Production: Film4, Studio Canal, BFI Technology
Distribution: Channel 4 (UK), Criterion Collection (USA)
Genre: Drama, Crime, Black Comedy
Director: Danny Boyle
Synopsis: Heroin addict Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor) has stumbled through bad ideas and sobriety attempts with his unreliable friends for the most of his life in Glasgow; said friends include Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), Begbie (Robert Carlyle), Spud (Ewen Bremner) and Tommy (Kevin McKidd) who make his life almost inescapable . Renton makes things worse for himself by acquiring a clingy, underage girlfriend, Diane (Kelly Macdonald), who insists she's along for the ride. After cleaning up and moving from Scotland to London, Mark finds he can't escape the life he left behind when Begbie shows up at his front door on the lam, and a scheming Sick Boy follows.
UK Poster:
LAYOUT/TEXT: Initially, we can see that the poster doesn’t fulfil the ‘Information’ category of the Uses and Gratification Model as it is image-heavy, not copy-heavy; however, this does allow the poster to introduce the main characters that are the focal point of the film.
The monochrome title attracts attention as it is in the centre of the rule of thirds of the poster, but it also stands out from the orange background. Conventionally, in the bottom third, the billing block is in a small, white font as to not deter an audience’s attention from the images of the character and the title. This fulfils the ‘Information’ category of the Uses and Gratifications Model as it contains integral information, and then more trivial aspects that will still fulfil the ‘Entertainment’ category of the Uses and Gratification Model as it contains the cast and director who may attract an inherited audience. However, as they are not particularly highlighted as important, this may allude to how the movie’s message is much more important to convey than the idea the movie may become a star-vehicle. This is something I want to convey in my movie as due to the fact it must be within the realms of indie, this means the actors will not be massive names. It’s more about the actual story.
INDUSTRY: Moreover, the mention of the producer opens expectations of his previous work ‘Shallow Grave’, which also attracts a secondary audience.
The institutional logos at the bottom of the poster suggest the genre to the audience as they are independent British companies who only have a limited production budget, therefore they often produce the low budget social realist films targeted at a niche British audience. Also, from Curran and Seaton’s Power Without Responsibility, the movie will be understood in certain finiancial or social circumstances, appealing those in disadvantaged areas as they can relate.
COLOUR: The orange and black is commonly associated with prison, henceforth representing the ‘Disruption’ stage of Todorov’s Narrative Theory and the stereotypical representation of lower-class in social-realist movies as violent criminals; however, we expect the issues of poverty to be explored as a catalyst due to the genre. This is further reinforced with the individual medium shots of the characters being set up like mug shots. Whilst this marketing strategy promotes familiarity with characters, this is not attempting to reach a Mainstream target audience, demonstrated by the dog-tag numbering of their names. These are unconventional marketing strategies for unconventional members of society, and because we are seeing them as individuals with their own persona, this is a challenging depiction which may appeal to an Explorer.
BODY LANGUAGE: This expresses uniqueness, further developing the characters as the poses exhibited by Diane and Begbie are very confident, dominant and disrespectful, contrasted by Renton’s introverted, reserved and intimidated stance. Sick Boy, pointing his fingers in a gun shape at the audience imply the violence and crime in the movie, and this also conforms to stereotypes of lower-class people in social-realistic movies. This creates a spectrum of representations in the movie which attract an audience that want to relate to who they are in a friendship group; this alludes to an audience who go out, party and have a sizeable group of friends, effectively aiming their marketing at 20 to 30s and perhaps C2DE.
COSTUME: Identity is furthered via the mise-en-scen of the character’s outfits, which are also unconventional for an audience’s preconceptions of ‘train spotters’, alluding to how this movie will take familiarity and twist and distort it. This lends itself well to the Genre Theory as whilst audiences may derive pleasure from generalised, archetypal characters that are far from reality, but this fresh take on people in society is challenging and appealing to audience members who classify as Explorers, as previously mentioned.
