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Insidious Chapter 2: Poster evaluation

One of the first things to note from this film poster is the expressions on the people. they all are showing some form of fear whether it be though there facial expression like on the women and small child. Or whether it be through body language like the boy who is hiding his face from the camera.
Another thing to note from this poster is that the woman is holding a hammer like its a weapon. this insinuates that these characters are going to be in danger throughout the film.
Also this trailer focuses on two main colours, black and red. this is important to note because of the connotation of these colours. black connotes death whilst red connotes danger and blood. This makes these colours perfect for a horror poster as it is easy for the audience to look at this poster and just by the colours they can associate it with a horror film.
A rather strange aspect of this poster is that the title is facing vertically as opposed to horizontally. However perhaps this has been done to highlight the unnatural/supernatural nature of this film.
Finally just above the image of the hammer there is a slogan that says "IT WILL TAKE WHAT YOU LOVE MOST." by saying with no verification of what "it"  is this creates a sense of mystery in the film and makes the audience want to see and know more.

Insidious Chapter 2: trailer analysis

Insidious: Chapter 2 is an upcoming American horror film directed by James Wan. It is a sequel to 2011's Insidious. The plot of the film is as follows, The Lambert family are happily reunited after Josh went into the Further to get his son Dalton back. However, the paranormal events continue to occur, which become more and more terrifying. When the family begins to notice strange behaviour from the father, they start to wonder; is it really Josh that came back from the Further?

The Insidious chapter 2 trailer does not goes in a chronological story telling manner and instead opts to show very particular scenes where there is a lot of tension. The trailer runs for 2:24 and within that time shows 92 different cuts and clips. At first this seems like a lot for a horror trailer that typically opt for just building tension and fear in the audience so you would expect this number to be lower. However the Insidious chapter 2 trailer try's to incorporate a few jump scares within the trailer itself as well as incorporating some quick jump to create an uneasy unpredictable feel to the trailer.

The sound used in this trailer starts off in a pretty uncommon fashion with happy upbeat music taking centre stage accompanied with the sound and imagery of happy children laughing and playing with their parents as well as several shots of the family being together and saying goodnight to each other. Their is also use of dialect "we are a family again" but again it all appears pretty regular and their is no hint at the genre of this film being a horror yet. The large majority of shots from this segment are group shots showing the family being together apart from the odd close up of each child as they go to bed and another close up of the mother smiling at the start

It is not until 30 seconds in that the trailer take a darker turn. The happy music fades out and you are left with a disturbing scene of a darker room with child's walking toy moving into shot by itself  with the sounds of the toy being the only source of sound. This creates an extremely eery feeling. This tune from the toy continues to be the only source of sound for the trailer for a further 20 seconds whilst the mother looks round the house only to find an unknown women who suddenly vanishes. The camera shots from this segment are mid shots of the mother with the camera tracking her as she moves throughout the house as well as a high angle long shot of her as she enters the room where he second woman appear closely followed by a close up of her reaction and the fear in her face.

It is when the woman vanishes around 1 minuet in when the trailer pick up tempo and the talking from scenes returns and now scarier darker music shortly comes as well. All the sound get progressively louder and the shots get progressively shorter for around another 30 seconds until there comes a scene where one of the children say "Is there something wrong with daddy mom?". It is at this point where the music stops again and the trailer has a fade which creates a atmosphere of tension and unease among the audience.

From this point the sounds used in this trailer are short lines form the actors accompanied by a strange

warping sound getting louder and quieter with clashes arriving at random points this makes a very disturbing and again uneasy atmosphere and makes the audience feel uncomfortable just watching it. This segment of the trailer is paired with some of the more disturbing images of the trailer with a large use of fast paced cuts in between as well as lots of camera movement such as tilts and zooms to keep the audience engaged. 

From here the screen fades to black the title appears and the trailer goes out to some more happy sounding music but this time it feel a lot more creepy now that the genre has been fully established.

The strangers: trailer analysis

The strangers is a 2008 horror film directed by Bryan Betino in which a young couple are attacked in their summer house by three masked maniacs.

The trailer follows a loose chronological pattern highlight a clear beginning and middle to the story but distorting the end pattern of the trailer to not give away how the film will end. It also runs for 2:00 with 91 different shots shown

The trailer begins with a very calm felling setting up an atmosphere that we would not traditionally associate with a horror film. It establishes this by using soothing piano music as its background as well as fades in between close ups of the couples smiling faces and even an engagement ring. As well of this a calm tone is set to the trailer through the opening scequence dialogue the couple telling each other that they love each other in hushed voices. 

This period of the trailer lasts for around 18 seconds then is abruptly ended by a loud bang. From here the trailer goes through a segment with no music what so ever but rather just the occasional creek from a swing. This 25 second period is telling us the story through titles to create further tension such a "based on true events" and "but sometimes we are wrong".

Following straight after the above text is what is in my opinion one of the most powerful and eerie clips shown in this trailer. for around 9 seconds we are shown a still long shot of one of our who we assume to be a protagonist standing off center from the camera as one of the masked villains slowly makes there way in the shot and stands there motionless staring at her. This creates a very uncomfortable atmosphere within the trailer.

It is at this point when the background sound starts to build with drumming getting louder with a whining accompanying it until again the tempo of the trailer is changed once more when an axe cut through the front door and a record player begins to play.

It is for the next 18 seconds of this trailer whilst the record player plays on a stuck loop that increases in tempo the longer it goes on that we see the vast majority of our shots. Non of which are on screen for more than a second. These shots are also in a wide variety constantly changing from still almost picture like clips to moving action ones and from establishing and long shots to close ups of items. This accompanied by the quickening cuts between scenes creates a sense of panic and fear in the trailer and then once again in theme with the rest of the trailer is abruptly ended so that their is no sense of calming.

It is from this that we arrive at our last key moment of the trailer where we are shown a distorted, blurry, off center close up of one of our main masked villains. To this scene there is no music, only dialogue where we hear non diagetic sound of a women asking the villain "why are you doing this to us". in which they reply "because you are home". This used in the closing moments of the trailer creates mystery no just of who the masked maniac is but also what is so special about the 'home' in which they are willing to kill for it.