Film trailer 5: The Babadook

The trailer begins with a dark screen where there is  sharp knock on the door, by having this diegetic sound allows to start create tension for the audience as it represents something unexpected may happen as the knock was every sharp, connoting importance and significance as this will start creating the story as it will evolve around a book. Then the camera cuts to a medium shot of a women who turning around, the background of her house seem very dull with grey walls. This suggests that she as an adult may be lonely with only one child and may have very little people to support her, so having an unexpected knock can show that she may not be close with anyone else and having this may seem strange as not many people visit them. The high angle shot of the women opening the door and looks outside and see no one, but the shot seems to show innocence as she looks vulnerable as the red book is on the floor, so it looks like it from that perspective from the female protagonist as this will be the start to haunts them, The lighting is quite bright outside which connotes a normal day, but the darkness from inside of the house is when she will pick up the book and will go back inside the house. This shows that something mysterious and haunted will begin to occur in that house.

 The camera then cuts to a point of view shot where the female protagonist and the audience are introduced to a book, which is laid in the middle, the red connotes danger, and draws a lot of attention as the rest of the lighting is very dull and so the focus will be on the book as this will be creating most of the problems. The wind which is blown with the sound of chimes along with deep horn noise playing starts to create a mysterious atmosphere for the audience as this book will reveal a past story which may haunt someone close to her. This would start to create tension for as the book has just turned up unexpectedly and will start to create problems in the film. This shows the convention of a horror film trailer, as it will shows the focus in which will start to scare the audience, and this will start to haunt them throughout the trailer.

Then camera cuts to a close of the book to allow the audience, This emphasises the significance of the book, showing that this book will be controlling a lot people, and this could be shown through the silhouette in the centre of the book, showing that he will be curing or controlling the someone for some sort of revenge, the camera stays focused on the close up for a while as this will make the audience remember the book and may refer back to it during the trailer or film, the non diegetic sound of the horn continues to play as this will start to create tension for the audience as it starts to build up and hint the audience that something haunted will happen in the film.

The next scene is shown the production title with the high pitch piano playing, with the background showing teared pieces of paper been put together with lighting hovering like a lamp over the production title fading from black to white from each side of the frame, The black and white connotes a mystery and allow authoritative and being powerful, This may suggest that the book hold a lot of power and strength over the whole story and the especially the female protagonist as it will start to cause problems for her affecting her relationship with people she is most close to. Icons is a independent film production company created in 1989 by the actor/director Mel Gibson and producer Bruce Davey, producing other horror films such as You're next (2011), this shows that having mad a previous horror film, it would allow them to be more experienced and know what there audience are like due to the previous film view.

The camera the blacks out then fades in to the next scene where the female protagonist is reading the red book to her son, whilst the non diegetic sound of the old-fashioned piano is playing, by having this it starts to create suspense for the audience this book will start to haunt the characters, the audience would know this creating dramatic irony, due to appearance of the book and how it arrived to house. Then we get a long shot of then both as the female protagonist is reading the book, as she is reading the book her voice is very clear as this allows to get the audience involved by making it seem as she is also reading the book to her as well, this would start to build tension along with the non diegetic sound as it creates a creepy atmosphere this is also complemented with the lighting which is very dark which presents a stereotypical convention of a horror film trailer as having a darker lighting creates a more mysterious outlook to the whole trailer, as this will create tension for the audience knowing that something will happen unexpectedly which will scare them. The camera then cuts to a close up of the parts of the book, where it shows the female protagonist and the child's perspective of the book, so having this will allow them to be fully involved and to follow along with the protagonist as she begins to put herself into danger by reading the book. Then an extreme close up is shown of parts of the story, such as the speech bubble saying "let me in!" connotes that its slow hints and demand of which will occur throughout the trailer and the film and having this there will make it memorable for the audience as they may refer back to it.  Then cuts back to the protagonist reading the book, her expression looks as if she is interested in what happens as she thinks its only a story, not realising that it will soon haunt her. Then as she continues read the book the child opens the flaps of the book, revealing noises which he repeats, then pauses as the child repeats them, and we get a close up of him as he stares directly at the book, making it look as if he is already being manipulated and being controlled by the book.

