2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Within the opening of ‘Poker’s Advocate’, various different social groups are represented. Holly, the only female represents both her gender and her upper class society through her gender, wardrobe (being of a classy dress, high heels, a shawl, and pearl jewellery). Through her leaving the game when it became stupid to stay in, it shows that she has the intelligence to save her overwhelming abundance of money. It also shows that she is more mature in gambling. Her leaving also shows that the higher class aren’t particularly the main social group that are to be portrayed in the film.

Gary represented the more wealthy Caucasian male, possibly single with a lot of girls following him around. We based his character around the stereotypical high stakes poker player at a Vegas casino through his cowboy hat and black leather jacket. His language throughout the piece is provoking and against the underdog which should make the audience not like him very much. He should be in his late twenties to mid thirties.

Dave represents the most average of players who don’t have much money and are playing to earn, not for fun. This is shown through his fleece jacket and nonspecific t-shirt. He would be about the same age as Gary. His continuation in playing the game says that he is stupid and doesn’t have much logic. Or possibly he is desperate for the money. Dave also has a brain tumour which represents these people as desperate as well as having action controlling hallucinations in the form of an angel and devil.

The angel and devil themselves represent the good and bad through their hair colour, skin tone, colour scheme and facial expressions. The good being innocent and paler. The bad being evil and dark.

This piece does not represent other ethnicities other than Caucasian except in the case of the devil. This could be seen as a view that Asians are evil (which was not the intention so casting could have been better thought out; maybe played by the same person, or even by the same actor as Dave and using split screens).

We chose to have a range of people from different social backgrounds within the game to show the variety of people playing these games. We also noticed how, in the real poker games in ‘High Stakes Poker’ there was a variety of people within one game. The majority of people playing are males, which was chosen as stereotypically, poker is a man’s sport/hobby. Dave was chosen to be the main character (being a male) as a woman would be less likely to turn to gambling to sort her money problems.