The costumes aid in individualising each character in how they’re represented. For example, as Diane is wearing a low-cut slim-fitting dress, she may be subject to the Male Gaze, whereas characters such as Sick Boy are more respectable as he appears to be wearing a suit. Though, as he is amongst working-class characters, it seems unlikely he is of higher-class, so it can be implied that the suit is stolen or borrowed. This creates a Binary Opposition of poverty and wealth, and how characters struggle due to their socio-economic background. This is in-fitting with common stereotypes of lower-class members of society being ruthless, perhaps witless to just ‘get by’. However, the suit still creates a juxtaposition between Sick Boy and Renton, who wears casual, ill-fitting clothes, suggesting he doesn’t have enough money to buy clothes that fit, and so we see him as a respectable character with morals.
Stereotypes are furthered by Begbie especially as his stance and the prop of the cigarettes reinforces ideologies that the lower class as they are abusive and unhygienic/unhealthy due to the passtimes of smoking and drinking excessively.
Alternatively, the poster can be read as varying stages of the stages of heroin use, which is a prevalent motif in the movie. It is subliminally messaged here as the idea of drug-use may veer audiences away, but I think this double meaning is very interesting and it really depends on situated culture. This is something I would like to convey in my posters as the idea of exclusive information.
American Poster:
COLOUR: It’s no coincidence that the top third of the poster is in American patriotic colours, where the false fact of ‘America’s Most Talked About Movie’ is presented at the top of the poster, allowing it to take importance to henceforth relate to that audience as the British references will be misunderstood or missed; this association with their native country provides a sense of autonomy over the text as they may derive pleasure from the fact they can still relate to a product of Scottish hardships.
The colours for the main body can be a double entendre of drug-use; a potential manifestation for the euphoria of drug-use and the heightened senses sought to via the lowly saturated, unrealistic imagery. Whilst the same Helvetica typography has been used to convey connotations of warning signs, particularly those on dangerous materials or prescription drugs, it has an underlying message of the movie’s theme of crime and substance abuse. This is not overt as not to veer the audience away.
LAYOUT: The layout is a lot more clustered, and looks like an old-fashioned comedy movie, perhaps implying that the American marketing wants to focalise the funny aspects of the film, rather than the gritty, social-realistic side. This is done by the loud colours which also visualise and represent the character’s personalities; there cannot be too much focalisation on individuality as this surfaces more serious debates. Their ‘in your face’ attitudes may appeal to Americans as humorous due to their arrogance which is represented as quite flippant, due to the fact they are undermined by the ‘popping’ colours.
REVIEWS: The film ratings/reviews are placed at the top to deem this information as significant; this establishes trust as these reliable critics such as Rolling Stones promote to an American audience profusely that this will be a good film, particularly as the reviews have no qualms or doubt. This lends itself well to the Cultivation Model as through this repetitious good reviewing of the movie, the audience will finally and subconsciously accept that this movie is good and will subsequently go and see it. The use of exclamative emphasise the passion with which critics enjoyed the movie. The sticker that mentions the cast will resonate with an American audience as they may have seen Danny Boyle’s movies such as Shallow Grave, which also stars Ewan McGregor, and it also mentions the soundtrack which includes Iggy Pop.
BILLING BLOCK: The actor names are visible in the billing block, but the mention to Miramax alludes to their previous cult classic, Pulp Fiction. This is an American movie that will instil in an American audience who enjoyed that movie that this is an edgy, black-comedy, indie movie. This is cross-media marketing, a convention I will use for my posters as indie movies do this as to widen their audience as much as possible due to how niche they are.
Interview:
This interview is very serious as it broaches subject matters such as poverty, working/lower class, drug/substance abuse, etc. but it never manages to become too entrenched within dull, philosophical situations as the interviewer asks some lighthearted questions which the director answers in the same manner in which they are asked. They are very respectful and sometimes passionate about the representations of the lower-class characters, and there are often signs of pity that evoked for them.
The interviewer is quite attentive and encouraging with small aggreements to push Boyle to further his answer, but he manages to always make it seem like an actual, tangible conversation. If it were contrived, the interview would seem stoical and malfunctioning, but the interviewer's reputable job at BBC establishes him as trained and good at his job; he knows where jokes are appropriate, and where questions should be drawn out longer.
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