Film Posters

Film posters

My groups chosen genre for our film opening is a crime thriller. Recent studies show that crime is the most watched genre of all television shows, movies and documentaries. It's also very popular as books and novels. Therefore, we decided that this would be a challenging, yet interesting genre to create. When looking at codes and conventions of typical crime thriller films, we found that the main themes include ransoms, captivities, heists, revenge, murder and kidnapping. Common colour schemes used within this genre are dark, dull and red. This stands out to the audience and these colours also usually imply a negative storyline.

Taken

Taken is a 2008 English-language French action/crime thriller film directed by Pierre Morel, written by Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen, and starring Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Leland Orser, Jon Gries, David Warshofsky, Holly Valance, Katie Cassidy, Xander Berkeley, Olivier Rabourdin, Gérard Watkins, and Famke Janssen. The plot of the movie coheres to the crime genre due to the main character's daughter getting kidnapped. It is then up to him to find and save her within 72 hours before she is lost forever. Pierre Morel adopts dull colours through the use of mise-en-scene, to suggest to the audience that this is a negative storyline. Darkness is effective as it's common for many individuals to be afraid of the dark, therefore it represents their fear. Images on the poster represent the crime thriller genre due to the use of props and facial expressions. A long-shot of the main character is effective as it shows their use of props, such as a gun, which shows there is a lot of drama, murder, action and crime, all of which cohere to the genre and attract the audience's attention. Liam Neeson's costume is also similar to the background colours and suggests to the audience that he is someone of importance and is also possibly dangerous. Other images are also used to show the story line of the movie, this is effective as it gives the audience a taster of what is going to happen, therefore intriguing them and making them want to watch it. Lastly, the font employed is large and memorable, this catches the audience's attention and is a good technique to advertise the movie.

The Call

The Call is a 2013 American crime thriller film directed by Brad Anderson and written by Richard D'Ovidio. The film stars Abigail Breslin as Casey Welson, a teenage girl kidnapped by a serial killer and Halle Berry as Jordan Turner, a 9-1-1 operator, still suffering emotionally from a prior botched 9-1-1 call, who receives Casey's call. Morris Chestnut, Michael Eklund, Michael Imperioli, and David Otunga also star. The story was originally envisioned as a television series, but D'Ovidio later rewrote it as a 94-minute feature film. Filming began in July 2012 and spanned a period of 25 days, with all scenes being shot in California, mainly Burbank and Santa Clarita. The film poster incorporates the colour red to suggest blood and crime, therefore it coheres to the thriller genre. This is effective because it intrigues the audience and catches their attention. The two images used on the film poster are the main character, Hallie Berry, and a faded out map. These images are effective as it shows the emotion of the characters face, therefore suggesting the movie is going to be dramatic and interesting. This close-up also forms a connection between the audience and the character. The image of the map is also effective as it shows how hard it is going to be to find the kidnapped girl, therefore telling the audience that it's going to be an intense movie that will keep them on the edge of their seats. In terms of the font, the producers have used black and white bold writing, it is also written in block capitals. This is effective because it stands out against the red background. As well as this, the statement 'there are  188 million 911 calls a year, this one makes it personal.' This suggests to the audience that this is going to be a crime thriller as  911 is typically used to report a crime.

The Silence Of the Lambs

The Silence of the Lambs is a 1991 American horror-thriller film directed by Jonathan Demme and starring Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, and Scott Glenn. Adapted by Ted Tally from the 1988 novel of the same name by Thomas Harris, his second to feature the character of Dr. Hannibal Lecter; a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer, the film was the second adaptation of a Harris novel featuring Lecter, preceded by the Michael Mann-directed Manhunter in 1986. In the film, Clarice Starling, a young U.S. FBI trainee, seeks the advice of the imprisoned Dr. Lecter to apprehend another serial killer, known only as "Buffalo Bill". The front of the film poster has quite an ambiguous meaning behind it, the use of a butterfly is unusual and attracts the audience's attention as they would want to find out what it means. Thep producers also use a black and white effect, however, the woman's eyes are given colour. This causes a connection between the audience and the character as it is as if she is staring at them. Similar to the other film posters, the main character is on the front cover of the film poster. This is effective because it gives the reader an idea of who is going to star in the movie. If the actress or actor has fans, this would increase their buyers. This is also an effective way of advertising. Different to the other thriller film posters, the font used is in lowercase and there are no capital letters too. This is not that effective as it doesn't catch the audience's attention, meaning it isn't a very good marketing technique. However, the producers do make the title a different colour to the background. I also noticed that the butterfly, eyes and title are of a similar colour, this shows all three has some type of significance and intrigues the audience.

Seven

Seven (sometimes stylized as SE7EN) is a 1995 American neo-noir crime thriller film directed by David Fincher, and stars Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman, Gwyneth Paltrow, John C. McGinley, R. Lee Ermey, and Kevin Spacey. The film was based on a screenplay by Andrew Kevin Walker. It tells the story of David Mills (Pitt), a young detective who is partnered with the retiring William Somerset (Freeman) and soon tasked with tracking down a serial killer (Spacey) who uses the seven deadly sins as tropes in his murders. On the film poster of the movie Seven, it's clear to the audience, it is less clear to the audience that it is going to be a crime thriller as there is no sign of crime on the poster. However, using the seven deadly sins is effective because it suggests that perhaps they are following a murderer that kills based on the rules of the sins, which shows it will be an interesting and detailed plot. Once again, similar to the other film posters, the producer's place images of the main characters on the front. In regards to the mise-en-scene, low/dull lighting is used to suggest this is going to be a more serious storyline, as opposed to a happy one. The title is bold and does stand out to the audience, however, they could have enlarged it to make it stand out even more. One good marketing technique it putting the main actors on the front cover, this is effective as fans of the actors will then want to watch the movie due to their good acting skills.