Action film trailer analysis

Looking back at my blog so far, I have noticed that I have mainly covered the horror genre and have set the action genre to the side. Because of this I have decided that I'm going to cover a trailer for an action film trailer so that I can see what I can use when I create my own film trailer.

Above you can see a trailer for the film Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) which has been widely considered one of the greatest action films of all time by fans and critics alike. Fury Road is the fourth film in the franchise being released 20 years after the last film Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985). It's a reboot of the franchise and was directed by George Miller the same man who created the original trilogy. Surprisingly he also directed the animated children's film Happy Feet (2006) and Happy Feet Two (2011).

Genre

As I mentioned this film is part of the action genre which can be seen throughout the trailer through the many different action conventions. These include conventions such as explosions, face paced editing and fight scenes all of which are used to keep the scenes intense hyping up the audience as they watch the film. This means that after watching the trailer people will become interested in the film and follow its production which can be done by following their social media pages this helps create a larger audience for the film so that when it is released more people will go to see it making the company a larger profit.

Camerawork

Max jumps for the hook 

The camerawork in the trailer is used to make scenes in the trailer look more dangerous to increase the tension and make the protagonist look more powerful. This can be seen near the start of the trailer when Max jumps off the cliff  to grab hold off a crane hook. In this scene a long shot is used to show how high up Max is and if he misses the jump he would fall to his death. This is done to make the audience panic as we are unsure if Max makes the jump so we fear the worse and assume that he falls. This creates tension in the trailer putting the audience on the edge of their seats as they wonder what is going to happen next exciting them making them want to watch the rest of the trailer.

Hand held camera of Max nearly falling of a cliff it starts
shaking as soon as he stops moving 

Also just before this scene when Max reaches the edge of the cliff a hand held camera is used the replicate the feeling of suddenly stopping as your whole body quickly jolts as you come to a halt which can be seen in the trailer as Max quickly stops before falling and you can see him move his arms in an attempt to keep his balance as the camera goes into a low angle shot showing us how deep the drop is. This has been used to catch the audience off guard as immediately before this scene Max is running through a dark corridor which makes many of us believe that he is trapped somewhere underground so we don't expect him to run through a door to nearly walk of a cliff because of this we feel the same way as Max feels as by looking at his facial expression as he opens the door you can see that he looks shock which tells me that he was surprised finding out how high up he actually is.

Editing

The Chase scene notice how the camera frequently cuts
to different points of view to make it more intense

The editing throughout the trailer is almost entirely faced paced with very few scenes where it slows down. This can be best seen at the start of the trailer which begins with Max being chased through a tunnel by a group of War boys the henchmen of the films antagonist Immortan Joe. During this the camera is quickly cutting from scene to scene showing the chase from a variety of different perspectives going from behind max to in front of him. This creates more tension in the scene as it happens with no context which make the audience question what is going to happen next exciting them but also making them nervous as we don't know if Max is going to escape or get captured by the War boys.

After this the pace slows down as the chase ends and during this period we are shown a slow montage of a variety of different places and characters. The most notable shots that we seen in the montage are as follows:

Immortan's insignia

We firstly see a person wielding a molten hot pole with Immortan Joe's insignia on it we are then shown are person with the insignia branded onto the back of their neck. This has been done to show us that Immortan Joe is a vicious leader as it shows he brands people which means that he owns them as if they were property to him and this has all been done before we even know what he looks which makes the audience fear him even more as we imagine him to be the worse possible thing we can think off.

Immortan Joe

However, after this next shot we are finally shown what Immortan Joe looks like and while it is only brief the scene is very effective. This is because while showing him to us we are only shown his face which has a very monster like appearance to it which makes the audience fear him even more as we don't acknowledge him as being human instead comparing him to a beast.

The citadel

The final shot from the montage that I'll be talking about is a shot of the citadel one of the main locations in the film as it is the home to Immortan Joe. The biggest thing that I can see in this shot is that in the top corner on the cliff face you can see what appears to be Joe's insignia carved into the wall which further shows his power as he owns the entire citadel. The next thing that I can see is the large amount of people in the shot. While this is only speculation these people are most likely the lowest people in Immortan Joe's kingdom making them scavengers. I believe this has been done to make the audience feel sympathetic towards them as they literally have no power whatsoever as they the most weakest and feeble people and are at Joe's mercy.

Night Filter

One of the most important editing techniques used in the trailer is through the use of camera filters to change the colours within the scenes to make them look more vibrant and give them different atmospheres. The most noticable one in the trailer is the night time filter that is used which makes the nights appear as being very dark with a blue tint giving a lonely, cold atmosphere which makes the audience feel as if they were there which makes them feel alone and powerless.

Mise-en-scene

A Buzzards vehicle

The War Rig

Mise-en-scene is a very important in the trailer as there are many unique props used that make the Mad Max films stand out from many other action films. This can be seen throughout the trailer through the variety of different vehicles of all shapes and sizes from the giant war rig to the smaller but more deadly buzzards which have been customised to be covered in metal spikes from all over to prevent people from grabbing hold of the car. These are important props within the Mad Max films as they are used for almost every fight sequence in the films and this can be see in the trailer as in many of the fights instead of people hitting each other they are ramming their vehicles into each other making their enemies explode. They have been used to make action scenes more intense as it allows the directors to create more deadly scenes very quickly as they can use many more explosions as all the cars would be falling to pieces during a fight and this would eventually lead to them being destroyed this is also easy to perform with cars as if it were just the actors fighting hand to hand it would require a larger build up before the explosion happens as it would be the pinnacle moment in the scene. For audiences this would put them on the edge of their seats as there is so many explosions happening there is never a moment in the trailer were the action completely dies down making them enjoy the trailer more hyping them up for the release of the full film.

Sound

The sound within the trailer also stands out a lot compared to other trailers as it starts with mainly diegetic sounds coming from Max as he runs through the corridors we also hear Max's thoughts as he is running you can hear that an echo effect has been used on his voice to make it sound more clearer and more powerful. After this the soundtrack begins starting off slow and quiet which creates an eerie atmosphere which draws the audience in as they wonder what they are going to see in the trailer. We then hear a speech being performed by Immortan Joe talking about how his people will rise from the ashes of the world as the film takes place in a post apocalyptic earth. I believe this has been done to make Immortan at first sound like a heroic leader who is giving hope to his people claiming they will create a new world this makes the audience view him as a good person at first.

Immortan's Insignia on one of his
wives clothing

In contrast immediatly after this scene we see Immortan's true colours as he finds out that his 'property' has been stolen and demanding that the person who helped them escape this him 'where they are taking them'. At first we are unaware of what he means by property as it could be somnething such as treasure or food however later in the trailer we find out that the property is all of Immortan's wives who he has been keeping locked up as if they were his hostages and we can tell that thye are his property as a close-up is used on one of the girls clothes as they are branded with Joe's insignia. This shows us that he actually is an evil person who likes to own people as if they were objects and not people this is so that the audience start to grow hatred for Immortan long before we actually see him do anything that action villans conventionally do such as killing/capturing people.