DETAILED PROPOSAL

1. Topic Area
French New Wave -characterisation focusing on gender, age and stylistic features

2. Proposed title, question, hypothesis
To what extent is characterisation in French New Wave affected by gender, age and stylistic features?

3. Teacher approval granted, in principal?
Yes

4. Principle texts (if text based study)
French New Wave - Jean Douchet

5. Reason for choice
Interested by movement and impact has had on modern cinema
Surrealist, artistic directing

6. Academic context for this study (similar research, relevant theory, named theorists)
Auteur theory
Alexandre Astruc - film critic and director, contributed to auteur theory
Andre Bazin - film critic and theorist, co-founder of film magazine Cahiers du Cinema
Critics for Cahiers du Cinema - Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, Éric Rohmer, Claude Chabrol, and Jacques Rivette

7. Institutional context for this study (industry focus, other texts for comparison, named practitioners, relevant theory, issues, questions)
See previous

8. Identify the audience context for this study (audience profile, access to audience, potential sample)
- Arrange viewings with wide range of audiences - record responses according to different gender and age
- Characters accessiblity and emotional/personal connection with the audience (maybe to particular genders/ages)
- Typical audience profile
- Audience responses to extreme and more subtle stylistic features used in the process of characterisation

9. How will the 4 key concepts be relevant to your study (audience, institution, forms and conventions, representation)?
Audience - identification with characters, understanding, reactions, responses
Institution - how directors used characterisation to express their artistic ideas, develop plot/narrative, choice of actors/actresses, distancing effects towards audience
Forms + Conventions - contrast to strict narrative, unchallenging plots in Hollywood film
Representation - alternate representation of sexes, age

10 Potential research sources (secondary): secondary academic books and websites, secondary industry books and websites, secondary popular criticism. Please identify specific examples you have come across.
www.sensesofcinema.com
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Stephen_Nottingham/cintxt2.htm

11. Potential research sources (primary): audience reception research, your own content/textual analysis etc
Questionnaires/focus groups/1 to 1 interviews -audience responses
Textual analysis of films

12. Modifications agreed with your lead teacher
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13. Potential limits/obstacles/problems?
- availability of films?
- alot of research/criticism in French (Cahiers du Cinema)