Deconstruction of films

Theories: audience and reception theories - active and passive

• Hypodermic Needle Model

'This is the idea that the mass media is so powerful that it can target an audience directly and the audience is powerless to resist' - This theory suggests that, as an audience, we are manipulated by the creators of media texts, and that our behaviour and thinking might be easily changed by media-makers. It assumes that the audience are passive and heterogeneous. (this theory also sees the audience as lazy).
The Hypodermic Needle Model applies in context to horror films in that the moving images as well as promotional images such as posters with the title and tagline captivates the targeted audience thus meaning that any message within the selected media of poster or film is accepted by the consumer. Furthermore, if the individual consuming the product fits in the TA, for example liking the horror genre opposed to others, they will be more susceptible to accepting any of the messages conveyed, thus making them more easily influenced. 

• Encoding/Decoding

Encoding - this is the production of a message. The Encoding model is the systematic coding of meanings. The individual encoding the message needs to be aware of how the 'world is comprehensible to the members of the audience'. The meanings can be sent through verbal and non-verbal symbols. Verbal consists of words, signs, images and videos, and non-verbal consists of body language, gestures and facial expressions. These symbols are made by the sender to be understood by the audience targeted.
Decoding - the way the audience can understand and interpret the product/symbol.
This model applies in terms of horror films in that filmmakers encode their movies, posters etc. with messages that the audience can interpret, rather than it explicitly being stated. For example, within a movie poster the genre is not stated but encoded through specific images, colours or terms that the audience can understand and match to an existing genre.  

• Two-Step Flow

This model focuses on the people with the most access to media, and highest media literacy explain and diffuse the content to others. This is a modern version of the hypodermic needle model. 'Cool' people are viewed as the opinion leaders and the 'uncool' people are the opinion followers.
This model follows on from the Hypodermic Needle Model but is more advanced as media developed in that it had selective influences on people. This model assumes that influences flow from mass media to the audience of opinion leaders or the 'cool' people and then onto the opinion followers/'uncool'. Therefore, this model suggests that mass media does not influence people as effectively anymore as it isn't as direct but instead connections among the audience alongside selective exposure are the main reasons for any influence from the media.
In relation to horror films, the Two-Step Flow model implies that the film itself is defined into the 'cool' category, where as the the consumers are defined under 'uncool'.

• Uses and Gratifications

This is the theory that explores why and how individuals seek out specific music magazines to meet their specific needs. This theory is an audience-centred approach to understanding mass-communication; the Uses and Gratification theory focuses on what do people do with media rather than what does media do to people. 

Audiences made choices about what they did when consuming texts; these audiences were made up of individuals who actively consumed texts for different reasons and in different ways. As early as 1948, Lasswell suggested that media texts had the following functions for individuals and society, surveillance, correlation, entertainment and cultural transmission (ideas shared by similar cultures).

This theory stated that individuals might choose and use text for the following purposes: diversion, personal relationships, personal identity and surveillance.
This model is used by filmmakers in their research and development of their TA, to enable a better understanding of the audience's wants. This is effective as it can then be applied to their film. 

• Preferred/Oppositional/Negotiated/Aberrant Readings

Preferred - meaning is embedded within a media text

Oppositional - the reader understands the preferred reading and recognises the encoding but rejects it as they do not agree. 'Reading against the grain'/subversive reading.

Negotiated - reading is partly accepted and partly rejected by the cosumer

Aberrant - the message is interpreted differently by the audience - bad communications between the sender and the reader

Auteur theory 
This theory suggests that the director is viewed as the major creative force in a movie. This is because the director oversees all the audio and visual elements in the process of creating the film, thus making them be considered to be like the 'author' of the movie. Overall this theory states that the visual and audio elements of the film are more prominent and important in telling the story than the plot and script itself.
Star theory
The stars/actors within a film are usually what also promotes the movie to the audience and increases their desire to see the movie. This theory explores this as an issue. Christine Gledhill is fundamental in the development of this theory; her study claims that these 'stars' can be defined by four key points:

• Stars as Capital Value - Stars increase the value of a movie than films without well-known actors/actresses. This also ensures the film will not make a loss in value due to the star-status. 
• Stars as Constructs - The idea that stars are presented in a certain way to make them desirable and likable to an audience. 
• Stars as Deviant - Audience's like stars that live to excess and do not follow normal rules of behaviour. Through other forms of media we gain an insight into the star's day-to-day lives, thus making them more relatable and identifiable to the audience, which then makes them more popular and their movie's are more likely to be consumed by these audiences. 
• Stars as Cultural Value - Stars are said to represent moral, social and ideological values. These stars are in positions of such influence to audiences that they can be used to control their views or impact their ways.

Formalist theory
This theory focuses on the formal or technical elements of the film e.g. the lighting, scoring, sound, set design, use of colour, camera-work, and editing. It further focuses on the emotional and intellectual impact of each of these elements on an audience; these effects are usually intentional and done by the filmmaker.
Marxist theory
This theory's idea in film was to avoid common narrative structure through eliminating the individual protagonist, therefore telling the story through moving the action by the group of characters. As well as the story being told through mainly the visual elements, 'the clash of one image against the next'; the idea with this was that they thought this meant that the audience would never be lulled into believing that they're consuming something that has not been worked over.