Hustle-Gender Essay

In an extract of the TV drama Hustle, gender is presented in different ways with stereotypes. In TV dramas stereotypically we expect females to be hardworking, likes shopping, perfect, make-up, clean and classy. The males tend to act like the alpha male, strong, have high paid jobs, and into football and rugby. There are six characters that I am going to analyse and feed back on their behaviour and appearance and whether I think it will fit in with the stereotypical type of male and female.

The shop we first see is obviously designer, as we can tell that there are not many items and looks really well made dresses. Therefore we expect the type of customer to be a rich, classy female who knows what they want in life. Whereas in the men’s club we expect to see the men laughing, drinking, smoking and joking.

 

The first scene is in the designer clothing store, with back lighting, cream shades and chic dresses, then the camera pans onto an older lady who seems to look out of place with grey hair, piled up messily. She pulls out a dress which is out of her price range. The shop assistant is extremely condescending towards her, and only gets on with rich people, therefore wants this lady out of his shop as soon as possible.

 Once the older lady scurries out, the camera immediately goes to the other lady in shop, called Sarah, who is part of the scandal which is about to take place. The camera starts on her ring, a huge diamond wedding ring. This portrays wealth, and the shop assistant skips over to her almost as if he is excited.

 

The next scene is presented with a ‘wipe’ editing technique, and the sound effects to go with it. This links to the idea that she is in a changing room. The shot is over the shoulder and mirrored so that the audience can see the back of the dress with the crystals and the reaction that the dress provides. I noticed that there was a slight drum roll after the shop assistant reveals the price, as to whether she was going to buy the dress or not.

On the other hand we are introduced to some more characters, which are in a different setting, of a men’s club with no females. The surroundings are darker in colours, there is smoking and drinking occurring and it isn’t very well lit. We see an older American man who would be stereotypically be classed as ‘posh’ as he was dressed well, with a silk handkerchief in his pocket. We later on realise that the well dressed man is trying to con the other man, who is dressed in all black, and looks too scruffy to be in the men’s club. The American man is getting the scruffy man drunk in order for the con to take place smoothly.

 

The scene is swiftly changed by another ‘wipe’ edit, this time with a non-diegetic sound of a zip, which goes back to the designer store. The camera then focusing on the woman’s bag. The camera quality seems to have changed to a hand held camera, as it seems shifty and jerky, which portrays panic, and moves around with Sarah round the shop. The lady is screaming and is hysterical which represents a ‘typical female’. ‘My husband will kill me’, this implies that the ring is extremely expensive and is the end of the world to this woman. She is playing the role as a typical ditzy, female blonde. Within this scene Sarah breaks the 4^th wall, by quickly giving eye contact to the audience (camera). This then engages and involves the audience to be part of the chaos that is occurring.

Yet again another wipe edit is used, to swiftly move on to the next scene. This time we see the shop assistant on his hands and knees attempting to look for the expensive ring. The con man then enters the room, like with Sarah and her ring, focusing on one feature on the person, the conman is first seen with a zoomed in close up of his shoes, which look like they are designer and strikes him as being wealthy. There is then a slow pan up his body, with a low angle shot making him look higher in authority and the shop assistant looking vulnerable whilst scrambling to find the ring. Although the conman is dressed well, his accent is cockney which brings his status down, he is not a typical ‘business man’, as he is chewing gum, scratches his nose, and uses the term ‘bird’, for his wife. Although he is extremely streetwise and knows what he is doing and wants. He too breaks the 4^th wall, by giving eye contact to the audience.