The Kick-Ass trailer establishes the comedy-action genre through its pacing and comedic scenes. It provides narrative details through dialogue to introduce the characters and plot. Social media promotion is included at the end. The poster positions the main character centrally among supporting characters to depict their roles.
The Chronicle trailer uses found footage-style cinematography and builds suspense through slow initial pacing. Little dialogue is used to reveal the plot. Social media promotion is also included at the end. The poster depicts three faint characters in an ominous setting to indicate its thriller genre.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre trailer builds tension through calm initial music and pacing that shifts when danger is introduced. It reveals characters but not specific plot
1. Analyse
Trailers & posters
Media Studies
In this I will look for:
How much narrative is given:
Length:
How is genre signified:
Pace of the edit
Synergy (How do they use social media(Facebook, twitter))
Voiceovers / narrators implemented
Music, lighting, inter titles
See how much of the trailer u pickup from the poster
By: Gabriel Veloso
3. Length: 2:35
Voiceover: Yes
Rating: 7.9 Kick-Ass Trailer
• First 2 seconds show the producers, ‘Universal’ and ‘Marv’, followed by an L cut with a shot
of another character then cuts to the character speaking, this comedic scene of a superhero
lookalike dying immediately reveals that it’s a comedy action hybrid genre film.
• Pace of the edit is rather slow until he puts on his mask, then it starts speeding up and non
dialectic music is introduced alongside occasional narration from the character within the
film followed by an inter-title sequence halfway through which brings the ‘calm before the
storm’ as it turns silent for few seconds for a characters line to add suspension, then cuts to
fast pace editing and energetic music of action packed scenes of the film.
• A lot of the plot is introduced mainly through dialogue, as we’re introduced to all the
characters and each individual in a way portrays their part in the film, for example we know
the ‘baddie’ wants to kill the ‘goodies’ through dialogue, and the ‘goodies’ established they
want to kill the ‘baddie’ via a scene of them fighting.
• Synergy occurs at the end of the trailer as there’s a 10 second sequence advertising the
Facebook fan website for those interested in kickass.
5. Kick-Ass Poster
• In the poster we see the main protagonist as shown by his position in the frame, followed by
three other main characters differentiated by height to symbolise their roles.
• His position between the ‘Red Mist’ and ‘Big daddy’ with ‘Hit girl’ indicates that the main
character is on both the good and although unknowingly also bad side.
• The characters have comical outfits for superhero characters and the one on the left has clear
resemblance and appears to pay homage to ‘Batman’. And the smallest girl wielding the most
‘kick-ass’ weaponry symbolizes her role as one of the most thrillingly exciting characters.
• With the background colour being red and there being that darker patch symbolizing blood , this
poster manages to portray a sense of gore to it’s viewer which is quite a common theme
throughout the film.
• Credits are all on the lower side of the poster, with the starred actors names above, and the
production companies listed bellow,
• Both the framing and M/E/S of the poster represent its genre as a comedy action film, although
in contrast to the trailer which revealed ‘the princess’ as Vladimir Propp’s theory would
suggest, the poster only reveals the hero costumed characters.
7. Length: 2:14
Voiceover: No
Rating: 7.1 Chronicle Trailer
• Opens with an approval for the audience.
• There’s a black screen, which transcends into a shot of a
fuzzy screen onto the shot.
• Smart use of camera work as it’s all from a POV of Andrews
camera.
• Music comes with the visual, although dialogue is
introduced before.
• Advertising campaign introduced in the end for Facebook
and Twitter.
• There’s slow pace editing until Andrew is shown to hurt
someone, from then its fast pace montage editing.
• The cuts have a fuzzy screen effect to them, establishing a
theme of the film as distortion.
9. Chronicle Poster
• This poster clearly states the films genre as it only
contains three faintly shown characters in an ominous
environment, portraying a sense of danger, therefore
implying it’s a thriller.
• The futuristic looking city on the lower half suggest
that this is a sci-fi film, with some form of post
modernism due to the way the shot is angled.
• The fact that there’s three characters each fainter than
the other implies that there may be some
conflict/differences in power, which could be a mild
suggestion for drama.
11. Length: 2:21
Voiceover: No
Rating: 6.1 Chainsaw Massacre Trailer
• Opens with an approval for the audience.
• Has calm non-diegetic music playing with footage of people
traveling, showing the victims at a calm and peaceful state.
• Inter titles showing date and location.
• Fast pace editing with fades into black and cut into another
shot, fades into white and fades from shot to shot, this
portrays a horrifying and disorientating theme to the film.
• Music stops and fast pace editing opens once an issue is
introduced.
• Reveals most if not all the characters but keeps the plot
reveal to a minimum since we don’t know who dies and
who lives.
• Ends with credits.
13. Chainsaw Massacre Poster
• This poster conforms most horror film posters
conventions as it’s dark and only shows a single
character.
• The typography being a stained white kind of colour
connotes stained purity.
• The character has cuts all down his face, telling the
audience that there may be gore or horrifying
characters within the film. His eyes being black
connotes he’s evil.
• The black background gives an even greater impression
of evil as well as solitude since the character is
surrounded by darkness.