Research Log 3 Social Realism: Karen J Sheperdson

Written By: Karen J Sheperdson
Published: 2003

'The Protagonists of Social Realism are often indecisive, immobilised by their situation and unable to act, or only able to respond to adverse circumstances and events that are outside their control. Even if dreams are realised, a price has to be paid, and the cost is far greater than envisaged'
'Film Theory: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, Volume 4'
(Page 104)

'The struggles of central characters are often inter-generational (primarily between fathers and sons), but occasionally they engage confrontationally with figures who represent the institutional forces of authority and containment (police officers, social workers, teachers, employers and so forth)'
'Film Theory: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, Volume 4'
(Page 104)

'Social realism emphasises that characters are inextricably contained within a  nexus of social/economic/geographical/historical factors that are far beyond the resources of any single individual to control or transcend. Characters face the violent and often tragic consequences of containment and exclusion: offering few solutions, the films express a profound ambivalence towards the existing social order.'
'Film Theory: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, Volume 4'
(Page 104)

'Social realism in the late 1980s and early 1990s engages an eclectic range of narrational and visual styles that are more usefully understood as part of a realist than isolated and discrete examples of particular filmic practice'
'Film Theory: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, Volume 4'
(Page 105)

'Women tend to be a background presence or to feature as victims in many contemporary urban dramas, their aspirations and hopes for a better life doomed to unfulfilled resolution'
'Film Theory: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, Volume 4'
(Page 111)