Film Poster Analysis - The Ring

This is the film poster for the horror film ‘The Ring’. I will be looking at various aspects of the poster to see how it attracts its audience.

They use the route of the eye to attract the audience in many ways. In the first line, they put the masthead ‘Before you die, you see’. This attracts the audience as it is a scary statement, which will make people want to watch it as they know it is scary. In the second line, they make it go through the middle of the main part of the poster, so this is the second thing that the audience notice and it also has the film’s name in it, which attracts the audience as they know what the film is called. In the third line they have the name of the main actors and the director and other crew members’ names. This can attract the audience as they can look to see if any of their favourite actors or directors is involved with the film. They place the main logo in the middle of the four hotspots, so if the audience look at the hotspots, they see the logo in the middle of them. This can attract the audience as they see the main image straight away, as it is very distinctive. They have also put the main image in the primary optical area, which attracts the audience as the name of the film is the first thing they see on the poster. They have placed just plain black in the dead areas as no one looks here, so it would be pointless putting information in these areas.

There is not a lot of text on the page, but what there is, the font has an impact. In the masthead, they have used a font that is quite basic, yet effective, as they have also done a shadow of the text in the background, as this is quite conventional, as shadows are often involved with horror. This will attract the audience as it may give them an insight into the film. On the main image, they have used quiet a creepy font for ‘The Ring’. It looks as if it has been drawn by a child, which links in with the film as it is to do with children.  At the bottom, they have used a basic font of the actors and directors, as this is not a massive part of the poster, and as it is quite small text, only people that want to read it will read it, so they’ve made it basic and easy to read.

     

The colours they have used on the poster are quite basic, as they have only used two colours. They have used black for the background, as black connotes evil, which is what the film is about. They have used white for the text and the picture of the ring because white connotes innocence, and there is always an innocent person in a horror film, with ‘The Ring’ being no exception. These colours will attract to the target audience as there is an excessive amount of black, and this will attract them to the horror-ness of the film.

The image they have used is of a ring, which links in with the film, as the film is called ‘The Ring’. They have made it as if it is fuzzy, like on a dodgy television. This also links in with the film as that is a big part of the film. This can attract the target audience as it gives them an insight into the film, although they may not realise it.