Film Trailer Analysis: Beauty and the Beast

I am analysing the trailer for the adaption of the classic fairy tale, 'Beauty and the Beast' which came out in 2017. Emma Watson stars as Belle, whilst Dan Stevens plays the Beast and Luke Evans portrays antagonist Gaston.

Audience appeal:
The primary target audience for this film are Disney fans and children. The trailer will appeal to them as snippets of the well loved fairy tale make up this trailer. It is instantly recognisable through the iconic music, the portrayal of the castle and of course the make up, costumes and overall appearance of the actors.
Also, the close resemblance to the original animation draws in the older audience who grew up with it. For example, the well known song "Tale as old as time" plays during the trailer, immediately drawing in the audience. Furthermore, Belle's recognizable yellow ball gown features in the trailer.

Genre signifiers:
The fantasy genre is firstly connoted through the use of setting, such as the traditional fairy tale castle. The genre is also identified using characters such as Lumiere and Cogsworth, who are seen to be talking objects.


Character and representation:
Belle, the protagonist, is seen as compassionate and brave as she takes the place of her father as prisoner. She is represented as a strong female character who is intelligent and independent. The beast is first seen as frightening and monstrous however, as the trailer progresses, we see the beast care for Belle. For example, this is shown when he fights off the wolves in order to protect her. The supporting characters, all household objects, help to narrate the story. Towards the end of the trailer we see the conflict arising, as the town are desperate to rid themselves of the Beast, believing him to be a horrific monster. This represents a dilemma in the narrative therefore heightening the tension for the audience.

Branding and studio identity:
The Disney logo is shown at the very beginning of the trailer as well as at the end. The website link 'Disney.com/beautyandthebeast' is featured at the end which encourages the audience to find out more information about the film. As well as this, #beourguest is displayed after the trailer to enable the audience to participate and be involved in the hype surrounding the film.

Continuity task evaluation

1) Explain the story of your video
Our short video portrays a sixth form student who is late for class therefore is haphazardly running to get to her lesson. In the meantime, two students are walking down the corridor absentmindedly chatting to each other. The first girl runs down the stairs and as she is in such a rush she crashes into one of the two girls.

2) How did you attempt to create 'narrative flow'?
We attempted to create 'narrative flow' by firstly planning out our 6 shots and creating a storyboard. We then made any necessary changes to the shots which would not work or flow with the rest of the video. When filming we were careful to keep the same positions and not have any jumps between shots so we could keep the continuity as much as possible.

3) Did you achieve full continuity? If not, why not?
I do not think we achieved full continuity as a few shots did not properly fit together, however, I think that it still works well. For example the walking shot that then cut to the pan of the feet did not appear to flow very well.

4) In hindsight, what would you do differently to improve the narrative flow of your video and  tell your story more effectively?
Overall I think that we had a good range of shots to keep the audience interested throughout the video and also helped to bring the audience into the narrative. Also, our cross cutting was very effective and the establishing shots for both sets of characters worked nicely.

Despite this, I think we could make some improvements to our video. For example, a pan would work well during the first shot and a variation in camera shots at the end would be better. Keeping the sound consistent throughout and slightly trimming a few of the shots would also improve our video.

Reflections on shots

Our chosen TV drama genre was horror/thriller.

 We used a wide shot and low angle to establish the setting of an old staircase. The focal image shows a girl lying on the floor seemingly unconscious. In the background of the shot there are a pair of legs which raise questions such as who the person is, what happened and if it was an accident or not. To achieve our desired effect of cold blue lighting we used a coloured lens. This helps to connote the horror genre, as creepy, cool toned lighting is a convention in many horrors.

Our shot successfully raises questions in the narrative which the audience are eager to uncover the answers to. It also clearly conveys the genre.

To improve our still I would frame the shot differently so there would be less empty space (such as the plain white walls) and bring the focal image more into the foreground.