A promotion package for a new film, to include a teaser trailer, together with a film magazine front cover, featuring the film and also a poster for the film.
The trailer begins with the diagetic sound of a telephone ringing with a man answering it whilst laying in bed, which straight away gives the sense of mystery as the audience do not know what one phone call could lead to. The music in the background is somewhat eerie and creates a tense atmosphere on the audience. The trailer then uses a fade out, fade in technique revealing a house on fire which the camera is focused on, with a man standing in the foreground which we make out as the camera slowly turns the focus to him. Then flashes to the man we see previously see on the phone running from his police car. He then has a conversation with the with a fire fighter, there is then a quick shot taken of the house on fire again which informs the audience of whats occurring once again and emphasizes the conflict of the man's house which is on fire and how he shows no facial expression or real reaction to the situation, which is effective as the audience would presume the man to show at least some emotions, however creating this dilemma leaves the audience confused and keeps us interested. We also assume that this man is a potential villain in the film when the camera uses an over the shoulder shot as the fire fighter points at him, again this links in with creating confusion and giving a little understanding of the story line to the audience. It then flashes in and out using the same over the shoulder shot of the women approaching the man whilst calling his name. As the man begins to whistle the camera uses a close up of his face with the burning house in the background, it then fades to a white effect which excludes the house on fire in the background and just leaving the image of the mans face in the shot, which gives the impression of this man being the real danger, not the house on fire.
It then fades black effectively along with the background sound, and fades back in with a high pitch resembling a ghost sound creating suspense within the audience. This scene reveals the same man we see whistling in a jail cell still showing no emotions creating mystery. The camera then zooms in on his face. When this happens a eerie sound is playing in the background building tension to a "jumpy" climax where the audience already know they will jump at. The climax builds to a scene that will not be particularly pleasant, however the audience remains enthralled.
The trailer then cuts from scene to scene using a flashing technique emphasizing each shot and keeping a flow to the storyline, but it's what particular shots of the film which are used between each flash that have the main effect on the audience, which is achieves creating confusion and suspense. Between each flash the series of events seemingly get stranger and stranger in how people are acting and shows that it's not just one person in particular that's getting effected. An example of what the audience will be feeling is the same as the police officer on screen, as a women on a bike rides past singing a cheerful song he is looking very bemused and puzzled, putting across the sense of confusion even further. And as this happens an over the shoulder shot behind where the police officer is standing puts the audience "into" the trailer feeling the same emotions as the character on screen.
The next flash is a low angle shot of the two police officers crouching over the man laying in the cell, then an over the shoulder shot is used to show the two officers looking at the man on the floor bringing the audience closer into the trailer. The man then jumps up screaming as he tries to grab the officer. It then fades to black and uses a quick crescendo of music adding to the intensity of the previous shot. The next shot shows the main character walking down a road using a flashing effect very quickly giving a pan icing effect on the audience, along with the non diegetic building to a climax where he reaches two children and have a brief conversation, as the children state, "We heard something from the funeral home" and the officer asks "What did you hear?" and they whisper "Screaming". And the whisper suggest that they don't want anyone to hear them creating fear which effects onto the audience.
There is allot more to talk about in this particular trailer, however the effects already described are used throughout the whole trailer and it achieves having a great effect on the audience. Which is creating confusion, mystery and a build up of tension.
The trailer begins with a white screen with what seems black hair going across it. It quickly establishes who produced and distributed the film. (Columbia) which is a convention in every trailer, however it shows no picture logo to represent Columbia, instead it chooses a black bold font, which is the theme used throughout the trailer.
It then fades to black and uses an establishing shot of a busy city easily identified as Tokyo suggesting where the film is set. Followed by another fade effect then a high angle shot of a closer look at the city and slowing of the camara to emphisize how busy the city is. Straight from the beggining of this trailer there is a background sound that resembles a heart beat, also a wind blowing sound and music played at a low tone, this creating a build of tension and suspense throughout the trailer towards the audience. It then fades black again, also having the same effect of creating suspence in the audience of not knowing what will appear on the screen next. And as a high angle shot of a house is revealed only for what uses the same effect as black hair going across the screen, to be covered again using a ghost like effect creating mystery, then text appears, "When someone dies in a grip of a powerful rage."and it's the "When" in this particular chosen quote that keeps the audience interested and wanting to see more.
