Trailer Analysis - Face/Off

Face/Off

1997

Director - John Woo

Institution – Buena Vista International

Face/Off is an American science fiction action thriller starring John Travolta and Nicolas Cage. John Travolta features as an FBI agent and Nicolas Cage features as a terrorist. The film has Travolta and Cage each playing two personalities, therefore making both of them the protagonist and antagonist characters at the same time. FBI agent John Travolta undergoes a face-transplant surgery and assumes the identity and physical appearance of Nicolas Cage a ruthless terrorist, but the plan backfires when the same criminal impersonates the cop with the same method. The trailer shows the two protagonist and antagonist characters stating why they hate each other and how they are after each other so the storyline is made clear to audiences when watching the trailer. I believe the target audience for this film would appeal to both males and females of the age from fifteen upwards. The region in which I personally think the target audience are from are mainly America and Britain, however the film is aimed at any region. The target audience could be any ethnicity or occupation so this doesn’t impact on a defined target audience the film could appeal to anyone from the age of fifteen upwards.

The trailer starts with a close up shot of John Travolta who features as an FBI agent, the audience are able to see clearly his facial expressions and the shot denotes a stressed FBI agent telling his side of the situation and who Nicolas Cage is to him. There is a soundtrack in the background of the trailer of non-diegetic sound which is incidental music in which is the use of music to punctuate a specific event. The music in the background is dull music, with sounds of knifes being slashed together slowly which connotes a sense of mystery and suspense. The trailer then goes to show a 360 degree camera angle of John Travolta which the audience are able to view John Travolta’s physicality, after Nicolas Cage then transfers into John Travolta using his same tone of voice. By doing this, it appeals to the audience as the audience are able to see the hate between the two characters and as they only show the FBI agent talking, the audience automatically think Nicolas Cage is the antagonist which again creates a sense of confusion for the audience as they are currently unaware of the storyline and this encourages them to go and watch the film even more.

Long shots are then shown of events that occur in the film of different action events where the two characters are fighting against each other. The trailer through the use of jump cuts shows all these events occurring. Throughout these scenes there are is sound FX such as explosions, crashes and gun shots going off which conforms the conventions of an action film. The scenes are all natural lighting of locations whilst in comparison to the start of the trailer it is all dark lighting with the only lighting being focused on their face. The audience are then able to see that these two characters are the main characters in this film.

Both characters are males and the costumes they wear conform the representation of males throughout the trailer as they are both wearing suits which connotes their authority and male power and make the audience think which character will win this battle. In addition to this, the trailer follows the ideologies of that males are strong, authoritative characters with power and the audience can see this by the suits they are wearing so their masculinity is shown through this, the props such as guns they use and have on them at all times as well as their physicality. This appeals to the target audience as they are able to see the two men in action fighting against one another, which encourages them to see the film more as they want to see which male will win in the end.

Overall different scenes from the start and middle of the film are shown from extreme long shots of locations and action events occurring to medium close up shots of character’s reactions to what has just taken place creating an enigma for the audience. The trailer is generally fast paced following the conventions of an action film with loud FX sound effects of gun shots, cars crashing and general fighting throughout. The film follows the narrative theory of Tvzetan Todorov, Claude Levi Strauss and Vladmir Propp with both characters being represented as both good and evil characters in different aspects. The trailer for Face/Off, I believe altogether appeals to the target audience as they are people who enjoy action films or admire the characters who are featured in the film as well as the trailer can be viewed by a large target audience.