Trailer 1 analysis

Trailer 1:

The lovely bones

Through the first shot of the trailer we get a clue to what age group the target audience as it says “ for appropriate audiences”, which suggests people aged 12 and over, however this is not stated. We then get more of an idea of the target audience when we see the main protagonist Susie, who is a teenage girl. We get clarification that she is of this age due to a shot of a typical school, which has two yellow school buses to suggest she is in middle school.

Through the Narrative the audience are enticed to watch the movie as all questions are left unanswered, one of these main questions is “who killed Susie”, as we are told by her she was murdered but not how. There is also a huge atmosphere of tension, one of the scenes that best show this is when the family discovers who her killer is, however the police do not believe them and says they need evidence.

Another way, which they entice the audience to watch this movie is through text. We are shown at the beginning the producer of the film and it states he is award winning, which suggests the film will be good. We are also shown two logos of film makers, which are well known one being Dreamworks and the other being film4. At the end they advertise the release date which gives the audience a talking point.

The Narrative at the beginning of the trailer is very calming, due to the background music and the fading transitions between shots, we also get to hear about the main characters life giving it a sense of normality.

This calm atmosphere is then disturbed when we find out she gets murdered as the shots start to speed up and the time of day is much later on.

We then see her murderer who is the man in glasses we assume, however as said earlier there is no evidence to prove this, which makes the viewer frustrated which mirrors how the characters are feeling.

Some of the scenes are interrupted by text, and then when it comes back to the story line we see the main character Susie is in her in-between world.

Due to the beginning the audience do not know that the voice over (the main character) gets murdered so are unsure to why she is speaking, but then come to a realisation when she tells us.

The trailer very clearly shows the film is a thriller due to the mis-en-scene used as there are many associations to thriller films throughout. There is also a use of lighting as the trailer switches to her death the lighting turns darker, which implicates danger.

As well as technical codes to show it’s a thriller, the producer also uses props such as the baseball bat seen which could represent death and danger. We also see a bracelet which is sentimental to the main character, which builds tension.  

Overall The Lovely Bones is not a traditional thriller due to the ‘fantasy’ side to it, and how the trailer shows no violence, however with things such as props, lighting, sound and language we instantly can tell it is a thriller.