Trailer analysis: The Woman in Black 2012

The Woman in Black 2012 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPYMUnJGURI The Woman in Black was released in 2012 and was directed by James Watkins. It stars Daniel Radcliffe, Ciaran Hinds and Janet McTeer. Daniel Radcliffe’s character Arthur Kipps is a solicitor faced with the selling of Eel Marsh House, an isolated house in a small remote village called Cryphin Gifford. However soon Kipps learns that the house in the marshes is haunted by a vengeful ghost angry about her son’s death. As revenge for her son drowning in the marshes she steals the children from the scared villagers.

However, conventionally, this much information is not given in the trailer. A trailer is a short piece of film lasting usually around two to three minutes with snippets of the film enticing an audience to go and see the film. There are certain conventions to horror trailers which the trailer for The Woman in Black follows. Due to following these conventions we know early on that the film being advertised in the trailer is a horror film. We can work this out through the use of certain conventions in the trailer such as setting, characters, pace and music to name a few.

However the genre is also clear before the actual trailer has begun through the advertisement of the film production companies at the very beginning. The first company shown is ‘Momentum Pictures’ The text is the usual font for this bran however the colour of the font has been changed to grey and the background is black with a smoke effect floating around it. The colour grey often connotes dullness and unhappiness, emotions and themes expressed in The Woman in Black. The second company logo that is shown is ‘Hammer’ which appears after the smoke has ‘washed’ away the ‘Momentum Pictures’ logo. The second company is advertised using its usual red logo, red often connotes blood and evil therefore relating to the genre of The Woman in Black well. The ‘Hammer’ film company is notorious for its creation of horror films such as Countess Dracula from 1971 and The Satanic Rites of Dracula from 1974. Therefore this advertisement is a clue straight away to the genre of the film.

The setting for the film is shown within the first ten seconds. It is important for a trailer to establish a setting and location for a film so that the audience is aware of where the film is set. This also helps determine information about the type of horror. The Woman in Black follows the conventions of a horror film in its location as it is set in a remote village and in an isolated house amongst the marshes. This is a convention for horror as it makes the characters vulnerable to the goings on. The conventional location of The Woman in Black is shown within the first ten seconds because trailers have a very limited time period to get information to their audience. Getting the right balance between too much information and too little about a film is challenge. For example if too much information is given about a film then the audience will not see the point in going and seeing the film however if not enough information is given then the audience will not be enticed enough to go and see a film. I feel as though The Woman in Black has a good balance between what is left unknown to the audience, what they are made aware of and what they are able to assume from the trailer.

It follows the convention of having the pace at the beginning slow as it unravels the back story to the film, this being the reason Arthur Kipps is visiting Cryphin Gifford. We find out that he is visiting in order to attempt the sell the Eel Marsh House property but is warned by the character of Mr Daily that he will struggle to sell the house. During an establishing shot of Arthur Kipps making his way towards Eel Marsh House on a horse and cart an over voice is used of Mr Daily saying ‘The sooner the house is sold the sooner people can move on’ This informs that a terrible event has occurred in the house that has shaken the whole village. This allows the audience to start asking questions but also hints to the type of horror film the trailer is advertising. The pace of the trailer then speeds up to having very fast shots making the audience feel uneasy and disorientated towards the events in the film as the amount of collision cutting and jump scares being used increases. This convention allows the audience to receive a certain amount if back story to the narrative structure but not enough to be able to work out the entire plot. For example you learn about the key characters, the main characters clearly being Arthur Kipps, the Woman in black and there is also a mention to Arthur Kipps’ son; only a brief mention which allows the audience to become curious about this without knowing the whole plot. However from the short trailer the audience can tell straight away that the character of Arthur Kipps in the ‘hero’ in a sense and will be the one who has to fight the evil, this being the Woman in black.

The type of horror is clear through the trailer; The Woman in Black is a ghost horror. This is clearly shown through the cinematography and shots of the woman appearing and disappearing out of thin air. However throughout the trailer we, as an audience, are not given a clear visual shot of the Woman in black. This is a convention to horror trailers, often glimpses of the ‘evil’ are not always shown. Instead the effects caused by the evil are shown and the emotional impact they have on the characters. This is to increase the fear and mystery that surrounds it. Therefore the audience are more likely to go and see the film in order to see what is terrorising the characters.

The short glimpses of the ‘evil’ in this case the Woman in black are often done through what is called a jump scares, these are shots that suddenly scare the audience. They can be created by filming a very quiet shot and then cutting to a very loud shot or going from a very slow shot to a very fast shot, this is collision cutting. Most of the time in horror these are combined, for example one of the main characters will be in a quiet and slow shot and then suddenly a fast and loud shot replaces it.

