2. Trailer overviews
By: Miriana Younan
The trailers I have presented above are all possession horror as my group will be creating a
possession horror movie trailer, by doing this overview I will get a better understanding of what is
presented in a possession trailer. I will also gain knowledge of what to include in my film trailer to
make it more effective and successful for the audience.
The seven film trailers have been designed to successfully promote the film within the possession
sub-genre. Through carrying out an investigation of them and comparing them, it is possible to
identify shared features within them and to establish repeated patterns.
All seven film trailers feature typical film trailer conventions. The common features that crop up on
film trailers are a little bit of the narrative of the horror being presented on the trailer, straps, music,
horrific imagery and production information.
In all seven film trailers they have similar narrative structure; they start off with the equilibrium the
normality of the family before the terror strike them, then you see the disruption that cause’s horror
for the family but you don’t get the repair of the film as that will ruin the whole film and the
audience would not want to go and watch the film has they would know what happens and at the
end of the trailers you get the fast montage of shots and the sting right at the end to catch the
audience when they least expect it. In all possession films the narrative is usually similar, in all seven
film trailers someone is being possessed by an evil spirit or devil and the spirit or devil is controlling
what they do. You will usually see in all possession films religious imagery used or religious place e.g.
church. In order to save the person being possessed they generally perform an exorcism in many of
the films or in some cases they ask for help from a therapist and as soon as the audience think it is
safe and the person has been saved you get a twist ending where the audience see the evil spirit or
devil reappearing suggesting it is not over and the audience feel terrified as they feel they are in
danger too. The most used editing technique used is cuts; the point of a cut is to keep the audience
interested by changing from one viewpoint to another, these cuts happen at a fast pace to keep
audience on their toes and build the tension as the learn more about the film and at every cut they
don’t know what they will see next, they don’t know if they should cover their eyes or keep
watching.
The mise en scene in all seven film trailers contain props, lighting, costume, setting and colour. In all
seven trailers the colours used are dark, white, and black and red to set the tone of the mood and
atmosphere of the movie, it gives it a dark and terrifying feel and keeps the audience scared. The
props used in all possession films are usually religious objects e.g. crucifix, bible and innocent object
that has been possessed. The religious props shows the fight between good and evil and as the
audience are religious and spiritual the evil factor of the movie scares them as they never have seen
this and that it could happen to one of them, the audience don’t want to get mixed up in the fight
between good and evil. The setting of all possession trailers are set in a isolated location where
nothing can save them and nothing can help, other locations you might see are mental hospital
where the possessed victim is placed and other locations are churches because the family of the
possessed victim want to perform an exorcism to get the evil/devil spirit out of the victims body.
The camera shots and angles are used in horror films to create tension, the sort of angles you will
see are; An Extreme Close Up - This is used to emphasise something, for example if the close up was
of the actions somebody was going through using their hands then it would be emphasising that,
that individual was about to do something of important relevance. If it was highlighting the
3. Trailer overviews
By: Miriana Younan
individual’s hands holding a knife then it would be highlighting then maybe something bad was going
to happen involving the knife. Close up - This is where the subject being filmed fills the frame, it is
often used to show the emotion felt by the subject being filmed. If for example the subject had just
done something of significance and was showing the necessary emotion this shot could be used to
connoted that and emphasise the emotion that the individual is feeling at that moment in time.
Extreme long shot - This is a shot by which the whole setting fills the frame. This shot is often used
so that the audience can establish what the setting is, mise en scene ect. This shot is often used in
horror films to create atmosphere and tension and to also inform the audience of the isolated
location and give the impression of helplessness. High and low angles can create fear, how
characters are positioned in the frame also help to add tension, if the evil spirit/possessed victim is
deep in the frame it makes it harder to see them and adds fear.
The reason all of these seven trailers scary the audience is because of the use of sound both diegetic
and non diegetic it creates tension and fear. Speech in horror films is often manipulated to scare us,
speech manipulation is used to alter the pitch of someone’s voice to make it sound darker. For
example in the exorcism of Emily rose, when she is possessed her voice is deeper and darker to
terrify the audience even more.
In all trailers they have non diegetic text to either describe the narrative of the movie or to give the
audience a hint of that might happen in the movie. It plays on the audience mind as they are left
wanting to know more, in the Exorcism of Emily Rose on the trailer the non diegetic text says
“Witness the disturbing story that will make you question beliefs”, this makes the audience need to
watch the movie and see what side they believe. In most of the trailers the text is white with a black
background this makes it stand out to the audience and sometimes its red with a black background
to symbolise blood and makes the text look more sinister.
In conclusion all seven trailers have the same features and conventions cropping again and again
which make the trailers effective and grabs the audience attention and wants the make them watch
more. From this overview I can include some of these conventions and features in to my own trailer.
By: Miriana Younan
