1. Film Poster Overview

2. All of these eight film posters have been designed and
created to effectively promote films that fall within the
supernatural sub-genre. Through carrying out thorough
research of these film posters and by comparing them all
to each other, I have been able to identify any shared
features within them and establish fully any repeated
patterns.
Each of the eight posters all feature typical and expected
film poster conventions such as the title, it is always the
largest and most significant text within the frame through
the use of typography they use in order to make it
effective, an image that dominates the frame allowing
the audience to become engaged with the film poster
signalling to them that the image is something or
someone important within the film’s narrative, a slogan or
tag line to support the image, as well as the expected use
of horrific imager from a horror film poster.
Furthermore to this, it is evident that there are other
repeated patterns. In almost all of the film posters, aside
from one all of the posters feature a main female
character, which appears to be suffering from some sort
of torment or looks as if she is under threat in some way. In
the Drag Me To Hell poster as an example, the mise-enscene displays an image of a female screaming in
despair as demonic hands tug at her necklace and
shoulders almost pulling her down creating a symbiotic
link to the title of the film as it could be suggested that the
hands are quite literally dragging her to hell. Within the

3. poster for the film The Unborn as an audience we can see
the reflection through the mirror of an evil, demonic child
standing alongside the female protagonist as she stares at
her reflection in the mirror. The idea from these film posters
is to display that the narratives of these films, just like other
supernatural horrors, focus primarily around a female
protagonist whose role is to play a fighting woman
against whichever curse, spirit or demon presents itself as
a threat to her. In addition, many of the females that play
the dominant protagonist are young and quite attractive
she does not appear as a typical ‘bimbo’ however
making sense as the ‘bimbo’ stereotype does not have
the bravery, intelligence and confidence to fight off any
dangerous threats.
In four of the eight film posters, we can see possessed,
demonic, scary children reinforcing the idea that these
characters are common in supernatural horrors and that
children often appear as sources of evil. This could be
highly dependent on the fact that children are, by nature
associated as innocent, adorable and sweet whereas evil
children are freaks of nature and timelessly terrifying.
Noticeably from each of the four posters, the children
look as if they are standing there lifeless, with cold blank
stares with their arms by their sides. The little boy within the
insidious poster even has his eyes scratched out, adding
emphasis to the overall idea that evil prowls within and
that any human innocence and warmth is completely
lost.

4. All the images presented in the eight film posters are all
horrific and designed to not only scare but to clearly
signal to the audience that these films all belong to the
genre of horror. Within the Sinister poster, we see a young
female protagonist wearing white pyjamas automatically
allowing the audience to think of the terrifying events
which happen at night. The girl appears to be smearing
blood along the dark, grey wall where the blood has
resulted to dripping down the wall to form a dark,
dangerous face which the audience can assume that this
evil, demonic face will appear within the narrative. The
image also featured in the poster for The Possession is
equally troubling; with a decayed hand emerging from
the mouth of the female to grab hold of her face creating
fear for the audience as they question what will happen
to her in the narrative. In each of the eight film posters,
there are no masked antagonists carrying chainsaws or
knives and no bloodied victims. Instead, there is imagery
of decaying hands with demon-like claws, ghostly figures,
images from the fires of hell and tormented souls creating
the suggestion that the threat within all of these films is
from supernatural elements.
In each of the posters, there is consitency of colour as
many of them use cold, dark colours, particularly grey,
and pale blue to add emphasis to the pale faces within
the images. These are common colours used in film
posters as they help create an unwelcoming, sinister tone.
With regards to the film posters for The Possession, Sinister,
The Last Exorcism and The Unborn the protagonist almost
disapears into the cold colours of the background to

5. represent the way in which the protagonists are being
drawn into a world of evil, where there is no hope or
escapism. Therefore showing that the battle they must
now fight against there lives completely defines them as
characters.
The title of each poster tends to always be placed in a
noticeable and exposed position and as a common
expectation is always the largest text dominating the
page. In six of the eight film posters, the titles are
positioned at the bottom of the film poster just beneath
the main image; the idea that the audience will then be
presented with the title. The repitition of this placement of
the text in each poster clearly conveys a layout
convention for supernatural films. All of the titles are
presented in an uppercase, bold yet simplistic and highly
visible font. The use of text effects, such as a drop shadow
on the Sinister film poster are used in most cases to make
the title of the film look more horrifying. The Orphanage
title is the most decorated title in comparison to the others
as it uses a more traditional looking font which could link
to the traditional old building that is featured within the
narrative of the film.
More than half of the eight posters include institutional
information within the film poster which is positioned either
at the base or the very top of the poster and seven out of
the eight posters feature a tagline or strap that help to
support and reinforce the meaning behind the image in
order to reveal more about the narrative to the audience,
allowing them to gain an insight into the film. The tagline
featured on The Possession film poster claims that

6. ‘Darkness Lives Inside’ complimenting the image of the
rotten, decaying hand which emerges from the female
characters mouth. Other additional text such as ‘Based
on a True Story’ which appears on the film poster of The
Possession and ‘From the makers of Paranormal Activity
and Insidious’ which is displayed on the film poster of
Sinister are both used to draw in the eyes of the audience.
Giving the audience the knowledge that the film they are
about to see has been inspired by a real occurrence and
event makes the film so much more scarier to watch for
the audiences, as they then go on to feel that the events
that happen in the narrative could possibly happen to
them. In addition, giving audiences again the knowledge
of knowing that the film has been produced from the
same produces as existing successful films allows the
audience to gain a trusting bond with the film as they
know and trust the produces to satisfy their needs and
wants when watching a Horror film. All of the text that is
presented to the audience is always kept readible and
simple and often the typography is in a sans serif font.
All of the supernatural film posters which are presented
above are highly effective and share simplicity in
common, with the use of minimal and simple text and the
image kept bold and dominant doing all of the speaking
for the film poster allows of these eight posters to become
highly effective and successful in which they aim to
achieve.