Feature Article Analysis

The feature that I chose was "Is the 'Wild Things' Movie Too Scary for Kids," written by Andrew Romano. The story is set up more like an essay rather then a news story, addressing a particular question rather than reporting on a news event. Unlike traditional news stories we don't get the main point of the piece at the beginning of Romano's article. It's not until the end of the second paragraph and the beginning of the third that we find out what Ramon is writing about. There is really no lead paragraph, instead Romano starts his story off by telling about Spike Jonze the director of the film and his interaction with a stranger. Romano uses this story which he took from an interview that Jonze did with Newsweek earlier to set up the idea of the film being too controversial or more importantly too difficult for children to understand. Romano eases the reader into the topic by using Jonze's story with the stranger, which is unlike a regular news story that want's to get right to the point in the first sentence. It's more laid back and it's trying to come to an answer rather than trying to preach the truth. One of the other bigger differences between this story and a regular news story is that Romano quotes from other written sources rather than from a source he interviewed himself. He takes quotes from interviews that people have given to Newsweek, quotes from journals and other articles that people have written, and he even takes a quote from a 1963 review of the "Where the Wild Things Are" book. This is where it seems to be more like an essay because he takes ideas from other people to help get his own point across to the reader. Romano has the entire article written out like an essay with a beginning paragraph, a body, and a closing paragraph to end the story. Regular news stories usually have an opening and a middle but rarely does it have a concluding paragraph that leaves the reader thinking about the main idea of the story they just read, and Romano's last paragraph does just that.