Evaluation Question 2

How effective is the combination of your main product and the ancillary texts?

Synopsis: Our film, Haunted, is a psychological thriller, which we gave a rating of 15. As our film is a psychological thriller, the aims of our film were to create fear, suspense and tension for our audience, as a psychological thriller concentrates on being able to really tap into people’s mental and emotional issues. We decided that our film would most likely be a rated 15, as there could be imitable behaviour in our film, considering it involves a young looking person committing a robbery and murdering a person, which could be easily copied. There is also threat and violence in our film, as Chloe gets murdered.
Our film is based around a young girl, in sixth form, who believes that she is being haunted by her cousin, Amy, who she believes died in an attack with a burglar. The film follows her ‘grief’ and confusion, however at the end, there is a twist that reveals she was actually the one who died and struggled to remember this, and was stuck in limbo. Our film was inspired by the film, The Others, which surrounds around a young family, who live in a mansion post WW2 in England. The young girl says that there are ghosts in their house, a man, a woman, a young boy, and a grandmother. However, at the end of the film, it is revealed that they are the ghosts, and the other family moved in when they had died.

Our main project was modelled around Richard Dyer’s theory of entertainment and utopia and the Uses and Gratifications theory. Richard Dyer’s theory of entertainment and utopia suggests that there are five things that a film is able to provide a viewer. These five things are energy of the film, transparency, which character are good and bad, and intensity, the character’s emotions. There are also community and abundance, however we modelled our film on the first three things a film is able to provide to the viewer, as we thought that these things are easy to get across in a thriller, as a thriller is likely to have energy, characters that are good and bad, and intensity, as psychological thrillers rely on emotions. We also looked at Uses and Gratifications, and focused two uses, which are socialisation and entertainment. As our storyline featured grief, we thought that this could potentially create socialisation, as well as the unexpected twist at the end, meaning that the audience can talk about what happened throughout the film. In terms of entertainment, the film is able to create this, as it matches the iconography of a psychological thriller, and therefore will be suspenseful.

When we created our film poster, we wanted to make sure that there was some synergy between the film and the poster. In order to be able to create this synergy, we found and matched elements from our film into our final film poster. Firstly, we tried to make the text from the film poster and the actual film have some synergy between them.

While the font from the film poster and the actual film are not the same, we decided to try and make them both a similar shade of red. We did this because it would allow the film be convey the horror iconography of our genre, showing that there could be death or violence within our film. As well as this, we also allowed our poster to be in synergy with the actual film. As we created our film poster during the final wraps of making our film, we decided to use a screen shot of an image from the film. Here it can be seen that the clip from the film has been used in the making of the film poster, however the image for the film poster is more zoomed in, so that the centre focus is around the main character and the location to which she is standing in.

Above is our final film poster. I believe that our poster reflects our overall aims and intentions of our film. Firstly, this is because the main image of the poster is in black and white, which could be able to convey the emotions of the main character, Chloe, as Chloe is a ghost stuck in a limbo world on Earth. We also wanted to get across that the main character is lonely, which can be conveyed through how small she looks on the poster. We also decided to use a screen shot from the film, where Chloe walks through an archway, as it has a cross statue in the background, and we found that this could be quite symbolic to what our film is trying to portray, as our film is centred around the theme of death and grief. Overall the film poster could be able to convey the mysterious psychological thriller theme of our film, as the poster is black and white, and features red coloured fonts.

Film posters can essentially be incredibly effective form of an advertisement, simply because film posters are more likely to be able to reach a lot of people, as they can be seen on social media, particularly if a production company has a Facebook page and releases teaser posters on there. Film posters can also be seen on billboards, at bus stops and on buses, meaning they are likely to be able to reach a wide demographic of people. In order to also make a poster an effective form of advertisement, it should also try to be eye-catching to actually draw people in to wondering what the film is about. When we were in the early stage of designing our group film poster, we decided to research into psychological thriller posters of real films to see what should be included in a film poster. I looked at a range of psychological thriller film posters, including The Others and Insidious, and found that on all of the film posters tended to have the main character is the centre part of the film poster, along with a background that could provide more information as to what the film could be about, along with typical information seen on a film poster, such as billing block and actor names. We also found that the title of the film should be bold on the poster, in order to catch the eye of potential audiences.

One film poster that I researched was Insidious, as it had some similar themes to our film, in that Insidious is based around the supernatural and violence. Here, you can see that the film poster for Insidious also has some similar elements to our own film poster.

1. The title of the film is in a bold font, to allow it to be eye-catching. The title of our film is in a thick red font, as this will stand out to the audience. On the Insidious poster, the font is also on the middle of the poster, and includes the title in the middle.