This is often a shot of the ‘evil’. By using collision cutting it not only frightens and entices the audience but helps identify the style of horror. The use of jump scares through collision cutting is meant to suddenly make the audience jump and have a rush of adrenaline and enjoyment, the main reason for watching horror movies is so that the audience can have an emotional reaction to it.

Other shots that are used conventionally in horror films are shots that determine a characters strength. Often towards the beginning high angle shots are used to make the protagonists appear weaker, and lower angle shots on the antagonist to make them appear stronger. This often then switches during the trailer, however this depends of the narrative but if the protagonist finds the strength to defeat the even they are then often shown as the more powerful one. Within this trailer there are various shots using high angles on Arthur Kipps connoting that he is weak however there are a few low angle shots suggesting to the audience that further through the film persons he becomes stronger.

The lighting of the trailer fits genre conventions, for example the only scenes which are light are the daytime scenes which take place in the village. Any scenes around Eel House and the marshes are dingy and grey. This is to represent good and evil.

This is because within films colours and lighting connote things.

Light connotes good and pureness, darkness connotes evil. Therefore shots filmed in and around Eel House are often dark and grey to connote the evil that lies around it. This work similarly for the characters in the film as well, Arthur and the other characters such as Mr Daily are filmed in bright light suggesting to the audience that these characters are good, the Woman in black is often in dark lighting connoting to the audience that she is evil however equally there is a shot of the character Arthur Kipps in a room in the house carrying a candle. The candle only lights half of his face creating a shadowed affect across his face. This is called chiaroscuro, the contrast between light and dark creating shadows. Often in films this connotes that a character is either good or evil, for example an anti-hero or anti-villain. An anti-hero is a hero who does bad things for good and an anti-villain is a villain who does good things for bad. It can also connote that a character is conflicted, therefore in this scene and its placement in the trailer connotes that the character of Arthur Kipps is perhaps conflicted between staying in Cryphin Gifford or whether he should leave as the shot happens once he has been told that he ‘won’t find a local buyer’ and ‘the sooner the house is sold the sooner people can move on’ This suggests not only to the audience that something bad happened in the house but also to the character of Arthur Kipps. The colour scheme of the film includes a lot of greys, dark blues and blacks, this is again to connote the misery, mystery and darkness within the films narrative.

The music and sound is very important within a trailer as it can give a lot of information towards a film. The music within The Woman in Black trailer is parallel to the action taking place. It can be argued that the music at the very beginning seems to not fit a horror genre film however as the pace of the trailer is slow at this point and it is gathering background information of the characters and narrative the music fits well. Throughout the trailer the music playing at the beginning suddenly comes to a stop after the voice over of Mr Daily has said ‘the sooner the house is sold the sooner people can move on’ this line informs the audience of an event in the past as stated before however the use of making the music stop just after this voice over increases the eeriness as the shot being shown at this time is Arthur Kipps first entering Eel House. It is clear it is the first time due to the use of shots and continuity used throughout the trailer helping the audience understand the narrative.

The shot of Arthur Kipps is a high angle making him appear weak and the house around him large and powerful again linking to the evil that lingers in the house. With the music stopping at the moment that he closes the door creates a brief moment of silence.

Silence in horror films is conventional as it adds to the fear and

terror only because in our ordinary lives we don’t often experience complete silence. However this moment of silence is soon taken over with an eerie wind/ breathing non diegetic sound. Non diegetic sounds and music don’t exist in the world at the beginning, for example this eerie wind and the music at the start however they add to the overall emotional impact of the trailer.

The target audience for The Woman in Black is hard to pinpoint. It has a wide age range being appropriate for people of most ages as it is rated PG-13 by MPAA (The Motion Picture Association of America) and rated 12A in the UK meaning it is appropriate for teens up. The film is targeted at both a male and female audience. I think the reason the rating is lower than some horror films is not only to increase the audience and therefore the amount of people who can go and see the film but also due to the fact that it is a ghost horror film it focuses more on jump scares and a dark narrative than the gruesome side to it using a lot of restricted narration. This can be argued as uncommon for a horror film because horrors are supposedly meant to be ‘horrific’ but in aiming to made it a wider appeal the film does not focus on gore. This is more common for ghost horrors compared to horrors such as splatter, slasher or torture porn / gornography.

Overall I feel as though the trailer is successful in the amount of information that is given to the audience as there is a large part of the narrative the audience would be unaware of from just watching the trailer. However just enough background narrative is given for them to be interested in seeing what happens. For example they are not aware of the order of the shots they are shown in the full movie and therefore the assumptions they make may or may not be correct and this would entice them to go and see the film to find out. It also conventionally uses intertitles which helps increase the excitement towards the narrative whilst giving information and mystery simultaneously. The intertitles read ‘The most chilling ghost story of our time’ and ‘Fear Her Curse’ It is successful in creating tense scenes and moments of emotional impact through the use of jump scares which increases the adrenaline of the viewers and increases their excitement and want to continue watching it.