Analysis of a Film Poster

Fright Night is a horror comedy where a boys mother falls for a man who actually has a dark secret. Her son begins to think he holds something, and that he is a dangerous man but she takes no notice.The idea of him being avampire is brought up and he investigates it further, along with his girlfriend, despite almost loosing everyone close to him in a way to prove he is right, you follow the journey he goes on, and the dangers he gets himself into.

The film is a deffinate teen film, something you would see the younger genrations watching. It has the sterotypical 'hot' girl and 'hot' boy characters and the stereotypical american lifestyle. It also comepltely destroys the true idea of what a vampire really is, and makes it soft, again something suitable for teenagers to watch.

Throught the film hold comdeic value, when the actor David Tennant plays a fake vampire killer Peter Vincent, bringing a comedy streek to the film, and in many ways mocking a lot of people that actually do it in real life.

The poster shows the two main charcters, the boy stodd with an axe instantly refferring to him as the herro then you have what you persume is the villan in a faint image of his face ressembly the sky, showing how hes watching over him. The dark lights used fading into rewd and amber sunlit colours hep to show dakrness and light meet, it shows the idea of fear and death. The beeding red eyes that stare ressembles hell or the devils in connmotes the idea of danger and how hes not human, you can get from this poster the film is not something happy and joyful the storyline will be something dark and different to the 'norm'.  The tittle is postioned at the bootom The letters F and T are shaped in the style of a stakegving the hint of vampires, the writing is bold red and with a acomplete black backgroup allowing the title to stound out.

Influences On Our Short Film

Sound And Music

The Ominous Knocking 

In our film there is large use of knocking coming from an unknown source. This is also used in the film Strangers where a couple are staying at an isolated holiday cabin when knock is heard at the door in the early hours of the morning. The inspiration for Stangers was stories of people knocking on doors at night and if anyone asnwer the house is left alone but if no one answers the house robbed. Starngers turns this on its head making it so that if someone answers the door the people who then rob and torture/murder anyone inside. 

The Harsh Soundtrack

For our film we want to use an harsh violin soundtrack similar to the famous music used in Psycho for the shower scene. The music makes the scene tense and builds anticipation for what's going to happen to the vulnerable woman in the shower, it also helps the horror of the scene as the woman is killled with the screech of the violin with every stab into the woman. 

The Theme Tune 

The theme song of Comedie Horror tend to take different routes to what is used, some go for songs that relate to the film, some go for the comedy songs to keep the humour going once the credits are rolling and some go for the Rock or Metal route that can fit with the genre of the film well. A Rock theme or something similar is what we want to use for our short film as we think it will fit well with our film, something maybe of the Pop Punk genre would probably fit best with our film.

 

  Hugo- 99 Problems from Fright Night

Metallica- For Whom The Bell Tolls from Zombieland

Costume design

Costume design is very improtant in a film. As instantly it is what people see, it allows people to eastablish what the character is like and what there purpose or job is. For example take a women in a suit for example instantly you think high class and professional, whereas if they wore a tracksuit and trainers you would think lowerclass and a little less professional. It all comes down  to steareoptypes and how you imagine clothes to tell about a person. For this we want Cara to be in Pjs this instantly will show that shes in bed or in a comfy environment, possibly from the character shown on the top it will give an idea that she is quite young. We want her to be dressed casual and comfy the hair to not be done up propperly just hung loose with a pretty basic makeup look if non at all to show she is ready for bed. Where as freddie will be dressed in uniform to show how hes is at work and has to set a standered his clothes will be wet from the rain indicating how long he had being stood there and for them to be slightly ruined and a little all over the place. From this you can imagine him being young and not really bothered about his appearance you can also tell that his job is nothing too porfessional or in need of having to look incredibly smart.

Audience

Our audience is mainly teenagers. This is because the two characters within the film are teenagers, making them relatable to the people watching. Further more, horror spoof type films are often a favourite for teenagers and slightly younger as they are a way of seeing horror movie themes without it being too scary and traumatising. The slight comedy within the film appeals to a young audience as they make the film a good choice for a “movie night” or something good for teenagers to watch with their friends. The film is set in a family home which teenagers will find comforting as they will relate to the girl and the way she lives. The pizza boy being a teenager also helps them relate as many teenagers have to take up low pay jobs to bring in extra money.

Our film is something you would associate with teenagers anyway its a stereotypical 'rom-com' with witty humour but scary and tense scenes followed throughout. The film is pretty dark however suitable for teenagers in respect that, it has humour in it to lighten up the film. It is something you would see a teenage wanting or going to see, as it is to do with black comedy, like scary movie or Shaun of the dead. Pizza is something teenagers hype about in this day and age so already they can relate to  the fear of opening the door to a delivery man adding more humour.

