Analysis of the film 'The Purge' for media A2

1. Analysis of 'The Purge'

2. Overview
The Purge (2013) is a film set in modern day America where crime is greatly
reduced and unemployment is at around 1%. So everything is looking pretty
good, but one day a year all crime is legal for 12 hours. Including murder. The
film follows a family in their preparation for the night and the night through
their eyes. It all changes when a homeless man gets into the families house
who is being chased.

3. 0-30 seconds
For the first 20 or so seconds of the trailer it deceives the audience by playing
calming music in the background and letting the audience know how good
the country is and how crime is at an all time low and unemployment is at 1%
etc. In the background calming music is being played. This film is a thriller and
this is not associated with a thriller so for the first 25 seconds the audience does
not know that it isnt a film of another genre. After 25 seconds they reveal that
there is one night a year where all crime including murder is legal and it then
shows CCTV footage of people being beat up and shot which is what is usually
associated with the thriller genre. The calming music is still played in the
background which almost detaches the audience from the violence which I
thought was strange. After 31 seconds the music stops and the universal logo
comes up and this is where the film changes tone dramatically.

4. 0:33 - 1:33
This section of the trailer starts building up tension through the choice of
background music which sounds almost at the end of a countdown. The
colours used become darker as the trailer becomes darker than it once
appeared and they explain why they have the purge to their children which is
followed by the purge announcement, it was also interesting during the
countdown that they had a slow transition followed by a fast transition which
builds up tension where it leads to the main turning point of the film where he
lets the man inside the house. It turns to black where they say that they don't
know who's looking for him and it builds up tension and the doorbell rings.

5. 1:38 - 2:20
Again this is where the trailer gets darker after some credits are shown. The
trailer gets darker in different ways, firstly the storyline changes and reveals that
the people will kill them if they don’t deliver the man and changes the tone
and it is accompanied by the colours in the trailer literally getting darker which
adds mystery and increases tension. The music becomes creepier and they
focus quite a lot on close ups to show fear among the characters so overall it
starts off happy and then it gets darker and darker as more of the story is
revealed and once the audience watch the whole trailer they would be
interested as the trailer will appeal to its target audience.