Poster Analysis 2 By: Miriana Younan

The poster above promotes ‘The Devil Inside’, a horror film that could be placed within a possession sub genre. When watching this horror films, the audience see how an evil spirit can possess a woman and turn an innocent mother into something so terrifying and horrific. I picked this poster to analyse as the colours and image really stand out and grab my attention and it’s also within my groups sub genre with this in mind, I will be able to analyse the poster and take ideas from the poster also.

This poster includes the main conventions of its form, the image itself dominates the frame and presents the audience a clue to what the film narrative is about and what is the monster/spirit. Other conventions that appear are text based conventions such as the film title, a tagline “No Soul Is Safe” and production information.

Mise-en-scene of this poster does not really present a setting which could suggest that the movie takes place in a lot of different place or because the background is black it makes the image stand out and as it is black it connotes death and the red connotes blood and danger, as the red is only on the right hand side of the poster it could suggest that the devil is over taking the woman in the image and possessing her. The idea of the nun dominating the poster is because creating juxtaposition as the nun represents religious imagery and the title is ‘Devil Inside’, this show the fight between good and evil. Also the use of a Nun scares the audience because Nuns are known as pure and virtuous humans however even that could not stop her from being possessed, and she is placed in the centre of the frame, drawing focus to her possessed nature. The presentation of the nun suggests that she has been possessed, from the white eyes to the blank expressionless face that is broken by a small sinister smile, the woman looks soul-less and creates fear in the audience. The image is also placed in the middle of the page because of the rule of thirds to reinforce her importance. The first thing that the audience notice is that the eyes of the Nun, as it is very strange for someone’s eyes to be completely white and as they are white and you cannot see the colour of

Poster Analysis 2 By: Miriana Younan

her eyes or the pulps which suggests the audience can’t see her soul or she has no soul. This also relates to the tagline no soul is safe, the devil has taken over her soul as well. The background of the poster is black and red symbolising evil and death; the colours of the background make the image stand out and grab the audience attention as the black makes the red stand out. There is a worn and scratched effect layered on top of the image that makes the image look damaged, possibly like the soul that has been possessed.

In the image above the Nuns costume is black and white, the white presented is a symbol of the nun’s purity and black is death which is over taking the nun and controlling her. Also the costume plays on the fight against good and evil, the costume is also represents religious imagery and typical of what nuns wear.

The title “The Devil Inside” has obvious connotations to religion. The “Inside” informs that this movie is most likely about a possession and the revered ‘D; emphasises this by suggesting that something is out of place within the characters. A small “the” shows how insignificant the word is in comparison to the rest of the title as it isn’t the most eye catching part of the title and the sheer power and dominance of the devil and the satanic possession. The serif font and the worn type make the title seem older and therefore creepy as older things tend to have curses tied to them. The worn out look may also reflect the status of the possessed soul; worn and lifeless. White also connotes purity as well as death and fear, but the virtuous nature of white destroyed by the word ‘devil’ and the eroded style.

Furthermore, the tagline “No soul is safe” is very specific in comparison to the conventional ambiguous taglines normally used in the horror genre. It adds to the theme of possession and by referencing safety, the audience feel as if they do not have any safety. The audience would fear that their soul isn’t safe as even the Nun a person known for devotion to religion and is pure has been possessed. The use of white font makes the text stand out against the black of the background and links to the Nun’s habit in the image. The repetitive‘s’ sound, sibilance, gives a hissing sound to the tagline that brings to mind a snake, a common representative of the devil.

By using the sentence “Inspired by true events”, the film has some credibility that may convince a person to watch it. It adds a realistic nature to the movie that in turn makes it scarier for the audience. Whilst it says it was inspired, however, that could mean that the creators picked and chose parts they liked from supernatural stories and put the scariest bits together, so whilst it adds credibility for the audience, it may not be entirely credible in actuality.

The decision to use the 6th of January as a released date connects the ‘devil’ as 6 is known as the number for the devil and therefore re-enforces that theme. The release date is serif font and it is in red, connoting danger, possibly danger in going to see it.

There is no institutional information featured on this poster apart from 3 small logos from the producing companies. Instead, they feature the films website in a font very similar to that of the title. This font is repeated to give a sense of continuity and simplicity to the poster and by featuring a website it makes the audience want to go online and look further into the move.

The most effective convention within this poster is the use of colour. The red and black work well together and stand out and grab the audience’s attention which is what you want to do with a

Poster Analysis 2 By: Miriana Younan

poster. The colours also represent the film narrative with the battle against good and evil. The use of colour inspired my work to use a good combination of colours to represent the horror film.

Overall, this poster will be successful at luring in the audience and they have effectively used the image and colours to grab the audience’s attention. The poster links everything back to the devil and works effectively as it scares the audience more. It leaves the audience asking lots of questions and for them to be answered they need to go watch the movie.