Represenation of Gender

Textual Analysis - Our Girl

The lead role in the series is a girl called Georgie. Stereotypically speaking, it is less common for women to fight in the armed forces. Therefore the series has to introduce a lot of ideas that challenge the stereotypical woman. In the clip that we watched she was being captured by a terrorist group.




In the opening scenes of episode 2, Georgie is being presented as weak and vulnerable. When she is in the van attending to one of the man's wounds, the van is suddenly stopped and attacked by terrorists. It starts with an establishing shot of the van turning down the road, although it dies not include much of the surroundings, we get an overall shot of the van and their location. It then moves to an over-the-shoulder shot of the soldier and the driver of the ambulance van. In this shot we see the terrorist group pull up in their truck, guns pointing at them. Over all this you hear the sound of tires screeching, this shows the audience that the they are in a rush as well as creating tension. A moment before the gun starts to fire, it changes to a shot inside the van. As soon as we here the gunshots, the camera shots move very fast as they are using fast-paced editing to create a chaotic effect. It then changes to a low-angle shot of the antagonist shooting his gun. It make shim look intimidating and powerful. It also demonstrates the fire power form the gun making him look even more powerful. It then changes to a shot where the audience can see three bullet holes appear on the windscreen of car. This demonstrates the damage that the weapon is doing. Then it changes again, back inside the car as we hear one of the soldiers using dialogue. At the same time, in the fore ground, we can see the driver being shot. The camera then moves to look from outside the car, through the windscreen, looking at the attacked driver and soldier. The driver appears to be dead whilst we hear the soldier screaming as he is shot in the soldier. After this the shots slow down as we see the antagonist get out of the car and the music takes over which creates a tense atmosphere. We can here a little bit of dialogue from him getting out the car and then the shot changes again to Georgie. She is franticly hiding all trace of  her army uniform and preparing to be captured.