Blog 5

Blog 5

My research topic is “How do Hong Kong teenagers interpret Patrick Kong's movies?” From now on I have finished the first interview and read around 5 textual materials.

I decided to invite around 4 different people to do the interview in order to observe and probe any special thing that worth study on. In my expectation, at the end of my work should find some academic result in the way of the gender different.

At last Sunday (3/4/2016), I have finished the first interview. He is my secondary schoolmate who are the faithful follower of Stephy Tang, the main actress starring at Patrick’s movies regularly.

From him I got the message that Patrick’s movies are like virus more than art pieces. He claimed that those movie are based on the same formula that the existence of treating must appear in a relationship. He found those movies can change the audience’s mind to think negative of the real world as he met a situation that his ex-girlfriend thought he was not devoted in the relationship after they watched “L for Love, L for Lie” at 2008.  It was the movie they watched together when they were 14, the period of teenage.

He have watched the movie “Anniversary” recently. He found it is a movie that can refreshed the memory of his ex-girlfriend. Even though 'cheating', still, were the main element that the movie talking about, the reason he watched the movie is to memorize the bygones. He found the movie can be the proof of flying time.

For the result of this interview, I got a clear direction that what should I do and the question be set in the following interview. I discover one important thing that some people might be affected after watching the movie. It means that if people believe a message, this message would influence the people's mind.

According to Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding model, the decoding of a message is how an audience member is able to understand. and interpret the message. The audience will reconstruct the idea by the giving meanings. It is undoubtedly that can fulfill the situation I mentioned on the above that the girl might find the movie refresh the true reality. In the following, I would like to interview the girl, my friend's ex-girlfriend, to probe and apply the encoding/decoding model so that I can understand in what extent she wanted to break up with my friend is related to Patrick's romance movie.

Also, I have invite a pair of couple to help me do a interview this weekend. They are nowadays the secondary school student and only have watched 'Anniversary' of Patrick's movie. For this interview, I want to compare the mindset between the past and nowadays teenagers on how they feel of the movies.

Blog 4

‘A SHORT GUIDE TO WRITING ABOUT FILM’ is a book introducing and lecturing the very beginning on how to produce a movie. It is a book demonstrates and conducts the audiences on film creating and script writing. As the movies of Patrick Kong that he is not only the director, but also the script writer. It is believe that the book may help me to carify the pre-production progress in a movie production and apply it on his movie.

At the chapter 4 of this book -- ‘Six Approaches to Writing about Film’ help inspiring a direction to me to study on my topic ‘How Do Teenagers Interpret Patrick Kong’s Film’.

It is a chapter that introducing the 6 major approaches or methods which would be used in every writing about film. Those methods are useful on creating and analyzing the writing of film. In other word, it also does a big favor to me on analyzing Patrick Kong’s movie.

Those six approaches are Film History, National Cinemas, Genres, Auteurs, Kinds of Formalism, and Ideology. Due to the informative explanation of those approaches, I would like to, mainly, focus on Genres, Auteurs, Kinds of Formalism, and Ideology to study Patrick's movie.

Patrick Kong has been named as "Mong Kok Woody Allen" in Hong Kong. His movie works always hit the town that become the talk among the teenagers and young adults. The polarization of the comments reflected that Patrick makes used on formalism to his movies. According to the literature book I took, formalism is a matter of structure and style in the movie that the audience would concern to. In my point of view, Patrick would like to show, reflect the darkness between a relationship when he documents the sweet and heart-to-heart moment at the story beginning. It is Patrick's usual storytelling trick.

There is a well said that 'seeing is believing'. It is worth studying that if the audiences’ thought changed after they saw the movie; if the movies only affect the single gender; if the movies changed or not, if the movies boring to see; and so on.

When it comes to the progress of my research, it is just the very beginning that I have arranged the time with an interviewee for the first interview. Unfortunately, it is delayed to next week as the interviewee got some private matter to solve.

The first interviewee is a male that he has just broken up with his girlfriend, who has become his company for 6 years. Patrick’s movies are the very memory between them as their first day of dating was watching his movie. It must be a rueful story between them and one of the important data that to do my research.

Blog 3

Blog 3

What is the refined research question that you are setting out to answer?

How do Hong Kong teenagers interpret Patrick Kong's movies?

How does this develop themes and debates explored within the lectures of this module?

Patrick Kong is a famous romance movie director in Hong Kong who has been produced more than 10 romance movies. The feature of his works is he usually makes use of the teen idols such as Stephy Tang and Alex Fong, as the main actress and actor, since his the first directed movies. Hence, his movies always became the focus of the youth in the past ten years of Hong Kong. 2016, the tenth anniversary of Patrick Kong’s romance movie, Patrick has produced a new romance movie. That movie, Anniversary that starring by Stephy Tang and Alex Fong, be the talk of town again. However, the comment of Patrick’s works are usually polarized. While the teen would feel that the movie is thought-provoking, a group of mature people would feel that Patrick only makes use of the former idea to movie. Actually, in Patrick’s romance movies always include the same concept: there must be the existence of the other woman or man in a pair of couple, scene is a must in the movie, the stage dialog is meaningless but can be the motto of the teen, and so on. Also, with the time flies, Stephy and Alex are no more idols between the new generation. Maybe it is the feeling of nostalgia more than a movie to the audience. Thus, it is interested to study that how the teenagers interpret Patrick Kong’s movies in Hong Kong.

