IRON MAN 3 MOVIE CAMPAIGN

MOVIE CAMPAIGN For my textual analysis, before I create my very own movie campaign, I am going to look at the movie campaign for the newly released ‘Iron man 3’ . Movie campaigns consist of multiple media pieces. There are usually teaser posters be it one or more, as well as a full theatrical release, again there can be more than one. This is usually followed by a teaser trailer, possibly a magazine cover and eventually a full length trailer. Movie campaigns just recently also use social networking sites to promote their new release.

Campaigns help to make the public aware of the film and build some form of suspense before it is finally released, hence the use of teaser posters and so on. Campaigns tend to be recognisable when all brought together. So the posters trailers and magazine covers all have similarities be it the image or colour scheme excreta. This is done so that people can make the link between the posters and the trailers, it helps to promote the movie and create a likeness of a brand to the movie in some sense. When campaigns fail to create similarity between these pieces of media then the film does not sell as well as it could, however most films do. I am going to take a look at how ‘Iron Man 3’s campaign does this successfully.

FILM: Iron Man 3

DIRECTOR: Shane Black

YEAR: 2013

NARRATIVE:

Iron man 3 is, obviously, the trilogy to previous movies. In a brief explanation the film is about the continuous main character, Tony Stark. Tony Stark was an engineer in weapons for war and made millions of pounds in doing so, Tony then turned to a more friendly career after being helped captive in the previous movies and forced to build weapons to kill the innocent. This is where Tony created the very first Iron Man suit. Form here the concept of the iron man suit bringing good to the world begun. Within the third one a terrorist threat occurs and Tony faces a battle against the ‘Mandarin’ but also a life changing one, to get rid of all the suits his created or lose his one true love, Pepper.

IRON MAN 3

Teaser posters tend to lack information and only give away tiny details about the movie to,

hence the wording, ‘tease’. Below are two teaser posters for the 2013 film ‘Iron Man 3’

TEASER POSTERS

These 2 posters are teaser posters and would have been released before the film was finished and obviously before the full length poster. These posters have their similarities.

TEASER POSTER ANALYSIS: The first teaser poster follows typical conventions of a teaser poster. We have only a date and a letter, there is no presence of a full title or starring actors. The image used itself helps to form an understanding of the film. The image is very dark creating an element of thrill, the colour scheme can be gathered as dark blues, reds and yellows. Not too much is given away however because it is a trilogy the audience can recognise what film is being advertised. However this is only due to the consistent campaign. The second teaser poster gives away some more information. In this poster we are given a full title ‘Iron Man 3’, a fully written date and a more precise image. In this image we can see who the starring actor is. This poster too sticks to a colour scheme of blues, reds and yellows allowing the posters to link together. Also notice how the number ‘3’ and the title are written in the same font and colour. This is a typical aspect used within a campaign and helps the audience to make the link between the 2 posters due to their similarity. I would like to include this is my work.

After the teaser poster release eventually a full length poster will appear followed by multiple different versions. Below is one of the Iron Man 3 full length posters. We can tell this

FULL LENGTH POSTER

is a full length and not a teaser poster for multiple reasons. Within this poster there is presence of starring actors, a billing block , the marvel logo, a full length title and a very important image that is not as simplistic in comparison to the others. The image works well in terms of empowerment as it is at a slightly low angle suggesting power and strength, also we can see multiple iron man suits in the background showing that he has some form of back up. The colour scheme again fits to the previous posters consisting of blue red and yellow but also the most important blue futuristic glow. Again the title is in the same font style and colour as the other posters making them fit together nicely. Also notice how in all three the text is in the same place, the bottom third. All of these aspects show that the campaign is following a typical convention.

• IMAGE• TITLE IN RED FONT• COLOUR SHCEME BLUE, RED, YELLOW• BLUE FUTURISTIC GLOW• SHORT RELEASE DATE

• IMAGE• FULL TITLE SAME RED FONT AND POSITION• SAME COLOUR SCHEME•BLUE FUTURISTIC GLOW• SHORT RELEASE DATE

• IMAGE OF FULL SUIT• FULL TITLE SAME FONT/POSITION•SAME COLOUR SCHEME• STARRING ACTOR/BILLING BLOCK

When looking at big blockbuster movie campaigns they all tend to have a big build up. There is multiple teaser posters released and versions of full length posters, then there are magazine covers to promote the movie further followed by teaser trailers and full length trailers. In terms of Iron Man, Empire was the magazine for them. Empire follows typical conventions which I have pointed out below but they too have also stuck to the Iron Man 3 campaign.

