SINISTER FILM POSTER ANALYSIS

Sinister poster analysis

The Sinister poster is a great example of how an audience can be drawn into viewing the film. There is always seven or eight key elements which must feature on an film poster, the first includes the title of the film. For the Sinister poster the title is placed centrally using bold, black capital letters which is presented in a very prominent and clear way, this simply tells the audience the title of the film. The font used is slightly blurry and smudged/ faded giving of a supernatural vibe, which coincides with the events in the film and helps to reveal a thriller/ horror genre. The second element would be an image, this is used to give the audience some sort of understanding to what the film will include.

The main image used features in the foreground of the poster and shows a young girl dressed in white pajamas, this could stereotypically symbolise that she is pure and innocent. Her head is turned away from the camera as she is presented to be walking away dragging her hand behind her along the wall. I believe that she looks entranced and that she has no real control over what she is doing. If you look at the whole image the young girl takes up a small frame and isn't necessarily that important. Behind her is a drawing which was illustrated with dripping blood to present some sort of disfigured face. The blood used resembles potential codes and conventions within a thriller/ horror genre. This is also hugely important as it reveals that the drawing of the face is overpowering as it takes up a massive chunk of the image and possibly reflects some sort of similar dominance over the little girl in the film. The image helps to reveal clues about the storyline and justifies the genre.

The third element is every poster will need to include some sort of catchy tagline. The tagline in sinister is ‘Once you see him, nothing can save you’. This is used to scare the audience and seek adrenaline, it follows the deathly tone of the whole poster.

The fourth, fifth and sixth elements are the name of the studio/production company, the name of the director and the actors names. In the sinister poster some of these feature along the bottom in the credits as they take up a large space of unnecessary information, however they have chosen to select previous films that the producers have made and place them at the top of the poster. This will encourage the audience to watch Sinister if they enjoyed the other films the producers have made of a similar genre.

The seventh element is the industrial information at the bottom, this is important because it is the legal aspect and reflects the things i have listed above featuring eg. production companies. It also utilises the opportunity to use social media with web links to facebook and twitter pages as well as the films own website which is shown in bold text. The industrial information also includes the final element which is the release date.

The sinister poster was a very successful way of advertising the film because it causes the potential audience to ask questions as it leaves a number of enigma codes, such as ‘ Who is the face smeared all up the walls’, ‘Is the little girl possessed’ or ‘What are the objects along the for’. These unanswered questions draw the audience in further and encourage them to visit websites and to view the film. It also helps the poster is very eye catching and would stand out anywhere it would be places.