Med 6 Response-2 Moving Texts

All these texts belong to carefully constructed marketing campaigns in order to promote the films: the original 1974 version of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the 2003 remake, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Both films, therefore, belong to the same genre which is horror/slasher, and so have similar generic codes and conventions such as a girl screaming, chainsaw as the phallic object and the psycho killer, which assigns them to this genre.

However, due to the different historical eras in which they were made and released, their target audience draw on the instinct cultural knowledge with different expectations, due to censorship relaxation audience are now more desensitised. This was one of the reasons why the producers had made text 2 Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) trailer more enigmatic to appeal to contemporary audiences. Moreover, text 2 covers some of Todrov’s theory by using equilibrium at the beginning of the trailer and then having a disequilibrium throughout, in contrast to text 1 that has a disequilibrium throughout the whole trailer.

Furthermore, text 1 is produced in a more of a news report style by using a dominant male voiceover to guide the audience through the trailer. This reflects how the film was created in a time where patriarchy was present as the trailer was male dominated as there were only two females present. However, in text 2 there are more women present but the two young women are objectified especially the final girl this is conveyed through having a medium close up of teenage girl’s bottom as this gives the male viewer the pleasure of fetishisation.

But then again, in text 2 there is a clip of fat women. This challenges Mulvey’s theory as she does not fit into what society believes to be beautiful. Moreover, its shows how the result of feminism has managed to get women from off-screen to onscreen and how women are not onscreen now just to be “look at ness”.

The camera sound is the sound that the two trailers share in common, the camera is used as a post modern element as it makes reference to previous horror/slasher film “Peeping Tom” (1960). It links to this film because the camera sound clicks and it looks as though a picture of the teenagers’ facial expressions are taken when they are feeling and looking terrified. Moreover, the camera sounds gives the audience this eerie feeling and connote that something bad has happened or going to happen. This helps contribute to give the audience the pleasures of voyeuristic, masochistic and suspense.

Text 1 is grainy and looks low budget to give it the real life documentary feel however, text 2 uses special effects by making the establishing shot look nostalgic by adding a golden/yellow tint to show that it is a re-presentation and that it is not real. Moreover, it links to the wider context and indicates how technology has developed and how the remake is reproduced by a big Hollywood studio so has the money to splash out on special effects. Furthermore, text 2 is longer compared to text 1this could be for the reason that it has more characters compared to text 1. additionally, text 2 makes use of the sound of a heart beat to create tension and indicate how the audience should be feeling.