What critical methodologies are you going to use? How are you going to produce the evidence you’ll need to answer your research question?

I am going to do in-depth interviews. I would like to interview 4 to 5 people who have watched Patrick’s romance films. They are young teenagers (around 12-16) and late stage teenagers (around 18-23) with or without a companion. I will ask the question to probe how the value different in those interviewee. For example, I will ask the comment or meaning of the films from those interviewee at first. Following, I will ask them the stages on love so that I can compare the thought and real situation of those interviewee. Compare with all the interview, I can find out in how the interviewee comprehend the movie and investigate and analyize what concept would be included from the audience’s behavior.

Now you should have some references in mind. If so, please put down a short reference list at the end of this blog so that you have a better plan of what articles that you are go to read for the project.

* * *

Hong Kong newspaper report of Patrick Kong and his movies:

Film review: Anniversary – Alex Fong, Stephy Tang back for Patrick Kong romance. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/film-tv/article/1896002/film-review-anniversary-alex-fong-stephy-tang-back-patrick-kong

Patrick Kong. (n.d.). Retrieved from

http://www.timeout.com.hk/film/features/54176/patrick-kong.html

* * *

What physical resources (e.g. camera) will this primary research require?

No

Self-assessment of risk:

Is this research exercise likely to expose you to any health and safety risks or any risk to property?

No

Name: Lo Hing Lun

HKU SPACE Student Number: 10586773

Research Project: Statement of Intent

How do Patrick Kong’s romance films affect nowadays the teens’ value?

2016, is the tenth anniversary of Patrick Kong’s romance film. Patrick Kong is a famous romance film director in Hong Kong who has been produced more than 10 romance films since 2006. The feature of his film works is Patrick usually makes use of the teen idols such as Stephy Tang and Alex Fong, as the main actress and actor. Hence, his films always became the focus of the youth in the past ten years of Hong Kong.

With the time flies, Stephy and Alex are no more idols between the new generation. Recently, the film, Anniversary, the tenth anniversary film of Patrick’s first romance film, had been shown on the last third of December of 2015. Still, Stephy and Alex were the main actress and actor of the film and, it hit the town again among the Hong Kong people.

However, the comment of Patrick’s film are usually polarized. While the teen would feel that the film is thought-provoking, a group of mature people would feel that Patrick only makes use of the former idea to film. Actually, in Patrick’s romance films always include the same concept: there must be the existence of the other woman or man in a pair of couple, scene is a must in the film, the stage dialog is meaningless but can be the motto of the teen, and so on.

I would like to study on how the influence of the teenagers from the film. As “seeing is believe”, would the film change the mindset of the teenager in terms of getting in a relationship? Or, would those romance films affect the teenagers immersible?

Methods to be used:

To do the research, in-depth interviews is needed. I would like to interview 4 to 5 people who have watched Patrick’s romance films. They are young teenagers (around 12-15) and late stage teenagers (around 21-25) with or without a companion.

I will ask the question to probe how the value different in those interviewee. For example, I will ask the comment or meaning of the films from those interviewee at first. Then, I will ask them the stages on love so that I can compare the thought and real situation of those interviewee. With the comparison, I can find out in what extent the films affect the audience.

Also, doing a questionnaire is needed. I can measure various views and opinions from the audience in terms of how they found the films and is it the main path affect the teens’ mindset.

Lo Hing Lun 10586773

Research Diary 1

"Learning is not only to understand what the lecturers said on the lesson, learning is to explore the knowledges from the lesson." ---- an unforgettable said form my former teacher when I was a higher diploma student. It is a motto that keep inspiring me to study in the way of searching the extra information and knowledges through the search engine, printed book or asking teachers.

In search of making an efficient learning result and gaining a fruitful experience, academic research is an advance work for student to explore the knowledge by ourselves, not only by asking teacher.

As a student in the field of media culture, it is easy to discover the division point or difference of opinion from the public in a media study. Thanks to the development of technology, the information can be delivered as fast as a bullet in these day. It is unimaginable that people can receive the message within a second that the message send out. Meanwhile, people are not adapt to verify the true or bogus of the message before they forward the message out to the other. Thus, doing academic research on media and culture can carry out a result that to identify if the message true or bogus. The most achievable thing is it can make a strong justification to convince the others.

There are two types of research methods: Qualitative research and Quantitative research, both of them play an important role on conducting an academic research. However, both of them have each strengths and weaknesses.

For the qualitative research, it is about to gain an understanding of underlying reasons and motivations of some phenomenon. In other words, it is to find out what and why the people would make those reaction of the topic. In order to gain the information to analyse, face-to-face interview is a need. The data are based on the interviewees’ own feeling and opinions. It is provides the individuals case informations that we can analyse the data in-depth. However, qualitative research is time consuming that to collect the useful data and the result is not objective as it is easily influenced by a little group of people.

For the quantitative research, it is about asking people for the opinions through collecting data, for instance, doing surveys or questionnaires, so that I can make a statistics and facts to help me to finish my academic research. It is useful for studying a large numbers of people and time saving. However, quantitative research fails to distinguish people from the world of nature.

I would like to study about the hybridisation of horror film. I can measure various views and opinions in a chosen sample in terms of how the people feel after watching the horror films of different country through collecting surveys. But if I want to enrich my research, using the theory to help analysing is not enough. In order to gain an in-depth result, quantitative research, interview the film critics is a need. 

Lo Hing Lun, Austin