Horror Film Titles Analysis

This post will analyse the titles for three films and suggest what are the most conventional:

Job Roles ~ Language ~ Ordering ~ Colours/Fonts

All but one of the titles of this film appear slowly with a ghostly effect to them – establishing the psychological horror genre.

Throughout, black and white pictures of the house in which the film is set are shown – with red titles on top. This contrast helps the titles stand out and be the

priority of each scene.

Job Roles

Only most important job roles are in titles of Insidious and appear like all the others. Produced by, Casting By and Written By are all included.

The only titles that appears differently to the rest is the Director - which just say’s ‘a James Wan film’ and not even ‘Directed by’ indicating that audiences should be familiar with his horror films. His credit is also involved in the following scene as its apparent as the camera turns upside-down (revealing the scene) that the circle illuminating his name is a lamp shade in the following scene.

Ordering

The ordering begins with the production company then the Director’s name which is interpreted into the scene. Then it goes straight onto the title of the film - this is accompanied by a sharp and generic horror ‘peak’ and only lasts a matter for seconds. The cast’s names, one by one are next in order of importance. Then finally moving onto the team who puts the film together such as casting, producers etc.

Colours and FontsThe colours and fonts are very generic of the horror genre. The colour for almost all of the titles – including the name of film – is red, connoting blood and violence as general horror films do.

The font for the title is also very sharp and unsettling. It stands out against the black background.

The way that the other titles appear is quite generic too as they are scarce and ghostly – connoting the paranormal. On top of that, they all have a black and white background as pictures of the house (in which the haunt takes place) are displayed.

The titles appear while a montage of death from previous Final Destination films plays in the background in the style of an X-Ray. The titles/credits are

incorporated into this.

Job Roles

Job roles are abundant in this opening – it seems to include the majority of them, rather than just the most important jobs and this is what makes the opening credits so long compared to

other films.These are all incorporated into the action running behind, for example the ‘associate producer’ credit is crushed in a lift – something that happened to a characters head in Final Destination

2.The production company was not included – only the producers.

Ordering In this opening sequence of credit the film title comes first, seconds into it. Giving indication that it’s the most important bit of information. This is usually the case with franchises as they don’t need to be particularly enigmatic when it comes to the titles because there has already

been previous films like it – the audience will already know what the film will entail to a certain extent.

Main cast names comes next, in order of importance, yet again involved in the scenes behind them – could this be foreshadowing?

All the job roles come last, as they’re the least important of the credits and there is more of them than any other type of credit. The directors name is last and stays on screen longer than the other job roles so it he can will remembered. There is also less chaos in the background as

his name appear.

Colour and FontThroughout this opening sequence the font and colour of the text stays the same. As well

as the general colour scheme of the background (inverted/x-ray). It looks quite professional and neat but it challenges the Horror Genre conventions in this aspect. Also, each credit is highlighted with bold lines around them to make them stand out

better.

It is not common for titles of horror films to be made such a priority but because this is the fourth in its franchise it can get away with yet again challenging this horror

convention.

Only some fade red to connote blood when necessary.

Titles in this happen to be less important than the action going on behind them as they are fairly small and simple and they’re surrounded by a lot more writing. The scenes are

cleverly viewed from CCTV cameras as events occur that give a clear indication of the rest of the film.

Job Roles

The majority of the credits in this opening are also job roles. This could indicate the difference in conventions between Psychological Horrors (Insidious) and Slashers

(Final Destination and The Purge). Many are included, all appearing in the same way and very faint. They each only last a

matter of seconds.

Ordering

The ordering begin with the production company before the scenes even begin. After, the actors names in order of importance appear – though there are few of these. Credits such

as producer and director and left until the end to show the significance of their roles. There are plenty more of these roles too and they go on for the majority of the time.

The name of the film is never included for this one.Also – most titles only appear for around 3 seconds tops –the actors’ credits are given more

screen time.

*see ‘Job Roles’ for production team credits’ images*

Colours and Fonts

All the titles are in a plain and small font throughout the opening which challenges horror conventions – where usually they’d be a bit more creative and stand out.

They are understandably made this way to converge with the theme in the background – the POV of CCTV cameras, and it is an effective way of doing it – but sometimes its actually

hard to see the credits, especially because their white, depending on what's happening behind them. I suggest they weren’t trying to make such an impact with these credit as

previous films discusses here like Insidious and really wanted to get straight into the film, hence the ‘Purge’ing happing as we watch the titles.