2. The Blair Witch Project – Print Analysis
A number of posters and print media was distributed around the
release of the successful horror The Blair Witch Project. When
researching I found there were a lot of different designs for the
posters, this is due to the distributers wanting to publicize every
element in the film. For example, some posters contains the
woods in which the film is set, others displayed the main
protagonist looking distressed and frightened.
The Blair Witch Project was released in 1999 by Daniel Myrick
and Eduardo Sanchez. The film took 8 days to film and a further
8 months to edit, plus only cost them an extremely low budget of
$20,000 to make. Having such a low budget for a film gave them
an extremely large budget to use on publicity and advertisement
for the film. This is why there were many different types of film
posters sent out.
3. Film Poster 1 was the most iconic poster and
seen by the majority of viewers. This poster
uses the typical conventions of a films poster
and that of a horror film poster. There is a clear
structure which consists of a prominent image
of a shot which we can also see in the film, the
title of the film, a tagline which intrigues
viewers and a discreet list of the starring
actors/actresses, plus the institution and
website. The poster purposely used dark
colours to reflect how it would feel to be
trapped in the woods. The protagonists face is
lit up and viewed from what seems like a rough
angle as she is meant to be filming herself.
This represents a key element of the film which
is that it is filmed solely on handheld cameras.
The tagline which features directly in the
middle of the poster gives audiences a direct
insight into the film before even watching it so
already, the plot is known. The trees which are
also featured at the top of the poster gives
away the location of the film, insinuating the
danger of the woods. The website at the
bottom is the only writing which is changed to
the colour red, this is because the films most
dominant advertisement technique was in fact
the website which was created solely for
publicity purposes only.
4. Film Poster 2 shared similar qualities of the
previous poster but the colours have been
inverted. Therefore the black background we
once saw has been transformed in white
meaning the trees etc. are not white. This poster
focuses more on the location of the film as it has
taken away the face of the protagonist. By
switching around the colours I believe the
creators of this poster have tried to turn the
wooded area in to a chilling and sinister location.
This poster has also added at the top a critics
quote claiming the film to be ‘Scary as hell’. This
quote at the top draws attention to the poster
and counts as some sort of proof that claims this
film is in fact frightening as people tend to
believe the critics quotes. The same tagline is
used as this information leads people to believe
the narrative of the film is in actuality a real life
story. The only colour red that is seen of the
poster is a strange symbol about the title of the
film. This symbol also appeared on poster 1 in
red making it stand out. This sign is featured in
the film and is a key part to the storyline,
therefore even before seeing the film viewers
will be looking out for it. This time, the
actors/actresses names are not located
anywhere on the poster, instead the only other
writing seen is the title and the website address.
5. Film Poster 3 takes a completely different train
of thought when creating the poster for The Blair
Witch Project. The background stays black
which is a colour which has presented on all
posters so far, yet the most dominant feature on
the poster in the word which is written in a large,
striking font ‘MISSING’. Directly underneath,
three missing person’s faces are placed in a
straight row. Once reading the slightly large
tagline audiences will understand that these
three faces are the three filmmakers in which the
film is based on. The images of them changed
from the black and white theme and are
displayed as sepia images. This helps them
stand out amongst the rest of the poster yet still
remains in the dark a eerie theme of the poster.
Near the bottom, the title of the film in written in
white writing, in a font which has been the same
in all the posters. The font and colours stay the
same throughout even though the posters have
different styles because the distributors want the
audience to be able to link the posters together.
The more publicity and advertisement which
gets out about the film, the more likely word
would spread which means more viewers when
the film comes out.
