Explain your understanding of Fredric Jameson’s theories about representation ‘remixed’ through pastiche, parody and intersexual references’ and postmodernism at play?

Post modernism is more than one thing. One meaning that relates to the ideas of pastiche, parody and intertextuality is the ideas that we live in an increasingly dominating media saturated world, which changes our sense of reality. It makes everything around us simulated and hyper real. Themes in postmodern media are about the piece being quite aware of its self and self-conscious. Postmodern films often make you aware you’re watching a film

Fredric Jameson’s theory is where the terms ‘pastiche’, ‘parody’ and ‘intertextuality’ are used in terms of postmodern media. Pastiche is about copying and taking from something else. It could be ideas, a style, a certain image etc. Parody is something that mocks the original. For example ‘Superhero descending a staircase’ is a parody of Marcel Duchamp’s ‘Nude Descending a staircase’. It a parody because it’s a version of an original thing but with an element of comedy added, (from the mix of highbrow art and pop culture being mashed into one). Intertextuality is when one piece of media references another in some way. For example, Mel Ramos’ ‘Nude descending a staircase’ is intertextual because its referencing Marcel Duchamp’s painting through the title and the similar subject. It’s not a parody because it’s not trying to add any humour and it’s not pastiche because it’s added something to the piece as it’s not just a copy, it now has a much more seductive side to it. It’s more like a separate piece that references it.  

The ‘Scream’ film series can be used for examples of Jameson’s theories. The first ‘Scream’ movie is very unique because it is probably the first horror film that is aware of other horror films. It does this by the main characters, all being people who like to watch horror films, so they make a lot of references.  It can be considered a parody of the horror genre.  It is more than just a pastiche because it adds an element of comedy and mocks horror a little. It is also intertextual because it name drops the directors name and mentions different films made by him. However some may say that it isn’t really a parody because, although it mocks, it doesn’t particularly imitate or exaggerate the genre.

The film ‘Scary Movie’ is a very obvious parody of ‘Scream’. It copies the film very closely in what happens, but it exaggerates and adds comedy. For example, like the very beginning of ‘Scream’, the main girl is making popcorn. Then the phone calls and the man on the other side says ‘What’s that noise?’. In ‘Scream’ she says, ‘making popcorn’ and in ‘Scary Movie’ she says ‘I farted’. It is a parody as it copies it, but adds humour. It is also a parody because it imitates and mocks. At one point, when the woman runs away from the man in the mask, there are two signs; one which points left and says ‘SAFETY’ and the other points right and says ‘DEATH’. The woman looks at the signs and runs right. This mocks the stereotype of people in horror movies making the worst decisions when running away from the bad guy, e.g., running upstairs when it would be safer to run out the house.

The film ‘Scream 2’ is a sequel to ‘Scream’. It is a parody as it mocks the trends of sequels and ‘based on true events’ horror films. It is also very intertextual. The two main characters in the opening are both black and they are talking about how there aren’t enough black people in horror films and when there are, they are just killed off straight away. It is intertextual as they are talking about other horror films and commenting on them. This makes it quite self-aware. This aspect of the film also makes it a parody because it is comic and mocking of other horror films. Especially as very ironically, (this also adds comedy) these two characters are killed off, very quickly, before the end of the opening, just as they were talking about how black characters are always killed off quickly.

What Fredric Jameson is saying through his theory is that there isn’t anything new anymore. It feels like everything is a parody, pastiche, or just referencing something else. However it can be seen that these three things can be used remixed and played around with to create something new from the old. The film ‘Scream’ is still very recent, and that is a very original and new idea. This shows that maybe not everything has been done.