The trailer for 'The Human Centipede' is typical to the Horror genre as there are many uses of genre conventions that allow us to categorise this film into a Horror genre.
The settings shown in the trailer are typical; at the very start of the trailer the weather is stormy as well as the fact that it is at night, and a simple car ride was made scary to the audience with the suspense that they are in a storm in the dark in a country area which the two female characters have never been before (they are lost). Leading to the home of the mentally-ill surgeon who keeps them in a basement, this is also typical to horror as the basement connotes primitive instincts, proven by the surgeons fantasies of creating a 'human centipede'.
There are typical conventions in the technical codes, the camera work includes many close ups of faces because the trailer is trying to portray the feelings of the victims, the real fear and desperation to escape that they have whilst showing close-ups of the surgeon to allow the audience to see the true mentally-ill sickmindedness of the character. There is an extreme closeup of the surgeons face when he is wearing his surgeons costume, he has his eyes closed, this stops the audience from being able to see his emotions as he is preparing for surgery as his eyes would give away this emotion, but perhaps the eyes behing closed in this extreme close up connotes that he has no feeling to what he is doing, perhaps he is even content with casually getting ready to perform this surgery on the victims. Nearer to the end of the trailer, the camera follows one of the female victims who is attempting an escape, this puts us in a position where we identify with the character because we are almost being put in her position, typical to horror as we are scared of the surgeon and where he is in result to being able to escape from him or not. Also close to the end we have a point of view shot to one of the victims when they are all joined together, showing us the surgeon moving closer towards her, this puts the audience in a position where we feel indenified with the victim. The editing of the trailer is mostly a series of quick cuts, showing short clips of the victims, surgeon and what he plans to do to them in surgery, giving the audience a fast but effective storyline that we immedately find interesting. I think the sound in the trailer is typical to horror, the moans, cries and screams connote the feelings of the victim, even when the scream is being used in the trailer but undiagetic, it creates a sense of what our reactions should be.
The visual iconography of horror is the surgeons basement, with the hospital setting, also the use of blood, costume (mouth masks, surgery gloves, tubes), drawings behind the mind of the surgeon and the gun, needle, cages. The lighting throughout most of the trailer is low-key, or natural lighting, with the brightest part being at the start with the girls being in their own homes at safety. When the females are in the car, the very small amount of light is directed to their faces, this is light specifically added to aid our view of what their reactions are to being lost, and to know that we are concentrating on how dark the area is compared to them which is typical to horror. The stormy weather at the start is typical to the genre as it creates suspense by using pathetic fallacy to portray that something as bad as the weather is waiting for the girls in the car.
The narrative structure in ‘The human centipede’ trailer is one that Propp’s can describe as following his theory of a villain or agent of change can manipulate the equilibrium to start a course of events that eventually are fixed into a new equilibrium, this trailer shows that the surgeon is the villain, changing the victims lives as he is shown to complete his intention of making this ‘human centipede’, however we are unaware of the ending, how do the victims escape or get out of the situation they are in?
Character types in the trailer are basic, with the victims, being a man who is already trapped in the surgeons home and the two female protagonists whose story we follow throughout the trailer, the second character type being the evil surgeon who is plotting against these innocent people. He is connoted to be a monster because of his inhumane plan to join the people up, we have an idea that the character is mentally ill.
The trailer shows typical conventions of theme, one being the binary opposites of natural vs. unnatural, the natural lives of the victims are thrown against the unnatural mind of the surgeon, and how his plan is inhumane and sick so is beyond reality. Another theme is the evil within the surgeon, showing that some people have dark intentions, with a deep evil inside their minds telling them to investigate things, e.g - the surgeons plan of maybe showing off his capability of a surgeon to create the ‘human centipede’. The other theme I think is insanity, the surgeons state of mind is typical in the horror genre, of portraying someone whose mind has been twisted into thinking what they are doing is okay or insanity of getting pleasure from something wrong.
The narrative structure in ‘The human centipede’ trailer is one that Propp’s can describe as following his theory of a villain or agent of change can manipulate the equilibrium to start a course of events that eventually are fixed into a new equilibrium, this trailer shows that the surgeon is the villain, changing the victims lives as he is shown to complete his intention of making this ‘human centipede’, however we are unaware of the ending, how do the victims escape or get out of the situation they are in?
Character types in the trailer are basic, with the victims, being a man who is already trapped in the surgeons home and the two female protagonists whose story we follow throughout the trailer, the second character type being the evil surgeon who is plotting against these innocent people. He is connoted to be a monster because of his inhumane plan to join the people up, we have an idea that the character is mentally ill.
The trailer shows typical conventions of theme, one being the binary opposites of natural vs. unnatural, the natural lives of the victims are thrown against the unnatural mind of the surgeon, and how his plan is inhumane and sick so is beyond reality. Another theme is the evil within the surgeon, showing that some people have dark intentions, with a deep evil inside their minds telling them to investigate things, e.g - the surgeons plan of maybe showing off his capability of a surgeon to create the ‘human centipede’. The other theme I think is insanity, the surgeons state of mind is typical in the horror genre, of portraying someone whose mind has been twisted into thinking what they are doing is okay or insanity of getting pleasure from something wrong.
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