Hotel Babylon Representation Essay

In this TV drama there is one main core elements of society that is being represented, which is Ethnicity and with another one of them that is not as important which is Gender. There is a representation of Ethnicity in Hotel Babylon as you can see because there is a typical stereotype of Illegal immigrants which have different Ethnic backgrounds that may have fled their country because of something that has happened to their family or home, which implies them to come into another country illegally and try to make a living for themselves and not be caught by the illegal immigrants office as it is being represented in this extract of Hotel Babylon.

There is a representation of Gender being portrayed in this extract as it doesn't matter which gender whether it be male or female both of them can be represented as immigrants in a country illegally. Gender doesn't define someone from being an illegal immigrants because there are many male and female immigrants in this world today.

These representations may engage with the audience as they can identify the key information that the producer intended them to identify. This relates well with the Stuart Hall theories of audiences who can be dominant, negotiated, and oppositional readers. Dominant readers can decode a message as the producer intended them to decode, this shows that the audience and the produce share the same cultural and ideological positions. If the audience are negotiated readers then they may understand the meaning and connotations of the message of the producer but they would have to adapt to fit with their own beliefs. But if the audience is a oppositional readers then they reject the producers message, despite them knowing the denotive and conative meanings. I believe that people who watch Hotel Babylon are Negotiated readers as we can pick out the and understand the meaning and connotations of the overall message that the producer is trying to get across but we have to adapt to fit it into our own beliefs with the representation of Ethnicity.

Camera:

As you can see in the beginning of this extract the camera is showing a close up shot of a person who is working at the Hotel Babylon and on his lunch break. there is a pan shot of him going out the back, but he stops and sees two policemen standing there waiting for the immigrants to come running so they can catch them.

The shot changes to a wide shot of a man and two other guys, one as a policeman. They walk up to the reception desk and talk with the reception lady, the camera changes to an over the shoulder shot to show the reception lady talking back to John Voyack.

Next the shot changes to another pan shot, wide shot of a worker who seems to be African American running down some stairs to a lady called Jackie so she can hide the immigrants that work in the Hotel Babylon. The same shot is shown in the same way but it is with a white male running towards the same person. The shot goes a wide shot of Jackie sitting in her office, when to males come running to her door and tell her whos here she quickly gets up goes to the kitchen and hallways to gather the immigrants into a staff only room.

There is a close up shot of Jackie scrambling threw her keys trying to find the one that fits the door. Everyone gets rushed into the room, there is another close up of their faces to show the emotion of fear and being scared to be caught. Jackie realizes that someone is missing, the camera quickly changes to him vacuuming a red carpet with headphones on which will cancel out the noise of everyone.

While in the staff only room there is a close up shot of a middle aged lady that faints because of diabetes, one of the cleaners get down to help her, Jackie was surprises as she never knew he knew how to do this.

There is a hand-held shot for when there is a knock on the staff only room door and everyone looks at the door in fear. There is an over the shoulder shot when Jackie opens the door and sees someone say that the one cleaner has been taken

A wide shot, pan shot captures the moment when Jackie runs out to the fewer and says that she will sack him but they have to let him go otherwise of he goes back to his own country he may get killed like his father and brother.

There is a shot reverse shot when Jackie and John Voyack are having a conversation this is also a close up that shows their emotions as Jackie shows guilt as she could have done more to protect the cleaner and John shows no emotions of mercy or sorrow but he shows that he doesn't care about taking the immigrant in.

Near the end of the extract there is a close up shot of everyone in the locker room while Jackie clears outs one of the lockers that belonged to the cleaner, everyone shows emotions of a great loss, a they show the audience that they have lost someone in their family.

Mise-En-Scene:

In the beginning of the extract there are two males who are dressed up as policemen, this shows to the audience that there are people breaking the law and the policemen are waiting to catch them when they try to escape.

As the camera changes we can see a reception lady dressed in all white, this is a symbol that represents how clean she is and how she is the first person that people see as they enter the Hotel Babylon so she would need to be looking appropriate and clean.

John Voyack walks into the Hotel with two men and one dressed as a policeman, John Voyack shows his ID and says who is he is, by showing his ID this shows the audience that he is who he says he is and he is not playing around to catch the immigrants. The ID gives him a sense of authority and responsibility as he is doing his job by obeying the law.

All the workers in the Hotel Babylon are either wearing suits/tuxedos or are wearing clothes that make them look well dressed except for the people behind the scenes like the chefs and cleaners, they are dressed in chef and cleaners outfits that make them stand out from everyone else. This shows the audience that this is a wealthy Hotel and they are very formal. This creates a sense of identity as no one would suspect immigrants working in a wealthy and well managed Hotel like this.

As soon as Jackie walks into the Kitchen you can see the chefs are cooking food for the guests, whether they are frying the food or cutting it. One of the cleaners are vacuuming the red carpets to make them look nice and presentable as guests walk on them. He has also got on headphones, so he cannot hear anyone and with the sound of the vacuum it blocks out them even more.

Jam in this case is being symbolized as giving life, since the middle aged female chef was diabetic she fainted and needed the sugar in the jam to save her, this creates a sense to the audience that these immigrants are more valuable then they are being represented.

The cleaners outfit almost look like a prisoner outfit in a way. This shows the audience that they are breaking the law and when one of the cleaners get caught his hands are behind his back which represents he is a prisoner being arrested and they clothing he is wearing makes him look even more guilty than he is.

Editing:

There is a shot reverse shot in the beginning of the extract with one of the workers and the policemen talking. This shows the audience that they are having a conversation. It is the same thing when John Voyack and the reception lady are talking back and forth together there is a shot reverse shot as they are communicating with each other.

There is continuity when the one cleaner is running away from John Voyack and the two men with him, he trips up on his vacuum cleaner and the shot changes to show it happen then changes to the shot before as he falls.

Sound:
In the beginning of the extract there is a Non-diegetic sound of music playing that sounds like it is for a spy movie or a detective movie, as John Voyack walks into the Hotel fewer. As soon as the reception lady talks to Job Voyack the music fades out.

There is a diegetic sound of dialogue and it is when John Voyack says to the reception lady "My name is John Voyack from the immigration service, we have authority to search this premises", the reception lady can identify that they are here to take the immigrants working in the Hotel so she very sneakily asks one of the employees in a tuxedo to go and give some "purple acquisition forms to housekeeping" this implies that he would need to tell the housekeeping manager to hide all the immigrants from being caught.

After this the Non-diegetic music plays again but this time it is faster and more adrenaline rushing, they shot speed and the music speed are in line like they are working together to create a sense of rush and suspense for the audience to see what will happen next and for them to wonder if they are all going to be safe or not.

In the kitchen there are diegetic sounds of the chefs cooking where in the movie you can hear the frying of food in a frying pan and the chopping of food on a chopping board.

When Jackie gets to the kitchen he is saying to everyone to come with her as they may be in danger, while she says this it is in another language which indicates to the audience that there may be immigrants who do not know English so Jackie has to talk another language to reach out to them and get their attention.