Cowboys & Aliens Poster Deconstruction
- The theme of action/ disaster is clearly prevalent in the poster; the large alien ship takes up over 50% of the poster which demonstrates the imminence of danger. Clearly, a theme in many posters would be the effect of background images and how they can be used to create effect; in our poster, the incoming threat of vampirism could be incorporated into our poster to represent a clear threat.
- Contrasting to this, we can see Daniel Craig's character standing boldly infront of the Alien ship which perhaps represents him as some kind of defending figure. The mise en scene of his revolver and stereotypically cowboy clothing helps feed into the stereotype of him being a cowboy himself. The patriotism and power in his stance represents that the conflict between the invaders and the natives.
- The bold and plain typography of the title shows perhaps a threat in its simplicity. The size of 'aliens' helps to conclude the threat of alien invasion. Furthermore, the line between 'cowboys' and 'aliens' represents an absolute impossibility of their co-existence. The imperative nature of the tagline in addition to it's short sentence structure connotes a clear sense of simplicity and one could infer from this that there will be an absolute conflict.
- Colour imagery is used to highlight a potential conflict. The unnatural blue lighting contrasts to the natural yellow lighting of the sun. Essentially, the alien ship and it's bold blue light blocks out and replaces the sun. The sun is a symbol of nature and regularity on Earth and if something is disrupting this, one could infer that the very nature of human existence could cease to exist because of the necessity of the sun.
- It is clear within this poster that everything from the typography to the colour imagery is used to highlight an absolute sense of conflict. Therefore, everything in this poster is connoting themes of the film. With reference to our film, I feel that we too should feed into this convention; the presence of vampire and crime could dictate a dark, black and red colour scheme. Furthermore, we should try to demonstrate an element of horror (perhaps blood) to appeal to target audiences and show exactly what our film will include.