There is then a low angle shot taken of a young girl looking around in a dark house that looks as if she is searching for something and during this we realise the heart beat in the background get faster building tension and suspence within the audience. There is then a series of fast takes of different clips, one particular revealing the camara underwater looking up at a man as his hand reaches towards you, giving the effect that the audience is placed in the film giving a sense of realism. There is also a scream as this shot is being taken which releases the build up of tension and may even shock some viewers. Then series of a flicker of shots are taken, less than a second long so the audience can just about see whats happening on the screen, the music gets faster building the tension once again creating a sense of fear within the audience. A close up of flames on a wooden floor, a flash of a pale looking face surrounded by darkness, then a shadow apppears rising on the wall making the audience seem insignificant, then an extreme close up of the same face on their eyes looking at the camara. As the clips are showing so briefly it creates an act of confusion on the audience, of what this Grudge is and what does it do thats so frightening. The music then goes calm and the ghost like mist fades in with text explaining, "A Curse is Left Behind" giving an idea of the storyline to the audience and creates mystery and suspence of who or what this curse is.
There is alot more to talk about within this trailer however, i believe the effects already described is what this trailer is wanting to achieve and does so very well, creating mystery, making the audience ask question to what "The Grudge" actually is and uses the build up of music and different text to create the tension and suspense within the audience.
It's the trailers purpose to make a movie interesting and hypothesis certain characteristics about the film to advertise to the target audience, but a trailer can only be as good as the film itself so choosing the right clips from the film, so it is vital to best describe what to expect within the film and how it's presented to the target audeince, within reason that each individual has a different opinion of certain aspects the film may contain.
The audience already has general knowledge of what the trailer will contain due to the fact a filmed produced, "28 days later" was released leading up towards this film inpacticular. Which will have a effect on how the trailer will be presented and leaves the audience with the idea of a twist occuring in the plot of the storyline, being a main factor to present within the trailer.
Looking into more depth about the trailer itself, it begins with a establishing shot of an empty city, which is London where the film is set. This is followed by a fade to black to bring out an overview or birdseye view of the city, which emphasis how empty the city is. The background soundtrack goes effectively well with the fade to black text and the intro to the clips of the film used for the trailer repetivaly, which gives the trailer a fast pase tempo going well with the horror genre, allowing main aspects of thetrailer to be presented briefly. The use of fades is a good technique as the audience is are not aware what will appear on the screen next therefor creating suspense within the audience. The beggining of the trailer seems to be used as a prologue, summarising past events with the chosen text the trailer uses, displaying confliction further into the trailer that creates irony for the particular story line the film follows.
This particular trailer includes alot of diegetic sound which in effect places the audiences in the film itself seemingly partaking in the events occuring within the trailer itself. The trailer also uses point of view shots to really put the audience in the characters perspective which brings a sense of reality into the trailer setting aside the idea of the film being fiction. The trailer also uses multiple different angle shots on the same actions being displayed in relation to the text. For example when sterilization is displayed a women being washed down features a shot that uses 2 different shots, main one being the close up of the womens face. This emphisizes the emotions shown by her facial expression representing the pain and agony this person is in, which makes the audience feel uncomfortable and allowed me to see how horror genre is represented to achieve this effect on the audience.
Another main feature i pick out of this particular trailer is how the music builds up to a climax to create tension for the viewers, for example when a loud alarming sound triggers there is a soundtrack used for background noise as the boy approaches the glass pane. This soundtrack, produced by muse is suddenly played at a much louder level as one of the infected bursts down the doors, thus showing the contrast of how the music is played along with the actions taking place which brings an element of suprise to the audience and emphasize the fear brought out in the characters. The shots used for the ending to this trailer are less than a second long and flicker on the screen so the audience can just about make out whats happening, this also builds up tension and fear in the audience.
