Film Poster Analysis - Silent House

This film title ‘Silent House’ suggests different mysterious meanings, as the text is covered in blood with it dripping down from the letters. This makes us wonder whether there are going to be killings in this house. The main image of this poster is of the main character Sophie screaming, but by the looks of it, it looks like a silent scream, this creates a code of enigma and makes us wonder what it is that’s making her scream, is there a killer or something supernatural. This poster employs the iconography of a particular type of genre; it suggests that it’s a horror/thriller. This is evident as there is blood dripping down from the title and the main picture of an innocent looking girl screaming, which is usually stereotypical for a horror/thriller movie.

The film star is Elizabeth Olson; her name is prominent on this poster which is above the title so it is easy for the audience to recognise. Her image fills out this poster, she is positioned what looks like her leaning over, we cannot tell this or her style of dress as the image is partly obscured by shadow. Her facial expression looks as if she is terrified and screaming/ crying for somebody to help her; she looks innocent in this image. This image is very effective as she is silently screaming, which instantly creates a code of enigma for the audience as we start to wonder what she is being quiet about, and why she has to scream silently instead of creaming at the top of her voice. This image also relates to the title of this film ‘Silent House’.

This poster does carry a tag line. This tag line is ‘Experience 88 minutes of real fear captured in real time’. This suggests more than one meaning. It suggests that the film is inspired by a true story and it actually happened, this is a unique selling point which is why they have picked it as their tag-line.

The credits on the poster are underneath the title and are very small; this may be as the producer and director are not particularly well known. The credits help to sell the film with the release date as it says ‘On March 9^th The silence will kill you’, this is a unique selling point and grabs the audiences attention as it relates to the title of the film.

There are many different experiences of pleasure being offered to the audiences, the audience feel scared for the main character on the poster. The target audience for this poster appears to be 15-35 and mainly males, this is evident because of the female main character and the blood dripping down the title. The film appears to have something that differs from other films, and that is the realism it carries as it emphasises that this is based on a true story when it quotes ‘Inspired by true events’ which is the films unique selling point.