- The Film Title: Halloween II (H2)
- Year of Release in UK: 9th October 2009
- Director: Rob Zombie
- Producer: Rob Zombie
- Production/Financing Company: Dimension Films
- Actors: Tyler Mane (Michael Myers), Malcolm McDowell (Dr Samuel Loomis), Chase Wright Vanek (Young Michael Myers), Sherie Moon Zombie (Deborah Myers) and Scout Taylor Compton (Laurie Strode).
- Films/Origin Info: The film is a sequel to Zombie's remake of Halloween (1978).
- Synopsis: The film is about a boy called Michael Myers who sixteen years ago brutally killed his mum, step father, his elder sister and her boyfriend. Sixteen years later, he escapes from the mental institution and makes his way back to his hometown of Haddonfield in search of one of the only people he has ever cared about, his baby sister Laurie Strode.
Halloween movies are well-liked by audiences as it creates a sense of tension and fear within the movie by the masked killer Michael Myers. In this textual analysis I will be analysing the teaser trailer for Rob Zombie’s 2009 remake of the Halloween 1978, that was distributed by ‘Dimension Films’. The teaser trailer is 1:01 (62) second in length which is not too long past the 60 seconds mark.
At the beginning of the trailer it is obvious that the teaser trailer is targeted at to those who enjoy watching horror movies and those who are also fans of the first Halloween film. The teaser trailer opens with very quick takes of a girl screaming, covered in blood. The shot is also edited in black and white colour. This opening scene is extremely brief, yet it creates an anxious and tense feeling. Also the use of sound connotes danger. The diegetic sounds used at the beginning of the trailer of the girl screaming and the sound of the gunshot gives establishes to the audiences that the genre of the film is horror and suggests a lot of violence will take place in the film.
There is also a fade transition that begins with a shot at full intensity of the girl and reduces until it disappears and fades in to black for a couple of seconds. This conveys the idea that this transition has been used to give the audience an impression of a change in location.
The next scene that is shown on the teaser trailer is another quick shot take that lasts for 3 seconds of the location, which appears to be a hospital. This shot is taken from a low angle, which follows the conventions of a horror film as the lighting of the scene is low key. This emphasises to the audience that something will soon take place, as it is dark and shadowy and connotes danger and creates an eerie atmosphere for the audience. In addition to, the dialogue used when a female character mentions “Nurse” enforces the idea to the audience that a patient is seeking for a nurse. This starts to create a tension for the audience as no one answers the female character, and appears to be very silent.
The following shot continues in the same location of a hospital introducing a female character who is seeking for a nurse’s help another dialogue is used where the female character states “Is anybody here?” Her non-verbal communication suggests that she is she is terrified when she sees a nurse lying dead on the floor. In regards to the sound, the non-diegetic sound starts to build up, and matches up with the diegetic sounds of the character’s voice.
When the female character (Laurie Strode) screams after Michael Myers foot and face is shown in the next couple of shots, the non-diegetic atmospheric music increasingly builds up and the sound starts to get louder in which it enhances the diegetic sound of the female character screaming. This creates a tension feeling towards the audience where by the audience is kept in suspense as they do not know what to expect next.
Low key lighting and a black and white filter is then used in the next couple of following shots until a black transition is used, whereby the shots are faded in. This represents the darkness of the evil. The transition is used to bridge two separate shots this represents a different representation of atmosphere.
However, the use of diegetic sounds of the female character screaming continues in the black faded transition and is followed by a voiceover of unknown male. Yet the non-diegetic sounds continues and matches with the diegetic sounds of the unknown male’s voiceover and shots. Many of the quick shots that shown are: extreme close up, close up as well as long shots. In between these shots there are transitions used in order to bridge each of the separate shots. Each of the shots last between 2-3 seconds until another shot is shown. The type of editing that is used during the voice over appears to be slow editing and in a chronological order. The lighting throughout this scene follows the convention of a horror film, as the use of low-key lighting is consistent and represents the danger which is reinforced by the voice over in the background.
The dialogue of "Inside every one of us, there exist a dark side, but some are consumed by It." enforces the idea to the audience the negative atmosphere present throughout the trailer. Though some of the shots shown before the voice over are not clear, the voice over helps the audience to keep up with what is going on the trailer
As the voice over stops another transition is used after a shot of Michael Myers face is shown and the non-diegetic sound implemented in the trailer builds up and fades back down at the beginning of the transition. During the transition the non-diegetic sound is faded in very low and there is pause in the diegetic sounds. The pause, questions the audience members mind what the situation has turned to. This is enhanced by the diegetic and non-diegetic sound changing. This keeps the audience in suspense of what will be shown in the next scenes.
