Regional Identity in Doc Martin

Regional Identity is present is many different ways in the clip for Doc Martin. 

In the opening scene Regional Identity is shown through the costuming, in the long shot we can see Doc Martin wearing a suit while the other characters are wearing boiler suits, this shows that he comes from somewhere where people working in very formal clothing while the other characters don't wear formal clothing and can get away with wearing whatever they feel comfortable in. The costuming also suggests that the characters wearing the boiler suits are doing manual labour whereas because Doc Martin is wearing a suit it suggests that he is doing more work to do with using the brain more.  This also suggests to the audience the Doc Martin is from a higher class than the other characters. The use of their own words and the fact that Doc Martin doesn’t understand what it means shows that Regional identity is also show by the way that they characters talk, the workers have a more rural accent whereas Doc Martin has a different accent, a posher accent, which makes him stand out. The manner of the characters also represent the place they come from, the characters that come from the rural area are much more relaxed compared to Doc Martin who comes from a much more urban area where things happen much quicker than in the country, this represents their attitude to the situation while because Doc Martin is stressed about the situation while the workers are relaxed in the situation.  The décor in the scene matches the place as it appears to be an old village that hasn’t moved with the time whereas the Doc has, the fact that the sink needs fixing relates to the fact that the town is old and tells the audience that the village is stuck in the old days and hasn’t made any effort to move with the time. The fast editing that has been used to show the Docs mood as he gets more stressed about the situation but it also use to represent the life he used to have. When nobody reacts to the dog entering the scene nobody seems to notice or care except Doc Martin this shows that he really has moved out of his comfort zone. The high angle shot of the dog makes him look innocent and lost almost like Doc Martin as he is lost in this rural town as he is used to living in a urban area.

When Doc Martin is seen walking around the streets there is asynchronous diegetic sound of the seagulls is used to show regional identity because it tells the audience that the programme is set by the sea and this helps the audience narrow down where exactly where it is set, also the small thin winding lanes also help the audience narrow down where the programme is as there are very few places that have windy road like that. A tracking shot is used to show the urgency of Doc Martins walk compared to everyone else in the scene as they are walking around the town slowly and without a care. The Policeman are shown as very relaxed which gives the audience the impression that in rural areas there is a low crime rate compared to urban areas this is show by the tilt shot from the hoover to the police officer suggesting that the village is safe and that the police officer is so confident in the fact that he doesn’t even need to patrol the area. The old computer in the background reinforces the fact that the village is stuck in the past and hasn’t moved forward unlike the life the life the Doc is used to.  The fact that the policeman is hovering rather than enforcing the law tells the audience that it is a safe place as he has the time to do the hovering. The dialogue is used to show that the village is very small and everyone is friends with each other where as in a large city not everyone would be friends, this tells the audience that everyone knows everyone’s business and knows exactly what is going on, this is also shown through the fact that the women by her car knows who Doc Martin is without him even introducing himself, the slower editing used here suggests to the audience that he has more patience to deal with a situation involving her than a situation with the two plumbers, where very fast paced editing is used to show that the Doc is becoming stressed about the situation. Regional Identity is also show when Doc Martin is walking down the street and he can see into the primary school, this also tells the audience that he village is save because if this was in a city there would be large walls around the school so no one could look in, also in the background houses can be seen made out of different colour rocks which is commonly associated with seaside towns. The fact that the village is very small is shown by the fact that there is no one walking down the street and the fact that the town is not very busy, this also suggests to the audience that the village isn’t a holiday resort town otherwise it would be a bit busier. The fact that the community is tightly knit is shown when the women implies that the old doctor used to write prescriptions in the street suggesting that everyone trusts each other, this is also shown through the fact that the women with the vegetables knows all about the school teacher whereas in larger communities most people don’t pay attention to other people within the community as there are too many people to get to know.  

In the opening scene the local people are represented as having their own local dialect, this is shown by what the saying when they use words such as ‘bodmin’ rather than using the word ‘barmy’. In the scene when the older lady is asking Doc Martin for a repeat prescription in the street suggests that she knows how to manipulate the situation to get what she wants and knows the exact works to say ‘ladies of a certain age’, suggests that she will get what she wants no matter what the cost. In the shot with the plumbers the younger plumber is shown as being very intelligent as he talks about Daphne de Maurier and make literary links to the word ‘bodmin’ this suggests to the audience that he knows what he is talking about. The long shot first used in this scene suggests that the young plumber has the lowest status in the room as he Is closest to the bottom of the screen, but when he start to become more involved with the conversation he is shown as going up in status because he stands up and is now higher than the old plumber, this is shown by a tilt shot as he stands up.

The use of fresh produce as a prop tells the audience that this is somewhere that fresh produce is grown and sold telling the audience that it is rural rather that urban because if it was urban it would be in boxes in packaging being delivered by a big lorry instead of which they are being delivered unpackaged in crates in the back of a pick-up truck, this suggests that people who live in rural areas eat more healthily because they will eat the fresh produce from the local shop..  This shows the audience that local produce is key to the village and is the woman’s lively hood. The fact that the shop is very small represents its rural nature and the fact that it is the local shop so should be small as local shops are never very big. The colour of the women’s clothes also suggests that she works outside as she is wearing clothes that are dark green and brown which suggests to the audience that she works outside, the fact that she works outside is also suggested through the fact that she is the one taking the vegetables into the shop.