Codes and conventions of a

trailerKiran Patel

What is the point of a trailer: A trailer is made to help advertise the movie

to an audience The trailer is edited to show the plot of the

movie usually by introducing the main characters, having a quick brief of the story, and saying the history or back story of the movie. They do this by either having a narrative or inter-title popping up on the screen.

However they do not try to spoil the whole plot by showing quick shots of the action or showing a glimpse of the villain

What is the point of a trailer: Godzilla (2014): In this trailer you

rarely see Godzilla expect for quick shots of it’s scale or body part; they do this to keep the audience in suspense until the very end of the trailer where you finally see the creature’s face

What to expect in the trailer: During the beginning of the trailer people

would see the production company logo, also in some trailers they have inter-title text which says “From the creator/director of…”, so they know what sort of movie to expect from that director

They slightly change the distributors logo by adding effects or altering the font style or colour. They do this to let the audience know the genre of the film

WHAT TO EXPECT IN THE TRAILER: Most trailers have one of the main characters

narrating bits of the trailer (After Earth/Transformers). Whereas other trailers have very little on-screen dialogue and has music in the background of it

Every movie trailer has to have cuts. Most of these cuts are fades into black or the next scene, they do this to introduce a mystery aspect to the trailer. They usually include numerous fast cuts of one scene to briefly show action

They also add jumps into the trailer or leave certain scenes on cliff-hangers to add tension or suspence to the trailer

From the creator of: Insidious: At the beginning of

this trailer they use “From the makers of, so fans of “Paranormal Activity” or/and “Saw” will be interested in seeing the movie because they would know what to expect

From the creator of: Avatar: Unlike “Insidious”, the person

who made the trailer decided to put James Cameron’s credit at the end; this could be because he is highly respected in the movie industry it would surprise the audience, making them want to see the movie

Changing the production logo:

Tron Legacy: As you can see the infamous “Walt Disney Pictures” Logo has been given a blue haze and a slight static effect over it

to represent the sci-fi/electronic genre of the film

The Pyramid: To go with the feel of the movie the “20th Century Fox” was given a

sepia effect to be continuous with the opening of the trailer

What to expect at the end of the trailer: In nearly almost every trailer the date, a billing

block and the title of the film are shown. This is because this will be the last thing the audience sees so it will stay fresh in their minds so they may research it later.

Some trailers do not show the names of actors during the trailer since they want the audience to pay attention to what is happening on screen so they show the names in the billing block

They decide to show the billing block in case someone in the audience may see a famous name and be excited.

What to expect at the end of the trailer:

Pacific Rim: In this billing block,

they had most famous actor (Idris Elba) second because he wasn’t the main character; even though he had little screen time he was above other actors due to his popularity at the time