SIDE-BY-SIDE POSTER ANALYSIS
My film poster is visually connected with the poster from the SMILEY movie that was released in 2012. I really like the focus of a face being concealed by a horror convention, for the SMILEY poster a girl’s face is covered with a mask and for mine the vast-majority of Jason’s (Harold’s) face is that of a lizard – I wanted to be creative with mine by still showing a slight section of Jason’s face to refer to how in the trailer he is transformed into a lizard. The reason behind my keenness regarding this mise-en-scene aspect is because the idea of the unknown is engaging; it initiates the question of who’s behind the concealment and what’s the reason for it? I also like the use of white and red text because it portrays innocence and danger. For my poster in particular, Michael Scales (Lewis, the victim of bullying) is a boy who’s drove to unruly acts due to his high school abuse, so the white colouring of ‘A BEAST IS AMONST US’ is to portray that he is an innocent boy who’s trying to do well in life (he’s very educated and loves his studies, science in particular) but has had enough; he doesn’t deserve to be treated so badly, hence his act of revenge where he turns his bully into a lizard. Then the red is there to refer to the ‘COLD BLOOD’ title, it ties with the idea of herpetology, DNA and science, the red is also to simply visualize the idea of danger. Not only that, I like the typeface used on SMILEY’s poster because it looks that of a ‘venetian’ style, very classic and traditional, this style of font is very strong and is easy to read. The simplicity of the font also refers to the vague concept of the poster; not knowing the reasoning of a hidden identity, because commonly the typeface of a poster can hint to what the film will include, i.e. if it’s a very gory horror the typeface of the title may be in the form of blood splats, if it’s a psychological horror then the typeface for the title may be shattered of some kind, etc. Whereas having a simple typeface supported with a
strange and unclear photo lures us in because we want to know the reason behind the stylistic approach of the poster. Referring more profoundly on my usage of the typeface, the traditional typeface also relates to the fact that Michael is strong and that he has a stylistic approach to his murders because they’re different and relate to his passion of science and herpetology. My typeface also contains minor segments that are missing to further highlight the uncertain factors of the poster.
Focusing primarily on my own poster, the name 'cold blood' plays on that of Lizards who have cold blood - the typeface for the film title is placed on top of a splatter of blood to visualize the DNA aspects of herpetology. In addition, I’ve incorporated a vignette of lighting were the lighting is strongly concentrated on Jason and the background is black, which is subliminal to connote that his horrid acts of bullying (his past is the black background to show he is a horrible person) has resulted in him being turned into a lizard. Not only that, I included smoke on the lower three thirds of the image to not only just make the red ‘COLD BLOOD’ title be more prominent, but also it makes the photo a lot more atmospheric and therefore make it look more mysterious. The reason why I wanted to achieve this was because the poster itself is very ambiguous, you don’t know why there’s a half human and half lizard entrapped on the poster, so the smoke adds to the idea of the unknown, why’s the poster so mystifying? Thus making you more intrigued.
The cold blood trailer itself is very controversial because we see that a young boy, who minds his own business and focuses on his studies, is a victim of strong bullying. As a result of this he is driven to the point where he physically cannot take it no more and decides to take revenge on all those who mistreated him – killing his bullies in the process of trying to turning them into a bully, he uses his revenge tactics cleverly to benefit his scientific studies which he makes a success finally with his last and worse bull, Jason Hawkes. My poster focuses on Jason, the photo of him looks very sad and can evoke a feeling of sympathy for him, but she we feel this being as he did treat someone which such a disgusting lack of respect. On the contrary, we’ve got the theme of the innocent Michael Scales having a hidden evil side; we as an audience commiserate for his high school abuse but should that mean we’re happy that he’s put his abuse to rest? The trailer is very divisive and we do not know who to feel sorry for. The poster is subliminally connoting that Jason possibly deserves what happened to him. On the other hand, people could argue that the stylistic approach could illustrate that although he did bully someone, he shouldn’t be resulted to such attack due to it.