We studied a number of film trailers and came to the following conclusions about their conventions. Each one of them has the common features that I have discovered.

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Pukar Bhattarai                Assignment 2

Movie Trailers

We studied a number of film trailers and came to the following conclusions about their conventions. Each one of them has the common features that I have discovered.

At the start of every movie trailer, there is a production company logo and name. This is very important in every trailer because it notifies the audience that the movie was made by this particular company. Each company has its own logo brand and copyright name/logo, as it has been used for many years, on different types of movies. I have also noticed that a company can make and supports a certain type of genre film. There are many different production companies that have been around for many years;

20
th Century Fox,                                Pathé,
DreamWorks,                                 Universal,
Miramax Films,                                 Walt’s Disney,
Paramount,                                        Warner Brothers etc.

These companies have made so many different films which people would now recognize in a flash, even without looking at the name of the company. This is because the company is so familiar and we see it in everyday life, all around us.

After a trailer has shown the production company (which only takes about two to three seconds), the film shows a very brief number of clips/images taken from the movie - but only the most exciting moments. These clips and images inform the audience about the genre of the film, it also gives us the some idea of the film, whether its genre is action, comedy, sci-fi, horror, romance etc. The clips show a number of different exciting or interesting moments to try and persuade the audience that this film is a winner. They do this by showing images from all over the movie in swift cuts so that we don’t know what we are seeing in a one second clip, but when the whole trailer has ended, the exciting moments remain in our heads. There are swift cuts to help keep the audience entertained and interested in the trailer, so that once the trailer has ended it makes you want to go and see the movie. Some trailers start off slow and build up the impact and some shots lasts longer than others this is to add more affect to the trailer - it all depends on the genre of the movie.

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Film trailers inform the audience about the genre of the film and also give the audience the idea of the film, plus the opportunity to see what type of film it is.  It gives them the idea of the film in the way the trailer is presented. If the movie is an action film, the trailer would be a fast paced one with hard hitting music, which can get your attention in seconds. If the movie is a romantic film, the trailer would have slow and calm type music with slow cuts, but with a longer shot than an ...

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