POSTER ANALYSIS NO.2

The tagline

‘Welcome to crystal lake’, sets the scene for where the ‘main events’ are set to happen. We can see that by the outline of the lighting that has been used that the antagonist is in a forest, subjecting the audience to a part of the narrative. Also sticking to conventions with an isolated location for where the story unfolds.

The tagline is in contrast with itself; ‘welcome to crystal lake’ is a greeting of happiness and welcoming, whereas for the narrative everyone wants to escape there. We can feel the sense of unwelcoming as the dark background with the mist and the overpowering figure standing before us is anything but welcoming.

The colour

The darkness that is surrounding the outline of the poster and the character is effective as we can only see what seems to be the antagonist making this frightful and luring the audience in as it is mysterious as to who this person is.

The light behind the antagonist head is ironic as it is light and making it seem like he could be a saviour as white is a pure colour and symbolises innocence.

Also the white-ness links with the ‘crystal’ in the slogan to make things seem like the narrative of the story is ‘crystal clear’, as you can almost see through it.

The profile lighting which is used just to the right of his head makes him look like he is blocking his victims form the light, that he is the deciding power whether you will be spared and you will be saved by the 'light' or whether your fate will be to be at the hands of a murderer.

The title

The tile of the film is in a bold red font. The red symbolises blood, which shows that the sub-genre of the film is; slasher.

The colour makes the title stand out of the poster as the poster mainly consists of blacks and dark greens. This is essential for attracting the audience’s attention as the meaning being the title is widely known to be an omen of bad luck.

The position of the title sticks to conventions as it is at the bottom of the poster, directly underneath the main image. With the production information above it ‘From the Producers of Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ this would help lure in the audience as the y are already a fan of this particular sub-genre, that having seen a film like it they may enjoy this one as well.

 

The main image

The setting of which the main image in is, is a forest, which supports the conventions for horror as it reinforces the isolated location of which the story line is placed.

Although the slogan says ‘Welcome to Crystal Lake’ there is no hint of a lake in this image. The forest can only been seen suggesting that the forest will be one of the main places where a lot of the action will take place, from a chase scene to a murder.

 

We cannot see the, from what we can assume to be the antagonist’s face, the shadowing has covered half of his face and body. This is created by a low angle shot again to make him look even more powerful than the average man. Also it appears that they are wearing a mask, which is a convention of horror as we can never see the antagonist’ face as the suspense of who the killer is, is a big part of the narrative in horror films, and is usually revealed at the end of the film. The mask also makes the antagonist look less human and ore grotesque and scary.

The costume of the antagonist is big, bulky, dark and defensive. This links in well with the profile of a killer as they are meant to be super humans and 'untouchable', the costumes makes him look protected as well as mysterious and creepy.

The long knife makes anyone who looks at it feel uneasy and uncomfortable as this makes him look incredibly powerful and dominating. this fits in well with the conventions of horror films as the killer always has a distinctive weapon that when heard or seen makes the victims feel terrified.

The image makes the antagonist look bigger than the average man. The killers in horror films are always portrayed as ‘super humans’, that they are almost indestructible and will take a long time for the victims to overpower them.

The moon light on the floor shows that the events will take place at night, again a convention of a horror film, as the audience’s main fear is what can happen in the darkness.

 

Other texts

The production information underneath the title is in white to stay in contrast with the colours that are already in the poster, but are different to the title as this information is less important.

The release date is the same colour as the title as it is the second most important information on the poster, it also has a link to the film as it will be released on the 13^thas well, this would make the audience more inclined to go and see it as they will want to be part of the legend.

 

Overall evaluation:

Overall this is an effective horror poster as it meets all the criteria for a slasher poster. We as an audience can see that it belongs to the subgenre slasher from the props to the lighting.

The target audience will be attracted to this poster and make them want to see it, the slogan is enticing and lures the audience is a false sense of security of a happy welcoming, that they will see the unfolding dramatic horrific events that will take place here.

The production information that is given will also bring in the audience as they will want to see a film made by the production company who have produced films they have liked in the past.

The narrative of the film isn’t given away too much though the poster, as we can see the location of the film is at Crystal Lake and that there will be deaths due to the weapon the antagonist is holding in his hand. These aren’t spoiler alerts and could borderline on a teaser trailer due to the lack of information given by the poster.