Trailer Analysis (w/ Codes and Conventions)

Many Film Trailers in recent times follow certain codes and conventions. These would mainly be:

• Reflective of the genre
• Graphics captions - director's name, date of release, text related to the film.
• Non-diagetic music - this can help reflect the genre
• Production Company
• Narrative enigma - this can help set up the film
• Editing - quick or slow depending on the genre to create tension, excitement or mood
• Close-ups - This will show off the stars in the movie

HP Trailer 1: Youtube

Present in this trailer, there are many distinguishable features which include:

• An introductory/establishing shot at the beginning of the scene to show where the current scene is taking place.
• The use of slow-paced jump cuts at the start of the trailer draws viewers into the trailer slowly, in time with the soundtrack as it builds up tension.
• These jump cuts eventually become faster as the soundtrack becomes more 'epic' with the inclusion of a vocal choir and orchestral elements.
• Titles are used with text such as 'The Finale of the World Phenomenon' and 'The Motion Picture of the Generation' builds up the trailer and almost makes watching the film to be a global, must-see event (considering the success of the franchise already.)

This trailer would want to cram in as much special effects and action as possible to entice the viewer, and also considering the film had an extremely massive budget they would want to showcase it in these trailers. Finally at the end of this trailer, the logo of Harry Potter is shown to furthermore show the successful nature of the franchise, as even without this logo we would know what film it would be about due to the reason stated previous.

Saw Trailer 1: Youtube

This trailer relies heavily on the atmosphere created by the soundtrack and the extended fades between cuts. These slow cuts build up a lot of tension with the inclusion of the dark soundtrack to go with it. Titles are then used to help set the scene of the movie.

Strangely, there is no use of an establishing shot in this trailer, which could be because of they want to keep the idea of containment, isolation, and also the feel that they don't know where they are. Between these long fades there are very fast flashing with little cuts of clips. This gives an almost disorientating feel to the viewer and implies a sense of torture through the use of the screams.

Near to the end of this trailer the jump cuts become very,very fast as the tension comes to a climax, where then the title showing the name of the film fades in. The main use of sound in this trailer is of diagetic - or at least shown that later on in the trailer - origin such as the TV playing the video tape, but also the voice-overs of the actors which blends through different cuts.