aim to express one of the key concerns of the studio, which is investigating the anatomy of comedy and how it can operate as a genre through various elements, specifically, the comic frame and genre-hybridisation.
The idea of framing can be referred “to the role of context in the construction of meaning. ” (Voth,2014). Applying this within the context of the comedy genre, Ben Voth suggests that the term comic frame can be utilised to understand “the existence of human differences”, using comedy to portray said differences in a lighter manner. According to Kenneth Burke, the comic frame can be “achieved through a technique termed “perspective by incongruity” (Burke,1984). This said technique can be demonstrated in our film through it’s secondary characters, such as ‘Dj Ozempic’ and ‘The Ratman’. Whilst both characters have the purpose of guiding the boys along their journey, it is the presence and the personality of both characters that can be determined as somewhat incongruous. For example, the character of ‘The Ratman’ being a giant rat lurking in an alley way, secretly selling tails through their trench coat is a clear element of ‘surprise’ within the story, and helps begin to construct the film’s overall absurdist tone. Throughout the film, our group also demonstrates ideas in a literal sense, for example the boys actually grow rats tails on their heads instead of the hairstyle. This further demonstrates incongruity in the film, ultimately leaving audiences to react to the obscene imagery delivered to them.
Furthermore, the element of genre-hybridisation can be represented within our film’s storyline. I like to think that “Operation Superstar” is a combination of the coming of age genre and comedy. In his article,”Its not funny!…” Rubén de la Prida states that “Such hybridization usually acquires, albeit not always, a parodic character, in which the conventions of a given genre are inverted with comic intent” ( de la Prida,2023). Taking this idea within the context of our film, the characters of Harry and Fergie are a parody of traditional Narmcore street boys, which can be explicitly represented within Harry’s persona and dialogue. However through the conventions of the coming of age genre, specifically our film utilising the key points of said genre’s narrative structure, we were able to represent the development of the character’s friendship, through their argument and reconciliation, and other visual moments. I like to think that these moments balance out the amount of absurdism within the film, leaving audiences to think beyond the weird elements within our film and see a story of a friendship instead.
If I was to continue to work on this project, I would potentially even out the amount of incongruity that is written in the script. Whilst I do think we have a good amount of absurdism throughout our story, I feel like at times there are moments where there may be a bit too much (that being said, can one really have too much absurdity). In order to do this, potentially, the film’s length may have had to been longer or focus more on specific elements within the film that are there to demonstrate incongruity.
Over the course of the semester, one of the key ideas that we as a class have been trying to explore is finding out what comedy really is. For me personally, I don’t think there is a definitive answer, however, I think part of the answer was to investigate the motive of comedy, and what it actually does to an audience. In his article “Six Small Essays About Comedy”, Seth Simon describes comedy as a means of multiple things, but more explicitly, he describes “Comedy [as] the formal representation of humor, which is the pursuit of lightness.” (Simons, 2023). From this idea, one can argue that the purpose of comedy is to make someone laugh (obviously) but it’s what exactly makes people laugh is where it can be ambiguous, due to the genre’s subjectivity. For me, I knew there were different ways, but over the course, I have come to discover the various definitive modes in which comedian’s/writers use in order to articulate a joke, for example, genre-hybridisation, comic frame (as listed prior), as well as the element of incongruity. While these modes of comedy have the intention to make people laugh whether it is reciprocated or not, I think that they can be perceived as the building blocks that one can use in order to frame a joke successfully.
Over the course of the semester, I have had the opportunity to work collaboratively in four media artefacts (weeks 4-6 sketches, and our final project), and within that, I have had an overall positive experience and have had time to reflect on my own comedic perceptions. I do believe it is important to collaborate with different people when working on new projects as you get the opportunity to understand a person’s artistic style and humour, and through that it helps to create an interesting learning environment as your learning new information about group members as well as the task at hand. However, I think it is beneficial to be able to work with people who have a similar style as you do as it is easier to bounce ideas off one another, and be able to create and build a story that every member can be proud of. Whilst I somewhat regret not venturing out more in terms of working with new people, I am glad I got to work with people that are close to me for our final project as I believe that we created something unique, and I can see all our personalities emitting within out film through our various tasks and responsibilities.
References:
- De la Prida, Rubén. (2023), “It’s not funny! On Wes Anderson’s comedy and genre hybridizations” in Comedy Studies. 14 (2), p.191-207
- Simons, S. (2023), “Six Small Essays About Comedy”, Humorism, <https://www.humorism.xyz/six-small-essays-about-comedy/
- Voth, B. (2014), “Comic Frame” in The Encyclopedia of Humor Studies,Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, pp. 148–150. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/2040610X.2023.2187747