Age Rating

Our Age Rating: 12A

The age rating for our film will be a 12A as  it has scary themes within, but is not a classic horror films. It also has no direct violence, swearing or sexual themes. However, it has scary tension when Cara believes that there may be a serial killer outside, and so children under the age of twelve would be safer accompanied by an adult in case they find the scenes too scary to watch. With the sin mind, we give our film a 12A rating as we want it to be available to as many people as possible without it being too inappropriate for it's audience.

What is the difference between 12 and 12A?

When a film is released in cinemas (during it's theatrical window), if it is only appropriate for people over 12 years of age, it can either be given a 12 or a 12A certificate. If a film is given a 12 certificate on cinematic release, the content of the film can only be viewed strictly by people over the age of 12 years. According to the BBFC classification guidelines a 12 film:

- Should not glamourise or provide instructional details on the misuse of drugs
- Should not promote dangerous behavour that children may imitate
- Should only use strong language to a moderate level
- Should only contain breif nudity, if any
- Should only portray sexual activity breifly
- Should only contain moderate physical and psychological threat and horror sequences
- Should only contain moderate violence (sexual violence should be implied and not explicit and should only be used in a suitable context)

If a film is given a 12A certificate upon cinematic release, it shouldnt be viewed by anyone under the age of 12 unless accompanied by an adult. The BBFC also advises that parents should make sure to look into a 12A film before taking anyone under the age of 12 to see it.

Props

Our bedroom will already have generic bedroom props.
We have a house that will be used as our house which is already full of homely things.
The only props we don't have lying around are a pizza menu and a pizza box, which we have now got. As we are filming in a real house rather than on a set, the house is fully kitted out already as a functioning home and will be a homely looking setting. We also used a glass for water which we had in the kitchen cupboards already.

Candella uk

One possible distributor for our film is Candella uk. Their films have featured at festivals such as "Cannes film festival", "Rushes Soho Shorts" and "VIVA!". It was founded in 2003 by Mariela Artiles. In 2009 she also created a distribution portfolio. Candella films gives opportunities to short film makers who may go unnoticed as they can submit films to the portfolio and win prize money in return. Their film can also then be played at one of Mariela's fifteen festival contacts. As it a production company that produces prodominantly short films it would be ideal for our film as w are a small group of people making a short film. As they take films to festivals, it would help to get the film more publicity and make our film much more popular, making profit and getting our film recognision.

Possible Film Distributors: Future Shorts

FUTURE SHORTS

'Future Shorts' is a company that allows any film maker to set up screenings of their short film. This allows amateur film makers with very small budgets to distribute their short films.
The company was founded in 2003 and every three months, the company takes lots of different short films from a range of film makers from all over the globe. This is why I feel that Future Shorts would be a good distributer for our short film as I feel that our film is going to be unique and have a twist that will be appealing to lots of audiences. This distributor would also be ideal as, in terms of cost and budget, it would be the more realistic option as we have a very small budget.     

Horror Comedy

Horror comedy is a genre of film that uses hohhor to build suspence, and comedy to add a sense of comic relief. Horror comedy often crosses over with black comedy as they both use dark and scary themes to create humour. Washington Irving's "The legend of Sleepy Hollow" is seen as the first good horror comedy and made people laugh one minute and scream the next. Horror comedy also comes under Gallows humor, like black comedy.

One popular Horror comedy is lesbian vampire killers. The basic plot is that of a vampire horror, with women being enslaved to the vampires by an ancient curse. However the film plays on the way that men see lesbians as sexy women and the lesbian vampires are seen as being desirable women. On their eighteenth birthday, every girl will turn into a lesbian vampire killer and the two main characters must fight their way through it. The film also consyains actors well known for doing comedy films.

The settings for horror comedy are often very similar to the settings in horror films. They are usually spooky houses or deserted forests, however sometimes they are in more populated areas to express humans being the enemy. They also have lots or bad weather to set the mood and give more opportunities for things to go wrong. Storms and rain are the most common weather types in horror flms as they can cut off phone signals and create disasters. Most of the locations have a dark and tragic histpry, giving them another lair of scariness.

High and low angles are used often as they can connote fear and powerof characters within the scenes. They often use a mix of shot lengths as long, flowing takes can show a building of tension as the samera doesn't leave the character. However short takes going quickly can show a sence of chaos and show panic that the characters re feeling. POV shots are good as you feel close to the character and relate to them, making you feel the the fear that they do.

Influences Of Our Short Film

Conventions and Concepts

Although we are making a Comedy Horror film our influences aren't all from the same genre, our influnces come from a range of different films. 

