1. Access
The audience can access the film ‘The Descent’ through websites on the Internet,
cinema and hard copies such as a disk. The primary method is the cinema as
most films are released there first and the cinema has the biggest screen with the
original, production quality version of the film. The secondary method of
watching the film is through a DVD or Blu-ray disk because it becomes available
soon after the cinema releases it and this hard copy can be kept forever. The
additional methods of watching the film include websites such as Netflix, which
require monthly payments and do not give you your own copy of the film.
The Descent poster analysis
http://www.pastposters.com/details.php?prodId=1462
The poster consists mostly of a black background and white text however it also
has a picture of Sarah’s face shrouded in darkness and rays of blue light shining
at her from above. The largest text visible is the title of the film and above it is
the phrase “face your deepest fear” in small, bold text. To find out more from
this poster, it would cost about £1 to use the Internet and search for information.
Underneath a quote about the movie are four stars, which match the blue light
illuminating Sarah’s face. This part is used to convince the audience that the
movie is good.
The darkness and blood on Sarah’s face combined imply that this is a horror
movie however there is nothing particularly creepy about this poster.
This poster is full of mystery and does that in order to get an audience to watch it
and find out the answers to questions that the poster may get them to think up.
2. The descent trailer analysis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptSdzdUhzKg
Most of the first half of the movie is missing from the trailer as it lacks action and
the actual scenes used in the trailer are all either screaming or loud sound effects
to make standard things more dramatic.
These scenes are repeated every few seconds with non-repeated scenes in
between to extend the length of the trailer without having to use the less exciting
rest of the movie.
In this trailer, the pool of blood is shown frequently to make up for the lack of
gore in the other scenes. At one point towards the end, the first jump scare of the
movie is used however it is left on too long and ruins the scare as the monster is
shown clearly and leaves nothing to the imagination. A few scenes of slaughter
are put alongside screaming which makes it look like the characters are killing
each other and these scenes go from dusty scenes to bloody ones: this is used to
confuse the audience and get them to watch the movie to make sense of it.
Throughout the trailer, each scene lasts a very short time for dramatic effect and
each transition is either a fade or cut. In this trailer’s case, the only fade
transitions are to the black screens naming a phobia, which this film could
trigger.
In the end of the trailer, there is no information besides the name of the movie.
This means the audience has to spend money on Internet to look up information
on the descent. The trailer works for the film’s audiences as it demonstrates
what they could be watching and shows things that would appeal to them.
The descent website analysis
www.thedescentfilm.com
The website has the new picture for the movie in the background as they had to
change their campaign in respect to the 7/7 bombing involving their old advert.
Back then, their advert which was stuck to the side of the bus had the same
3. context as to what was actually going on with the bus, therefore they had to
change it to avoid people associating the film with that bombing. The website
simply says the name of the movie and the release date then otherwise there is
nothing besides a complaint about flash player to the website.
