Analysis of existing media

FASCINATION AND FILM: Film trailers are a visual pleasure. Fascination and film engages our emotions through images and spectacle. Mulvey uses psychologists to discover where and how the fascination of the film is reinforced by pre-existing patterns of fascination already at work within the individual subject. Mulvey says that when she uses psychoanalytic theory as a 'political weapon'.

CINEMA AND PLEASURE: Hollywood/mainstrem/narrative cinema manipulate visual pleasure. It codes the erotic into language of the dominant patriarchal order.

SCOPOPHILIA: Pleasure in looking

WOMEN AS IMAGE, MAN AS BEARER OF THE LOOK: Pleasure in looking split between active/male and active/female. Women connote 'to-be-looked-at-ness'. The visual presence of women works against the development of a story line, freezes the flow of action in movements of erotic-contemplation. The women functions as both an erotic object for the characters within the screen story and erotic object for the spectator within the auditorium (object of fantasy). The spectator is led to identify with the main male protagonist. The power of the male protagonist as he controls events coincides with the active.

Camera angles are an important aspect of film trailers as often a camera angle can determine superiority, through high and low angles for example. Also point of view shots to help the audience connect with certain characters. Camera angles help us to understand the story and build suspension, for example long lingering shots. We see this in the links to Harry Potter and Twilight film trailers on my blog. Establishing shots also give the audience a clear sense of where the film is taking place and in some genres such as horror, the establishing shot is an important convention in this genre as an establishing shot such as an isolated wood.

Mise-en-scene is another convention to help us understand what genre the film is, for example if we to see a film trailer with characters in futuristic clothing we would presume this was a sci-fi genre.

This is similar with music, as certain types of music represent different genres, for example if we were to here a fats upbeat pop song, we would presume the genre is comedy. Non-digetic sound used for film trailers also builds suspense and keeps the audience engaged. A horror film trailer's music should be eary, cold and create an atmosphere to point out its genre and although the audience may be frightened, they will not be able to keep their eyes off the trailer and want to continue to view the film. Special effects in the sound such as echoing also creates more suspense and horror as the echoing sounds gives the impression that we do not know where the sound is coming from therefore we feel the vulnerable character's attitude towards it and therefore the suspense keeps the audience engaged and alarmed.

Dialogue also helps the viewers to understand the story, narrative can be used to describe the story (voice overs) or the characters who are acting can describe the story also and this can both be used to describe the genre. For example a jokes and punchlines ect will indicate a comedy.

Special effects are another aspect which make film trailers more engaging. Certain special effects will keep viewers attention through the unique effect or simply the creativity behind it, for example films such as avatar, Harry Potter and action packed films. In our normal day to day lives we do not see such things as we are shown by special effects, therefore this is a convention for film trailers as it certainly grabs attention.

Locations are another aspect of film trailers which enable the audience to distinguish what type of genre the film is, for example an isolated location connotes the film is a horror as it shows a feeling of being alone and more vulnerable, something is more likely to happen. Another example being if the location is in an urban area with tall business buildings and so on that the film is an action/crime film. In many films such as action, horror and thriller the rising action and climax being the key focus on dilemma, when often we have confrontation or a scene where somebody is going to be murdered the location is always isolated, some examples are; an empty house as shown in 'Texas chainsaw massacre' and an empty private garden (kill bill volume 1). By this the film becomes more realistic, as murderings and confrontations which perhaps are private and deadly would be in an isolated place so the people are not seen. Locations such as, rivers, beaches and resturants can connote romance as all these places are associated with romance, the location makes the scene more romantic and appealing to the audience and emphasizes their genre of film.

CONVENTIONS OF A FILM TRAILER:

-Use of flashback
-Editing
-Captions
-Music
-Importance of star names
-Title
-Narrative
-Never give away ending
-Release date
-If a horror genre, the setting is usually isolated
-Camera angles
-Voice over
-Mise-en-scene
-Types of shots
-Special effects
-dialogue and sound effects


THE NARRATIVE STRUCTURE OF A FILM TRAILER:

FREYTAG'S PYRAMID - Aristotle identified the basic linear plot structure in 350bc as a simple triangle of beginning, middle and ending. He observed that the middle section might involve some form of crisis, resolved by the end of the story. The exposition is the stage in which we are introduced to the characters, relationships and situations. The action then begins to rise, this is where tension begins to culminate before the climax were tension culminates completely. We then go through falling action then on to the denouement, being the resolution of the plot. The structure then however goes back to equilibrium, revealing the slightest bit about the ending to keep the audience maintained and for them to want to see the film. By looking at Freytag's triangle we can relate to how many films use this structure. Therefore whilst producing my plot I can use Freytag's pyramid to structure my story, the pyramid is a clear convention in films and therefore the trailers they produce as majority of films have this structure in their creations.

In the film trailer 'Twilight' we can see a clear structure in the same way as Freytag's pyramid. The beginning of the trailer introduces the characters and the narrative and dialogue helps us to understand the relationship between the characters and the main situation, being that Bella has discovered Edward Cullen's real identity. We then reach the crisis as one of the characters has been pointed out to be evil and hunting Bella, the editing speeds up and the music creates intensity as does the dialogue. The fighting scenes are all part of the climax and reach the falling action. We then see the hints of the ending through the fighting scenes between Edward Cullen and James (evil vampire) and dialogue such as "Im strong enough to kill you", indicating that this is Edward's aim and could possibly be the ending to the story.

In the film trailer for Harry Potter and the deathly hallows however the structure is not entirely related to Freytag's pyramid. In this trailer it starts off immediately with the climax and rising action as it is a series of films the audience is assumed to know the background of the story due to previous films. Although halfway through the trailer becomes very chaotic with emphasis on a climax, it appears the beginning of the trailer already starts with rising action rather than exposition.

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