Wednesday 27 June 2012

Film Trailer Analysis #1- The Vow

The Vow-

I watched The Vow trailer, I personally thought it was an amazing trailer and from personal experience, when I first saw the trailer, it which made me go see the film. After I watched the trailer again I analysed it. These are my findings.
At the start it establishes the love in the love interests.  It’s funny, sweet and romantic. As Channing and Rachael characters are driving in the snow, a ‘Meatloaf’ song is playing, which Channing is singing madly to, which makes Rachel’s character chuckle as he has bad taste in music. Then there’s the problem/ impacts where there’s quick shots of their marriage and their beginning of their love, which was shot in flashes, which represents heartfelt moments. There’s a monologue of Channing character, which helps the audience feel and fully understand what the character is going through. After that there’s a slow duration panning shot, which established the problem of Rachel’s character, by her loss of memory and the lost relationship with Channing’s character. There are no fancy shots or transitions from shot to shot. It’s just straight cuts which allow the audience to feel the tension in these scenes. All this has happened in 51 seconds of the trailer, so my aim to establish the problem before the first minute is over.
Then there’s writing and a enigma question, ‘What if 5 years of your life disappeared?’  This poses questions to the audience and makes them think in the shoes of the characters. The plain black writing and non-fancy font allows the audience to feel that this is a serious issue. Also the use of the dull yet yellowy, green background shows that this part of the film will be dull, which connotates the problem being dull. The word ‘DISAPPEAED?’ appears in white, this connotates the reality of the issue also connotates the actual word disappeared of her relationship with her love interest.
Then after this shot, there’s pictures of the pain in the lovers, with quick cuts and quick fades which allows the audience to understand how the characters are feeling. It also shows how one of the lovers is trying to recover the forgotten love. Then there’s a funny moment in-between where Channing’s character is walking naked into his room, where Rachel’s character half naked. This allows the institutions to reinforce the purpose of the film in the minds of the audience as being a romance, drama, where romance has moments of fun.
 Then there’s a fact which appears, stating it is, Inspired by true events. This allows some audience members especially me to fully care for the characters as this has happened to someone in reality. As Channing and Rachel are trying to establish the issue, Rachel creates another issue with ‘thinking’ she still has feelings for her ex. This is another problem which has crept up, which allows more drama to be introduced into the film. Then there’s hope of reconnecting the love which has been forgotten, by having in the narrative of Channing’s character re asking his ‘wife’ for a date. In the duration of that shot, there are flashbacks of how the characters first met in the start of the film. Then there is another funny moment where they are about to go on a date and where Rachel states, she needs to be back before 10 in the morning. As Channing’s character replies, ‘first date and you already wanna stay the night?!’
After that moment, there’s the same background and same writing of when the film will be released. This allows the audience to take in and kind of organise themselves of when to watch the film.
After that shot, there’s Channing’s monologue alongside shots of the love interests being happy, for example when their characters first meeting spot and the car journeys together. Then the institution establishes the characters with scenes from the film of both characters stating which previous romance drama films they had been in. This allows the audience to regain and remember (mind the pun) who the actors are from previous romance drama films. These shots are used as fades in and out to show their relationship and to show the actual flow of the film.
 Then there are repeats of the problem with other characters getting involved with the issue, for example where Jessica Lange who plays Rachel’s mother in the film states, Paige (Rachel) won’t remember her relationship with Leo (Channing) love. There’s the impact moments where the audience gasps, which allows the audience members to feel active in the trailer rather than passive throughout.
Then there are back and forth shots of happiness and sadness when the problem is again shown. This again reminds the audience that this film is like a roller-coaster. It will rise when happiness is shown then it will dip when there is sadness. This is a convention of a romance drama trailer.
After there is on screen writing, ‘will love find a second chance?’ with the characters being happy in the background. This is an enigma question which allows the audience to think as the characters and as themselves.
 Lastly there’s shots again of happiness and sadness, which then allows the name of the film to pop up. At the end there are all the credits of the institutions names and the releases date of the film. The end is where the audience are left with thoughts and emotion. I would like to create that impact at the end of my trailer to my audience and make them feel, they would want to watch my film.

Overall I think The Vow trailer will be a major impact on my trailer. The way at the end of the trailer, the binary opposition of the happy scenes and tense scenes most definitely impact the audience by making them go through a emotional rollercoaster. This allows the audience to be active in the duration of the trailer and always on edge.
Also there are two scores, one which is acoustic when the problem is introduced then there’s a soundtrack of Taylor Swifts- Enchanted http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrRlUwaOHfM when the problem is trying to be rectified.  I particularly think the use of the acoustics allows the tension to be seen through the drama without any lyrics. The soundtrack of Taylors song, allows the audience to feel a sense of recovery and hope of the romance drama story. I would like to use an acoustic song in my drama and somehow change the song in the duration of the film trailer, like how The Vow trailer have done.
Lastly the use of the enigma questions was used effectively to allow the audience to be in the place of the characters. I would like to use some questions effectively like ‘The Vow’ has, however I don’t want it to be non-effective as it could just be a pointless question. So I am debating on the use of the questions.

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