The Unknown Villain

The Blair Witch Project is a good example of this as the villain is never revealed, the students who trying to find out about the legend of the Blair Witch experience strange happens but are never met with a solid incarnate of the Witch. All that really seems to happen is the members of the group possibly getting possessed in some which could mean that these themselves are the villain but to be possessed you still need some form of entity to possess the person in question which means there must be some form of greater protagonist.

Psycho is anther great example of the villain not being known, or least not until the end of the film. As murder insues at the Bates Hotel suspion rises and only one character is never scene, this is Mrs Bates, Norman Bates' mother. Although the characters think that Mrs Bates is in fact alive it turns out that she is dead and her decomposing corpse is in the attic. Due to her death and the unnervingly cloise relationship she and her son had Norman develops some sort of split personality that causes him to dress and act as his mother while murdering innocent people. The actual murderer is still argued as whether it is Norman Bates or the part of his personality that is his mother that commits the murders.

 

 Locations

As our short films is all in one locations, which is the female's house Rope shows good influence to the short as the entire film is set in just one room. Although you tend to need multiple locations to create a good story and narrative Rope is proof that minimal locatios can also create a great setting for a film as well.

Another Alfred Hitchcock film is a good influence due to the one main location butalso because Rear Window shows point of view shots out the window to see the neighbouring houses of the wheelchair bound Jefferies who looks out on the neighbours as to pass time. 

 

The Comedy Twist Ending

Given our Genre is Comedy Horror it wouldn't be right not to have a comedy ending to our film. Unlike most horrors that have the last surviving member of a group moving on after the events that have happened, complete culling of the group of the protaginists or some other form of serious ending comedies and especially Comedy Horror tend to have a lighter ending or a rather outragous ending as to fill the film with as many laughs as possible.
One ironic example of this the Shaun Of The Dead when Shaun goes to the shed in the back garden to play video games with hs now zombified best mate Ed who Sahun tells off when he tries to bite his arm.

Evil Aliens also has a great example of a comedy ending when the last surviving member of a Alien Invasion fleet returns home. The end of the film is of the female alien who survived on a chat show with the host not believing her story of these "Evil Aliens" or humans that have managed to slaugher of her entire crew. 

character steareotypes

 The Villan

The villans in a comedy horror and are very much usually vulga, and innapropriate especially towards women you find that they sexulise them and can be quite blunt. Take BettleJuice hes Very blunt towards the women and sees them more as an object. He is a well known character in the hit movie Betteljuice and is a very good example of a comedy hororr.
They always have an object or an obvious purpose but they always have a comedy side to them, and personally i find them to be the funniest charcter alot of attention are focused onto them.

 The Hero 

In a horror comedy you usually find the hero to be really sweet but at the same time still be quite twisted, take the girl again from beetlejuice, who saves the house and the couple, however shes quite twusted at first as shes the only one that can see dead people she dresses in morbid clours, just black, and comes across as dull and blunt. However it  adds humour as you wouldnt ecpect her to be kind from strereotypical veiws.

Film Poster Analysis

Rocky Horror Picture Show

In this poster for the rocky horror picture show, there are many aspects that can be taken into account.A film poster includes a lot of things to make it fully detailed and to give the audience information about the film.

The picture in this poster gives a lot of information about the film. The red lips show the risque themes within the film and give the audience the string idea that there will be sexual themes within the film and that it may make people feel uncomfortable. The image of Frank N Furter laying on the lips also tells of what to expect within the film. The transexual themes are made clear as he is dressed quite obviously as a transvestite. His extremely large heels, skimpy outfit and exaggerated make up make it quite clear that he is a transvestite. This is done ot make sure that the correct type of audience is attracted by the film and that people can see what the film contains. The images on the film poster are, like this one, often taken directly from the film as audience members then get a sneak peak of the film and the characters and what they do.

The title of the film is written on the film poster. This is done because the name of the film needs to be out there so that people know what it is called. This can also give clues as to what is in the film.Some people may recognise the name of the film if it has previous popularity on a different platform, like book or stage show, so including the name can bring in remaining fans, making the film more money. The title is written in a dripping blood font, which could tell the audience that the film will contain horror and gore within. This also helps to bring in a wider audience as people may expect it to be scarier and so want to go and watch it.

At the bottom of the poster is this selection of tiny writing which is used to give credit. It tells the production company, the stars of the film, credit to the music composer, the screenplay writer, the music producer, the associate director, the director and the producer. These things all help to advertise the film as they may be people or companies that people have heard of before and seen, however they are also there to give credit to the people behind the filma as they have put time and effort into the film and deserve to be recognised.

One thing that is not included in this poster is a release date. This isn't good as a releae date can be helpful in letting somebody plan to go and see the film as they will know when it is available for viewing. It also doesn't include an age rating which isn't very helpful as people will not know if they are old enough to see the film and may not bother going, or may go expecting to see it ad find out that they are too young, having a wasted trip.