Fish Tank (2009) is very typical of the social realism genre.
Fish Tank was filmed in Tilbury, in Essex, in a run down estate called Mardyke. This area was renowned for its high crime rate and anti-social behaviour, as it is an underprivileged estate. Since Fish Tank was made, the estate it was filmed in has been renamed to Orchard Village and it has been given funding for re-generation. With the knowledge of where the film was made and the type of reputation the area has, helps Fish Tank to be successful in the social realism genre.
In the scene where Connor gives Mia the video camera, Mia fiddles with the camera and learns how to turn it on and work it. This is followed by Mia filming Connor getting dressed, and smelling Connors aftershave - giving him her opinion of it. Subsequently, Connor pulls Mia over his knee and playfully slaps her on the bum. This is foreshadowing what will happen later on in the film, when Mia and Connor end up having sex. This is typical of social realism because it is all filmed with a hand held camera, and it is all very raw and natural. Flirting between a teenager and her mothers boyfriend are not something that is seen in mainstream happy-ever-after films, and so this means that it is a gritty, social realism film as it is very real life.
Fish Tank is not a film that fits into the Propps theory of narrative as there are no clear heroes or villains. Mia is the protagonist who wants to get away from a dysfunctional, down-ward spiralling world of anti-social behaviour and no future. Mia is constantly walking very fast, as if she is trying to get away, but is going nowhere. In the opening scene where she confronts a group of girls that are dancing in a park with some bare-chested boys looking on, she is filmed on her own, isolated away from everyone else.