MAGAZINE COVER

MAIN IMAGE IN CENTER THIRDS

COVER LINES

MASTHEAD

MAIN TITLE

THE MAIN IMAGE OF THE MAIN CHARACTER IN THE SUIT WE HAVE ALREADY SEEN ON POSTERS

MAIN TITLE IN THE TYPICAL RED FONT

COLOUR SHCEME; BLUE/YELLOW BACKGROUND, RED COVER LINES, RED/YELLOW SUIT

TYPICAL CONVENTIONS

CAMPAIGN CONVENTIONS

It is obvious that this is key to the campaign. Then there is the use of image, they are both very similar to one another. They both show the character ‘Tony’ in his suit with out his mask. The use of the suit makes it easy for us as the audience to make the link between the two, these suits are also present on the other teaser poster. Furthermore the text and font used is very similar. The text on the magazine is red as well as the title similar to the text on the poster, the title is also red. The billing block is in white which again is similar to the magazine cover lines. The two link together nicely creating amore clear cut campaign.

MAGAZINE AND POSTERLooking at the magazine cover and the full theatrical poster we can again see similarities that are clearly consistent throughout this campaign. First would be the colour scheme. Both the poster and the magazine consist of blue tones, red tones and yellow tones.

TEASER TRAILERhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=1Cn8KB9VKQo

This is the link to the teaser trailer

Teaser trailers tend not to be very long however this one is just a tad too short. I struggled to find a teaser trailer on its own separate from other trailers so have no choice other than this one trailer. However it is a part of the campaign and has key conventions of a trailer as well as aspects of the campaign that i have previously highlighted. This trailer shows only a few shots at a fast pace which is a typical convention as it allows a lot of scenes to be aired within a short amount of time. It also helps to identify a thrilling generic style. There is also use of captions, camera angles and soundtracks. Looking at the captions first we can see that they follow the same font used on the posters. This allows, again, the postersand trailer to link together. Also in this trailer there is a similar shot of Tony Stark in his iron man suit in a similar position to the full theatricalrelease , this again allows a clear link to be made. Furthermore this trailer has a dull blue colour scheme fitting to the posters and the magazine cover.

SIMILARITIES BETWEEN TRAILER AND POSTERS VISUALS

TRAILER

TEASER POSTER

THEATRICAL POSTER

Notice the stance of Tony in the trailer screen shot and the full theatrical poster. These images are very similar to one anotherAlso notice the background of the trailer image, see the suits all lined up on display, this setting is used within the teaser poster. Therefore the imagery and shots used allow the pieces to be easily linked. Also the colour schemes are very dull with the blue futuristic glow again linking them together.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBZVCjj_cY8

FULL LENGTH TRAILERLink to full length trailer.

The full length trailer has obvious differences to the teaser trailer. This trailer gives away some more information compared to the other as it is much longer. Within this trailer there is use of fast pace cutting , a range of shots and camera techniques, but again there are also aspects of the campaign that connect both the trailers together and again the posters and magazine cover. This trailer has many more shots of action packed scenes that include the iron men suits. There are multiple shots that help to make the understanding of the movie clearer but to also intrigue the audience, creating enigma codes. There is also use of the same shot used in the teaser trailer, the shot of the iron man kneeling down that I compared to the posters on the previous slide. This instantly allows the link to be made between the two trailers. This trailer also uses the same consistent font and the same Iron Man 3 logo used. Also the soundtrack is very similar with the same deep rumble and loud ‘bang’ every so often, this being another aspect they have kept the same between the two trailers.

BOTH TRAILERS

TASER TRAILER FULL TRAILERHere are the few similarities I have highlighted. We can see that they are practically same and therefore work well in sticking to the campaign.

THE WHOLE CAMPAIGN TOGETHER

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Cn8KB9VKQo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBZVCjj_cY8