Monday, 25 November 2013

Fangoria magazine cover analysis

Fangoria, first published in 1979, is listed as a horror, slasher, splatter based American magazine that specialises around exploitation films. Edited by Chris Alexander, Fangoria is published monthly, reaching 46,000 people each year.

As my second magazine analysis, I will be depicting the creation of this particular issue and going into depth with the conventions of a typical horror magazine to enable as much knowledge on the topic as possible for when I create my own.

To begin my analysis, I feel that the main focal point, hinted by the central positioning and large size of the face, is Natalie Portman, playing Nina Sayers in the 2010 film, The Black Swan. Positioned behind the masthead and enlarged to fill the whole of the poster, the instant recognition of the well-known film is established and the powerful make up helps to create an eye catching cover for the spectator. This particular image has been used to influence the audience into understanding the general story behind the Black Swan by her tightly pulled hair, presenting her as a ballet dancer. Her hair, which is hard to define, is the only part of her face which gives the spectator enough information to clarify that she is human. Although the character is presented to be evil, she is still seen to be beautiful. By this, I would associate this with one of the horror conventions due to a lot of films making their female antagonist sexually appealing and making their persona deviating and manipulating.

The colour scheme used includes predominantly blacks, reds and blues. These three colours are the signifiers towards the Black Swan and also help to create unity throughout the cover, presenting the audience with a professional, sophisticated approach into the creation of the magazine which contradicts the conventional, busy and messy appearing magazines that horror genres typically prove. Due to the white face, I feel as if using white for the background helps the supernatural, unsettling feeling to be evoked, whilst enabling the more important aspects to be clearer and analysed instantaneously. These particular features have been outlined even more by the strong, harsh make up that helps to show her sour, evil facial expression, hinting the horror genre for anybody who is unaware of the thriller film. As addition to this, I also believe that her white face illustrates her innocence and purity, whilst the black make-up, shaped to be feathers, show her change of nature and how she has gone from good to bad through her acting and ballet. Another way of proving this theory is by her red eyes that represent evil and can be linked with the devil taking over her body.

The masthead on this specific issue of Fangoria is a bold red colour with a shiny, 3D effect. Having used these features, I feel that the horror film convention, blood, is influenced through the appearance as addition to the “F” and the “A” being shaped as if they’re two fangs on a vampire. This also hints the bloody appearance due to fangs being related this this convention. Below the main image is “Black Swan” written in a sans serif, upper case, red font. This information gives the spectators the knowledge of the film title in case they’re unaware and for promotional importance. The colour links in with the red magazine brand title, creating unity on the front cover.

Above the masthead, a strapline reading “Darren Aronofsky’s dance of death” is included. This pull quote helps to depict the film by stating that the ballet takes over her life and quite obviously destroys her life and kills her. The word death is one that is automatically linked with horror genres. By writing such a blunt line along with the film, the audience is, again, aware of the dark story that is like no other dance film, completely contradicting the innocence and beauty of ballet.

To the left and right of the main image, a few features and regulars from the contents of the magazine have been listed to enable an easier approach towards the audience understanding whether they would like to purchase the magazine or not. These bits of information, including “Dead Space 2”, “Vampire Circus” and “Stake Land”, are written in two columns in the three colours that are associated with the Black Swan.


Below these, a film strip banner has been presented at the bottom of the page with four different film stills aligned neatly.  This feature is seen in the majority of Fangoria magazine issues and provides the spectator with other films that may be of interest to them. For this magazine issue in specific, the audience may be uninterested in The Black Swan. By adding extra movies that are featured within the magazine, they may purchase the magazine purely for one of the other films listed. This film reel is additionally inserted to enable the target audience to acknowledge that the magazine specialises in films. The four films included are all of different sub-genres. This highlights the point that the target audience is a lot wider than just one specific horror sub-genre fan.

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