British Cinema: Exam Question

 How are the ideological themes and issues in your chosen film resolved?  (40)

In this essay I will talk about how throughout both films, Shaun of the Dead and Trainspotting, they both present us with some sort of change in comparison from the beginning and the end, in particular relationship/friendship change. 

One of the main changes in Shaun of the Dead is the relationship between Shaun and Liz, which is at the start they break up, in this break up scene at Liz's apartment she is upset that Shaun couldn't book the table at the restaurant they had been planning to go. She lists out things that Shaun had been promising to do but couldn't do it, essentially calling him unreliable and irresponsible. However the ending scene of Shaun of the Dead they are living together in Shaun's place which has been completely modified to I'm assuming Liz's liking, both the change in the house and their relationship mirror how much of an impact the genre change had on Shaun, primary example being that you'd generally think this film is a rom-com at the beginning, when in reality it was a zombie apocalypse, and that these changes only began to take place when Shaun realised that he's not in a rom-com.

 Another change in Shaun of the Dead is the relationship between Shaun and Philip, in the job scene where Shaun's working and is visited by his step-father Philip to remind him that he has to bring flowers to his mum, Barbara, which Shaun childishly responds that he will. We are shown that Shaun doesn't like Philip from the way he addresses towards him, his colleague told him that his dad is there to visit him which he quickly responds with "He's not my dad!" proving furthermore that their relationship is clearly not good. This however changes in the car scene where they're driving to the pub, and Philip is about to become a zombie (die), where he confesses to Shaun that he loves him and that he always believed in him, Shaun forgives him and fixes their relationship. By the time this happens though Philip turns into a zombie and everyone quickly had to get out the car and leave him in there.

Last relationship change in Shaun of the Dead is the relationship between Shaun and Ed, although their relationship isn't bad at all, Ed's a burden to Shaun, he doesn't do anything to help and is always slacking making everyone slow down. For example in the beginning scene Shaun is getting ready for work whilst Ed is there just playing games without even attempting to get up and do anything to help, this presents the slack and laziness of Ed, which you could say that Shaun and Ed are opposites just because of the way they're portrayed in this scene. In comparison to the basement scene, where Ed sacrifices himself letting Shaun and Liz escape and leaving him behind because he comes to realisation that he slows everyone down and shows some character development by being mature and letting them go.

These changes all started happening after the film genre fully transitioned into a zombie apocalypse, the narrative is unrestricted due to bits of film form, from the beginning the audience could already see bits of zombie apocalypse, from the zombie-like yawn of Shaun at the beginning to a whole scenarios happening in the background whilst Shaun goes on about his day, the changes however only started happening once Shaun comes to realisation that he's in a zombie apocalypse, a good scene to mention the full transition of the film would be when he wakes up from the night out with Ed, there's a big flash and the sky turns more gloomy and Shaun starts reading his goals which he literally wrote down.

In addition, changes in Transpotting also happened, one main change is Renton's relationship with heroin where throughout the film he goes back and forth on it. The first change was at the beginning of the film where Renton says he's done with drugs and wants to be drug-free , the second change was at Dawn's death scene where he relapses back into heroin due to sadness from her death and last change was in the shoplifting scene where he is caught and gets sent to rehabilitation where he is fully done with heroin. 

Furthermore, a relationship change in Trainspotting was also Renton's relationship with the gang (Spud, Sick Boy, Begbie, Tommy). In the opening scene we are introduced to them and we can see that their relationship is fairly good nothing really negative. However this changes when Renton decides to run away with the money that they got from selling £4,000 worth of heroin for £16,000, he leaves £4,000 for Spud showing that he still cares for him, however for the others he realises that they're not good friends.

These changes were all ignited after he comes back from rehabilitation, after selling the money he finds out that Sick Boy was planning on stealing the money for himself and running away, adding on the Begbie's aggressiveness after he beat up a man really badly for spilling beer on his shirt , Renton realises that his friends are bad friends and that none of them really deserve the money so he decides to betray them and run.