2. An important feature of a film poster is the background of the film. In the Insidious poster, there is a strange looking house seen in the background, which could be able to give a hint on what the film is about. In our own film poster, the background is that of the entrance to a graveyard, which could be able to convey that the film may have some mention of death in it.

3. In the centre of a film poster, a main character may be featured to show that they have a certain level of significance within the film. In the Insidious film poster, a young boy is in the centre, and looks like something supernatural may be happening. On our film poster, our main character is in the centre of the film poster, along with the background, as to convey the character’s loneliness.

4. A possible selling part of a film poster is having the names of the main actors within the film. This is because star power can help sell a film, as people may see a film because of certain actors. On the Insidious poster, the actor names are just above the billing block, and on our own film poster, they are just below the title.

5. At the bottom of the film poster, there is also a billing block that could include a variety of different information, including production staff and the actors.

6. At the bottom of the film poster next to be billing block is also social media information and the production company. This allows the audience to be able to find the film’s social media and follow it for updates. As this is common on real film posters, we also included our own social media information for the film.

As well as our film poster, we also created a radio trailer. Radio trailers can be an effective form of advertisement, simply because, while they are called ‘radio trailers’, they can be heard on other platforms as well. Radio trailers can be heard on the radio, and can target people at certain times, for example, during the morning when people are commuting to work. ‘Radio’ trailers can also be broadcasted on online music services, such as Spotify, particularly if they are trying to target music soundtrack fans for a film. Before we created our radio trailer, we also had to research what may be included in the trailer. We found that there are a few certain elements that are included in radio trailers to be effective. Most radio trailers include:

• Quotes from the film to get the audience’s attention
• A voiceover to provide information about the film
• Music and the use of sound effects

While researching into radio trailers, I looked at the radio trailer for Gravity, as it does have some thriller aspects to it. The radio trailer for Gravity included all these elements, to be suspenseful about what was happening, as the film was set in space. The trailer included dialogue from film, such as “We have to go, we have to go go go”, which can be used to create an intense atmosphere. The voice over also tries to sell the film, by calling it an ‘cinematic masterpiece’, and advertising it in IMAX and 3D. There is also a sound effect that could also hint that there was an explosion. Finally, there is voice over information about when the film will come out.

When we created our own radio trailer, we wanted to make sure that the trailer reflected our aims and intentions of our film. We also wanted to make sure that there was synergy between the trailer and the film, like with our film poster. Firstly, we used a voice over to give information about our film, and try to effectively sell the film, as the radio trailer starts with the voice over saying “This autumn, comes the exhilarating thriller you've all been waiting for”. After that, we have a quote from the film, which is Chloe saying “Dear diary, I think I might be going crazy”. There is then the voice-over, which says that “Critics have named it thriller of the year”. After this, there is a quote from the film again with Chloe saying “Every time I close my eyes, I see it.”, before it cuts back to the voice over again with “A thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seats”. After this, there is an intense scream, which the audience may not have expected. The voice over then says the two main actor’s names, and then there is a quote from the film again, with Amy saying “I miss you”. Finally, there is information given about the production company, the title of the film, release date and how to view it. “A 15-rated thriller, Outsider Productions presents, Haunted, available on YouTube, October, Friday the 13th.” Throughout the radio trailer, there is also non-diegetic music over the top of the quotes and voice over, which was also used in the final graveyard scene. We added this to be able to create suspense, so the audience would wonder what the film was about, and who was being haunted. As our radio trailer followed all the elements a real radio trailer should include, then our radio trailer reflects our intentions for the film.

Here is an example, using the online app, PhotoFunia, to see what our film poster may look like on a real billboard. The first picture is our film poster on a train station bill board, and the other picture is our film poster on a city billboard, along with real film posters to see the comparisons. Our film poster looks very real next to actual real film posters.

Finally, I think that our ancillary texts were effective overall. This is because the use of the film poster and the use of the radio trailer means that these can reach a wide demographic of audiences, as most people are likely to be able to see a film poster in a bus stop, or on a billboard in a town or city, meaning that it can reach many different people. We also asked people in our friend groups if they thought that the ancillary texts were similar to those of real media texts, and the majority of people said that the poster looked like a real film poster and the radio trailer was what they expected. The use of the radio trailer means it can target people who may listen to the radio in the morning or on their way to work. The two ancillary texts work well together for this reason. Both ancillary texts were successful in getting across the aims and intentions of the film, which was to promote our film, and create a thrilling atmosphere and reach our target audience, which was mainly young people. After we made the film poster and the radio trailer, we asked a few different people on whether they thought that the ancillary texts were effective, and most people did, simply because they got across the thrilling atmosphere that the film intended.