The teaser trailer I chose to analyse is for the latest remake installment in the iconic horror film franchise, Friday the 13th, released in 2009 and directed by Marcus Nispel. Over the last 30 years, the franchise has spawned 12 films in the series and with each film there are major differences in the trailers. I decided to analyse this trailer as it is the latest, and I also feel it does well in building up the character of Jason, especially for viewers that do not know much about the franchise.
The trailer starts off with an establishing shot of a lake site featuring high key lighting. This works to mislead this audience because of the fact that it is a horror movie, and beginning the trailer with such a pleasant view could be a false front. There’s a sudden quick cut, and a quick shot is showing of a light source wavering in the darkness, accompanied by a sudden haunting diegetic sound. They most likely intended this to represent how the darkness, in the case, with always overtake the light, and at this point the audience know that the first shot was a false front. Following this, all other shots have much lower key lighting. Music/sound suddenly turns ominous as we see shots of Camp Lake City and a cabin, all in low key lighting. There is narration over this saying: ‘Did you know the young boy drowned here?’, which is an introduction to how the story began. The word ‘you’ is a direct address to the audience, and they are left wondering who the young boy is, which helps to get them into the trailer.
Shots following this feature a dark figure (as a result of low key lighting) entering the cabin seen from previous shots, waving what seems to be a flashlight, and this is seen in different parts of the trailer throughout. This is very effective, as after questioning who the young boy is, the audience feel involved in searching in the cabin with the character in the trailer. The trailer seems to follow a pattern of having two fading shots of this, followed by a handycam quick shot of a girl running in what seems to be the woods with a flashlight in her hand, and it could work as a warning to the audience, because of the fact that the girl is holding a flashlight, suggesting she has tried searching already and is scared of what she had found.
One of the shots shown whilst the character is searching with a flashlight is a close up shot of an abandoned baby doll cover in dirt. This helps to reinforce the ‘young boy’s innocence, especially when accompanied by the narration: ‘he wasn’t a very good swimmer.’ Following this is, once again, a shot of someone running in the woods with a flashlight, which challenges the audience to think whether or not what the trailer is leading them to believe is true if someone is running away.
The following two shots are fading shots of the dark figured character still searching with the flashlight, along with narration saying: ‘the counsellors weren’t paying attention.’ This is immediately followed by a caption reading ‘from producer Michael Bay’. As the caption is shown, a diegetic sound is heard of a girl crying ‘oh my god’ whilst evidently still running. The narration may work as an indirect message to the audience that they should pay more attention to details of the trailer, and the fact that the pattern that seemed to have been common in the trailer was stopped by the caption (accompanied by the girl’s whimpering) builds even more uneasiness and paranoia.
As we progress, the incidental music starts to climate, and we are presented with more quick shots – this time being close up shots of characters’ facial expressions, and we get a stronger sense of the extent of horror that they experience. Quick shots are used more frequently as the music climates, including shots of a woman running with a flashlight and a police car, clearly signifying danger. When the music finally comes to a halt, we are presented with a close up shot of a lamp swinging helplessly alone in the darkness, perhaps now giving the audience an opportunity to make use of the light to search for what the characters are searching for. Following this is two quick mid shots of the ‘Jason’ character, at which point dark incidental music jumps in and a blackout immediately follows. This gives the audience a chance to understand what the characters were previously running from, especially following the next shots, including a shot of a woman screaming and crawling away in fear is about to be attacked by Jason’s weapon, at which point the title of the movie is introduced.
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