Contemporary Representations of Youth and Youth Culture By Toby Clench

Harry Brown (2009, Daniel Barber)  Provides a typical representation of youth and youth culture, in the 21 st Century, as the antagonists wear hoodies and carry around dangerous objects such as bladed knifes and guns.

Noel Winters (Played by Ben Drew / Plan B)  ‘Noel’ would be seen as the lead antagonist as he is the ‘ring leader’ of the local gang which are constantly in trouble with the Police for threatening behaviour  This is a typical representation of youth and youth culture, in the 21 st Century, because the media portrays youth as misbehaving thugs who wear hoodies and carry weapons around  There is a scene, within Harry Brown, where ‘Noel’ and his gang are all wearing hoodies and all are carrying weapons of some kind which further emphasizes the fact that the media portray the youth as being dangerous

Tunnel Scene

Tunnel Scene Analysis  As demonstrated in the previous clip, it goes to show that the youth (the antagonists) are posing as a threat to society due to their irregular behaviour as they shoot several bullets through the tunnel towards someone who they cannot even see

Middle Class Fear  To coincide with the stereotypical youth representation, within ‘Harry Brown’, this film also shows the fear that middle class citizens have of youths and the youth culture  This is represented through the use of dark lighting, a loud soundtrack (to build and create tension) as well as off-balance camera angles to portray the sense of uneasiness, during the scene

Scene

Scene Analysis  The main protagonist, ‘Harry Brown’ - played by ‘Michael Caine’, would likely be viewed as a member of the middle class in society and due to the way in which the media portray the youth, the older generation of the middle class (like ‘Harry Brown’) are likely to be scared of youths because they are portrayed as being dangerous  In the clip it could be seen that ‘Harry Brown’ was afraid of getting hurt himself, as he was threatened with a knife, but as the tension heightened he retaliated by stabbing the youth in the chest  The use of an accompanying soundtrack helped to raise the tension and make the audience feel uneasy about what was going to happen next

Conclusion  Overall, it goes to show that the youth and youth culture are stereotypically and very negatively represented within ‘Harry Brown’.  This is mostly down to the fact that the antagonists are wearing hoodies and carry around guns whilst also hanging around in tunnels late at night  All three of these components contribute towards the stereotypical representation of youth in the 21 st Century and how the media represent them