Fish Tank: To what extent are your chosen texts typical of their genre?

'Fish Tank' is a social realist film and is very typical of its genre due to the representations and narrative styles that it uses.
One of the ways in which it conforms to its genre is through it's representation of the under-represented, which in this case is the underclass population. It shows a real-life view of the people that tend to be hidden and shunned by society. An example of this would be the small clip at the start of the film that shows the flat block alleyways in front of the apartments and the children running up and down the walkway on one of the floors, showing what life is like for the 'regular' and common people living in Britain.
Another way that 'Fish Tank' is typical of social realism is due to the conventions it uses, specifically the use of handheld camera shots. In a scene towards the end of the film, when Mia 'kidnaps' Keira, the scene shows Mia running after the child. In a different genre, this scene would probably have been shot as a still camera movement but due to the features of this genre, the camera is handheld and moves with her, following her movements as she runs and blurring the landscape as it does so. This makes the shot and the film seem more realistic as this is how the action occurs in real life and makes it feel like more of a documentary than a fictional film. This therefore makes 'Fish Tank' typical of it's genre as social realistic films try to keep as close to reality as they can get.