Textual Analysis Of A Horror Magazine Cover

The images used in this poster along with the title are a clear give away of what the film is about, you have "Leatherface" walking down a Texas road with his chainsaw, you can see he is wearing something that looks a lot like an apron which is a shade of green, you can tell this due to the light coming through it, chainsaws are heavy bits of equipment used for logging etc, how the main character holds it in one hand and walks with it suggests that he may be quite strong. The typical horror colour conventions have been used but altered, its not the strict black background with the red writing swiped across it, blood, dripping, the cloudy skies have been given the colour of the dusty Texas plains.

The bottom right section where "Leatherface" you can see the camera image was edited as were "Leatherface" is walking the sky is of a lighter colour so you can see the back of the main character whereas the rest of the sky is seen to be charcoal grey. Right at the top of the poster where the sky is seen to be charcoal grey is where the title has been written in the colour of the sky in the bottom right section.

Although the title and the image give away the main ideas of the film, very cleverly underneath the title is written "The Beginning", so when you immediately see the poster you think you've got most of it worked out however when you see the writing below, it gives the effect that there is so much more to come which is very effective. On some movie posters they have certain magazines ratings on the film etc, on this particular poster they don't have that, which gives it that raw UN-rated effect, personally i tend to read or browse reviews when i am going o watch a film but with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre i didn't read and didn't see any ratings however still thought id watch it.

Everything on this movie poster is an indication of the genre, the colours, the props, the font in which the title is written, the strap-line, these are all indications that this is a dark, bloody horror. The way all of these things have been put onto this poster which is of high deffinition quality, but been given that old rigid effect that tops off the whole idea you can get from the poster, big built male walking casually down a deserted road splitting the Texas plains holding a chainsaw, old, ridged, rough, these are the word which come into mind when looking at this particular poster, the idea gained from the image of the main character is that he doesn't care, its clear he doesn't fear anything, but is that just because he has a chainsaw? Anyone could have a chainsaw, its the mindset that sets you aside from the rest, there is a clear case of that with this character, not just alone but in a city or busy town, in the middle of Texas, certain form of isolation.

The way the character is walking along, casually, doesn't give the impression he is in a hurry, and the fact that he is just walking down a road that seems so bleak, suggests that hes not really walking towards anything. This gives the impression that there is some sort of connection between man and location, hes a crazed man with a chainsaw..in the middle of nowhere, he doesn't seem to be walking to anywhere..there is nowhere to walk to.

The strap-line plotted right in the centre of the poster, "Witness, The birth of fear." suggests that this is where the fear begins, this is well co-ordinated with the way they wrote "the beginning" underneath the main title, when a film is released, and there are plans for a sequel, they don't tend to write the beginning or anything of that sort because right at the end of the film there is a scene which suggests there is going to be another one. "the beginning" and "Witness. The birth of fear" are both lines that give the effect that this is something else, not quite like any other horror you may have seen, not any other film or thought that has made you fear something or someone, gives it the "one of a kind" identity which is what i believe is this movies USP (unique selling point).

When you put all these thought and ideas together along with the poster of course you can clearly tell what kind of film this is and what target audience it is aimed at. The language used in the title is very strong, powerful yet rigid, just like the effect of the poster, old, rigid, slightly faded effect. They have set it as a real true story by adding "The" before the main name, when you think there could of so many other names for this film, even if the name remained this long there are so many other words that could be used to substitute, however they have matched up the poster effect with the style of the writing, the positioning of the character, the colours and the text perfectly, these all come together to back up the message that the text gives, there isn't a horror quite like this one.