Trailer analysis 2

Trailer Analysis 2 By: Miriana Younan

The trailer above is promoting “The Possession”, a horror film that could be placed within a possession sub genre. When watching this horror film the audience can see that the little girl has been possessed by an evil spirit and turning something innocent into something terrifying. I picked this trailer because it uses effective editing and uses great jumpy moments to scary the audience.

All film trailers start with the normal regulatory warning message, this message will warn the audience against some of the content which is about to appear giving them the chance not to watch if they wish. The message is has a bright green background and is written in a white font, therefore making it very eye-catching to the audience, making sure they do not avoid or miss the important message. There is no sound whilst this message is being displayed, giving the audience a chance to read it. Straight after the message is displayed, the logo of the film production company that made this film is displayed; this makes the audience aware of who made the film.


The next part of the trailer you hear a non-diagetic soft piano sound denoting a calm and normal atmosphere and with the sound you see an establishing shot of the stock location which is where the action of the movie takes place. The long shot of the house is used to show the isolated house surrounded by trees, which is typical convention of a horror film.

The scene cuts to the father talking to the mother, both the mother and father are smiling which shows the happiness with the family and there care free and simple lifestyle. This shot is two shot where you have two people within the frame. The scene is also quite bright which shows the normality of the movie. This is the equilibrium of the film.


After we are presented with the family, the audience know who the main characters are, we see quite a lot of shots of the father taking his daughters to his house to stay with him. As the scene progresses we see a change in colour with the shots (which are presented above). It gets darker this suggests to the audience that the narrative to this point is going to change. The music changes when we are presented with a long shot of the house and a bird’s eye view of the father and daughter lying down. The sound of the soft piano decreases and we hear non-digetic sound that sounds like an angel singing. The angels’ singing connotes the lead up to the disruption of the trailer and it’s also a warning to the audience of what’s to happen next. After the last shot above, the scene fades to black screen and the next shot appears on top of the black background again suggesting the danger of the next scene.

The family visit a car boot sale together where the young girl dresses up in white accessessories, the colour white may denote the purity and vulnerability of the young girl which is a typical convention of a horror film as the victim is usually an innocent character. In this shot we get a mid shot of the girl walking up towards an ancient box that she has spotted, many shots are used with a fade transition to emphasise how happy she is to have found this box, getting closer to her face each shot fades to show her emotion. When she is in front of the box we get a close up; to see her facial expression and also we see some sort of writing on the box which instantly suggests to the audience that the box has some meaning to it. You hear a non-digetic sound of someone screeching as she approaches the box which could suggest the box is evil/possessed.

The lighting of this scene becomes dim and gloomy; the non-diagetic voice over of the Father saying 'whoever made this didn't want anybody to open it' gives the box a sense of mystery and 'unknown'.

In this scene you see the girl in bed getting up to see the box, the music changes you hear the loud


thunder as the girl opens the box and the opening sound of the box is emphasised showing the change between the normality of her lifestyle and how it's now going to change since she's opened the box.

After the opening of the box you see the girl sitting on her bed with the box and the music stops and you still hear thunder, the lighting in this scene is gloomy and dark and the only light spot is on the girl suggesting the evil spirit is after her and also how she is vulnerable. As soon as she picks up a dead moth you hear a banging sound every time she picks up something different from the box. This non-diagetic sound you hear could be warning the audience that she should not have done that and she’s in trouble now. After this scene (girl wearing the ring) the pace of the shots speeds up to build tension.

Before the speed of the shots speed up, you see a strap in the shot. This strap is telling the audience everything they see in this trailer has happened to a real family and this adds more scare factor to the audience as now they think it’s not safe and this could happen to anyone. There is 4 shots of the family worrying about the little girl, after every scene changes you hear an amplified sound of the girl tapping the plate.


After the fourth shot, you see the girl tapping her fork on the plate and the tapping speeds up as the father tells her to slow down, as her tapping speeds up the cuts speed up and we see lots of cuts of between the girl tapping the plate and the fathers face. The close up shot of the girls face implies she has been stripped of her vulnerability, she is not the innocent young girl we saw at the beginning. This shows that the father is getting annoyed at her and the girl isn’t listening. Over this scene you hear whispering sounds which could be the evil spirit that is controlling the girl that is making her do everything. When the father final is really annoyed he bangs his hand on the table and the girl stabs his hand with the fork, as the father screams out of pain the scene changes and we get a change of music to a soft hymn- like tune. The music denoting that she has been possessed by something to do with religion, however making the trailer creepier by doing so. From this the audience know something is wrong with the girl as she isn’t listening to her father and she also has the ring on that she found in the box. This is the disruption of the trailer.


When the girl is standing alone in the road, you see moths being sucked into her, this shows her being possessed and taken over as she can’t control it, also moths are attracted to light and flames this could suggest that the moths are attacking the girl because they see her as a source of light. The music stops after this and you hear the soft piano from the beginning being played this is contrapuntal sound as they are going through a horrific time and the scene is not calm at all. As the trailer goes on we see straps saying “darkness lives inside”, this is again telling the audience the evil spirit is inside the girl and is living in there. The background of these straps is black which connotes death and danger and there is Hebrew symbol’s which reflects the box as danger and could possibly kill people. The writing of the straps are white which makes it stand out from the shot but also connotes the girl as the darkness is living inside her the white writing reflects her as she is pure and vulnerable. In one of the shots the audience are presented with religious imagery, the father is reading out from a Jewish bible, this is a typical convention of possession sub genre and represents the fight between good and evil.

You also see some horrific imagery, you see the girl being over taken by the evil spirit her eye turns white and you see a lump on the side of her cheek. Also the MRI scan shows the evil spirit inside the girl as it appears on the scan, the lights in the hospital turn off when the girls getting a scan which shows the darkness inside her possessing her.

When we see the whole family in the hospital the music changes and the pace of the shots speed up even more this is called the montage. We see the rabbi trying to save the girl, this is again religious imagery, we then see the ring on the girls finger which shows the possession has something to do with that girl and also her skin is changing colour, it’s a grey which is a dull colour which connotes evil and the colour reminds the audience of a disease the evil spirit is diseasing the innocent girl. We see the father with a hand coming out of his mouth and this makes the audience think why is there a hand coming out his mouth? This will lure them to watch the movie to find out why the evil spirit is inside of him. Throughout this montage the music is the sound of angels singing, singing a hymn, the


music symbolises religious imagery and is contrapuntal sound, you only hear hymns in church and this shows the fight between good and evil. The music crescendos to then come to a complete stop, which will create a tense atmosphere for the audience. The scene cuts to Emily in the bathroom, the non-diagetic voice over of her Mother saying 'there's something in her' showing two fingers coming out Emily's throat, leaving a sense of mystery with the audience as they don't know what's inside of her.

Overall, this trailer is successful because this evil spirit remains unknown throughout the trailer and gets the audience asking what it is and what does it want from this girl? In order to answer the audience questions they need to go see the movie. This trailer inspires me as it uses great editing and shots in the trailer to make it effective, because of this I will be taking on board ideas from this trailer in order to make my horror film trailer a success.

Trailer analysis 2

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