How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

In order for my film 'Nightmare Endings' to be successful, the distribution company would need to devise a marketing campaign that would effectively target the films target audience to attract the most attention to it as possible. A marketing campaign can include many different strategies including, trailers, posters, websites, set visits, merchandising, and film festivals. A successful marketing campaign usually consists of three main components: advertising, publicity and promotion.


My main product (trailer) and my film poster are both part of the adversing campaign, designed to create a 'buzz' about the film, and create interest and awareness. In order for both of these products to work together as part of a promotional package, they need to show a degree of coherency. I have ensured my trailer and poster are coherent in a number of ways.

One of the most obvious ways in which I have done this is through having the only image on the poster be of the main character in the trailer. This makes sense to do as she has the most screen time in the trailer, therefore the audience can make a connection between the trailer and poster. The image on the poster is taken from the main 'scare moment' in the trailer which ensures that the coherency between the trailer and poster is maintained. If I had decided to take a new photo for the poster, the audience could become confused as the image is non-diagetic, meaning it cannot be seen in the film. In the two images below you can see how I have used the shot from my trailer, on the poster.

Original still taken from my trailer

Film poster including the still from my trailer



Another way that my main product and poster work together as a promotional package is through including the same tag line. The tag line "New beginnings... can sometime lead... to nightmare endings" is shown in various inter-titles in my trailer. I decided to quote this tag line on my film poster as I felt it succeeded in giving part of the story of the film away to the audience, but only enough to just 'wet their appetites'. The repetition of this line in the advertising campaign (trailer and poster) would ensure that it becomes memorable to the target audience.


The film poster I created refers to a website, which allows the target audience to go online to find out more information if they wish. This also allows for the opportunity of viral marketing campaigns, such as the one created by Warner Bros. for 'The Dark Knight', with their website www.whysoserious.com 

Viral Marketing Campaign for 'The Dark Knight'

All in all, I feel that the trailer and film poster I have created work well as a promotional package to advertise the film. However advertising a movie isn't the only job for the distributor, they also need to generate favourable publicity from other sources. Publicity from different sources is very important for the success of a movie as the general public may find that the opinions of others will give a more reliable source of information about the movie. One main way of obtaining this publicity is through front page, and main article appearances in 'big name' film magazines i.e. Empire, Total Film and Sight & Sound. The distributor will attempt to gain this type of publicity through sending out press packs to the magazine company, and arranging interviews with actors and producers, as well as organizing press screenings.


I have created a front page for the magazine 'Total Film' featuring a main article for my film 'Nightmare Endings'. One problem with this type of publicity is that the distributor has little or no control over creating the magazine front cover, therefore the films distributor needs to ensure that they give the press a good impression of the film so they will write favourably of it, and hopefully in return generate more interest and widen the films potential target audience.