On the next shot a close-up shot of the character Michael Myers is then shown and the use of non-diegetic sound increasingly builds up to a high climax and is used to tease the audience by making them jump and tensed. Also a lot of quick cuts are used this leaves the audience feeling anxious and nervous. Throughout the trailer the common use of editing is used, the continuity of quick cuts is highly common and makes the effect of compressing time. The compression of time between shots is very frequent throughout the teaser as it manipulates time. This is a convention that is followed in many horror genre teaser trailers. The use of low key lighting yet emphasises the consistent negativity within the teaser trailer and connotes evilness and terror.
On one of the shot where another female character is running away from Michael Myers, it is a typical convention that exists in majority of horror films. The female character that is running away from the psycho killer appears to be shorter than her male counterpart. This is very stereotypical convention that unfortunately still exists, that the males in horror films are much stronger and superior compared to females, whereby they are defenceless and weak. This portrays women in a negative and weak way and is still a popular convention for horror films. Also this shot has been taken from a low angle shot, from the female perspective. This view is used to show the characters power within the teaser trailer. The low angle shows the visual representation of the killer being the dominant character in the teaser trailer and has full power and authority over the situation that is in progress. Whereas with the female character, the low angle shot used stereotypically represents her as weak and defenceless.
After this scene of the female character running away from the killer, another transition is used in which the previous scene is faded in, to bridge the two shots together. However, on the transition there is a text which shows ‘On August 28th' which addresses to audience that the film will be released on that day. The build up of the dramatic non-diegetic sound gets louder and louder, this is when the actual music rhythm for all the Halloween movies and re-makes is included, this makes the whole teaser trailer appear authentic and creates a anxious mood to the teaser trailer.
The next scene shows a shot of the female character (Laurie Strode) standing in front of a mirror, where by the use of non-verbal communication suggests that she is extremely frightened and terrified. The following shot of the villain is shown in extreme low key lighting whereby the killers' face cannot be seen, this makes the audience eager to know how the killer looks like and what he is going to do. In these two following shots medium close-up is used in order to allow the audience to see the face and expression of the characters.
The following shot is faded in to, showing the villain and a small child standing in front of each other. This shows the comparison with how the villain is powerful, strong and very tall compared to others around him. This scene also makes the audience wonder what he does to the child and yet again makes the audience eager to know what will happen next. Also low-key lighting is still used which emphasises the negativity within the teaser trailer. The following shot is faded in too, which shows a shot of the killer Michael Myers when he was young placing a mask on his face. This connotes the idea that Michael Myers suffers from metal health problems from a very young age whereby he has killed several people as shown in the following shots after this.
Another following shot of Michael Myers face is re-established but this time in high key lighting coming from higher above him from the helicopters whereby you can see him with his mask on. The use of high key lighting enhances the killer's character, by the fast use of high key lighting the audience are visualised with the psycho killer's face.
Another shot after this is used in which it follows the convention and ideas of male killers being strong this suggests to the audience of how much strength the killer has, as he is shown breaking the door with one kick and a close-up shot of his face. These shots are yet again in low key lighting and portrays the amount of negativity, Shown in the trailer. The following shots that are shown, are of the people who are also the main characters being either attacked however, it is not clearly shown as the whole part of the teaser trailer is not to give everything away but to convince the audience to watch the film when it is released. Towards the end a lot of quick cuts were also used, the frequent cuts are intentional interruptions to shock and to emphasise the atmosphere of the film.
The use of shot, reverse shot camera shot is used to give the audience an idea of invading the characters space through the teaser trailer and experiencing the effect of what the characters are going through. The shot reverse shot is shown by a close-up shot of the villain holding a knife pointed at someone and a shot of the female character (Laurie Strode’s) facial expression are shown and the final shot of the knife going down ready to kill someone. Also the use of non-diegetic sound as well as diegetic sound of a knife stabbing in to someone enhances the shots and allows the audience to experience a sense of what the character is feeling. This is when audience is mislead to think that the trailer has come to an end as the title name of the film is established in motion graphic movement of the typography.
However, an over the shoulder shot was used, when the female character closed the mirror cabinet, she realised that in the mirror reflection she noticed someone is behind her, not until then when she turns around a lot of low key lighting was used to allow the audience to visualise the figure of the person who was behind her, which is acknowledged by the audience that it is Michael Myers. The use of non-diegetic sound was added in order to enhance the scene of the climate end to the teaser trailer. Overall the teaser trailer ends in another motion graphic movement of the typography, where by the date of when the film will be released in cinema was shown.
No comments:
Post a Comment