Then the camera fades and shows another title, describing what the film will be like from the authors perspective, as this may have an influence on who watches the film. Then we get a long shot of a tree in the dark as the clouds fade from dark, and fades into the scene. By having this it shows the darkness represents that something strange and secretive will happen and this starts to scare the audience as they know that something unexpected will happen at some point when they least expect it. Also the as the camera fasten up the night time as it shows that things are being put into place ready for the female protagonist to face, as shows the fast time change, as creates a more dramatic look as it makes thing more intense. Then cross cuts to the inside of the boy laying on the sofa, as this may shows that the book may have already started to created problems such as making the boy scared because of the book, but seems manipulated at first and starts to haunt the boy and controls him, this is shown when the camera shows an empty dark room with the boy talking as the non diegetic sound saying "It will haunt you first" suggesting it will come and start scaring the female protagonist first before starting anything else. Then we cut to both of them asleep as the female protagonist is woken up due to flashing of the lamp, suggesting that this ghost is here and is starting to show its presents through controlling certain objects in the house. This follows the convention of a horror film trailer, because its important to having the right lighting and setting as this will help to scare the audience, also making sure the lighting has unbalanced as it set the atmosphere for the audience to start building tension for the female protagonist.
Then we get a lot of cross cutting of which shows the female protagonist look in the wardrobe, the point of view shot shows from the ghost's view, as the women is completely oblivious to what is happening around, as the child grabs hold of her, seeking protection as he is scared about what may happen next. Then the camera shows a lot of cuts to empty rooms, and the focuses on the door connoting the presents of the ghost which the audience are introduced with, this starts to build tension and scare along with non diegetic sound as they dont know how manipulating this ghost can be. The camera then cuts to a long shot of little boy sat on chair, by focusing on the boy will allow the audience to suspect that the ghost has already got control of the boy, and so he will start to create problems which the protagonist will encounter.

The camera cuts to a closeup of the female protagonist with the lighting focused on her eye, as she attempts to protect her child, she looks for this monster that her child has been scared of and the light from outside suddenly turns off, which shows that ghost will start to take action and haunt her more that she will notice it. She then starts to rip the book apart with anger and determination, so that she can protect her child. Then the voiceover of the boy talking about how she cant get rid of it as it will continue to haunt them even if they destroy the book. The high angle shot of the book being burnt shows that the ghost is also watching this at the same time, and this make it more determined to seek revenge on her. Then the next few scene are shown of the ghost taking revenge as it starts to use the boy to haunt the mother and the boy starts to shout a rhyme and repeats, scaring the audience further as the fast pace editing starts to show the problems which the women faces, then the camera blacks out the it becomes slient for a few second then a ghosts noise start to happen saying "babaddook" this scares the audience as it makes it seem as if this ghost is close to the audience as well the protagonist. This adheres to the convention of a horror film trailer as the face pace editing and the sound of a ghost noise after the sharp knocks, as this starts to frighten the audience and can make them shake, as they may fear as if its quite close to them with the clear audio, by having this knock, the audience can remember that from the beginning as it was just on it own, and now it has the ghost voice, so this suggests that it was the ghost who had already entered into the house, and now starts to make hint of its presents. This is links to the convention of a horror film trailer as the ghost will show sign of it being around the protagonist and scare them, so its something to expect.

The camera then cuts to another empty room where it tries to show the ghost entering in as the door opens unexpectedly. The diegetic sound of the ghost screaming and making noise continues, as the camera then cuts to another closeup of the female protagonist waking up in the middle of the night, after hearing the noise. This is effective because it starts to show the ghost taking action of revenge of scaring the female protagonist and by this is using her son. The dark lighting which is continues to get darker as the ghost gets revealed, and having this constantly throughout with getting any brighter, suggest more worse problem will start to happen, which will shock the audience further. Then the ghost says it wants to have the boy and the female protagonist starts screaming as the editing becomes more fast as this starts to tease the audience as something what will happen to the women and they would have
to watch the film in order to find out. The high angle shot of the boy looking behind the door makes the child seem innocent , with the shadow looking as if the ghost is behind him and will start to possess him and use him to scare the female protagonist. This adheres to the conventions of a horror film trailer as the ghost will use someone close to the protagonist in order to scare them. Then the camera shows a lot of scenes where the female protagonist starts to get hurt through her being haunted and the close up shows a women being reveal with the bright lighting which starts to reveal the ghost and makes the female protagonist even more scared, and starts to scream for help, but with no one to help her she is on her own battling this.

Then the final shot of the trailer shows a medium shot of the female protagonist holding her child, screaming suggesting that she has had enough of this ghost, as she has been hurt and this is shown through the blood on her hand as she hold her child, and this may show that the child is either dead which has put her into this state as the child was the only person close to her. The audience would side with her, as she has gone through a lot, and made her mentally unstable with scare from the ghost, and that she can't handle it anymore, Then the camera cuts quickly and the voiceover of the female protagonist saying "you can get rid of the babdadook" this suggests that she has been possessed by the ghost into saying that, scaring the audience making it real, which will make it memorable for them.

Then at the end the title of the film is shown. The word "babadook" is enlarged in capital letters in bold having this making it seem more prominent as its something the audience will remember. The black font suggest power and mystery as the audience don't know what this ghost looks like besides scare and cause problems for the female protagonist. With ripped paper with shadow lighting, suggests something hidden will be reveals, which could be something to do with the past. Then the lastly the trailer finishes with ways to find out more about the film, as the audience may be interested in finding out more about the film as the release date has not been shown, so the website is shown at the bottom, along with the small print writing of the producer, having them in small font, would appear as less of attention for the audience as they may not notice it there, but its important to have this in a trailer as its important to show who produced the as it will some popularity of some of the producer who may not be as well known.