Jacob’s Ladder

Adrian Lyne

Overview

• Jacob’s Ladder is a 1990 psychological horror/thriller.

• Distributed by TriStar Pictures.

• This trailer is a teaser trailer - short in length and revealing less of the storyline than the theatrical trailer.

Why did I choose Jacob’s Ladder?

• My film is also a psychological thriller, so I can learn of codes, conventions, common shot types, themes and motifs used in the genre.

• As this film is rather dated now, I can observe the differences between this and the contemporary trailers I analysed.

Narrative

• Little of the story given away. Voiceover only tells us that Jacob Singer (the titular protagonist) is “afraid”, that people are watching him and waiting for him in his home and that he is “running out of time”.

• Visually, we are offered a bizarre montage of strange and horrific imagery. At one point, the protagonist yells “Help me!”.

Shot Types used in this Trailer

• Close-up

• Mid-shot

• Establishing shot

• Extreme close-up

Close Up

• Used to show emotion on characters’ faces. In this trailer, it is used also to emphasise horrific imagery.

Mid-shot

• Used to denote position, action among other things.

Establishing Shot

• Used to introduce a new place, scene, etc.

Extreme Close Up

• Used to emphasise something. Used in this trailer to create a horrific effect – a screaming mouth, a person with a reptilian tail.

Extreme Long Shot

• A shot that shows all of the character, but from a distance. A substantial amount of background visible.

Cuts

• Initially fairly far between, clean cuts. These slowly build tension when combined with the music.

• When the voiceover finishes, the cuts become very rapid, sometimes clean, often overlays/cross dissolves to further distort the disturbing imagery. This has a disorientating effect.

Use of Ident

• The Optimum Releasing ident is the first thing that appears in this trailer making audiences aware of the films connection to this company.

Use of Captions

• There are no captions in this trailer.

Title Screen

• Red lettering on black background; danger.

• Grammatically correct title (capital letter at the beginning of each word followed by lower case letter) – quietly threatening, unnerving effect.

Credits

• Follows colour scheme of title screen.

• Idents visible at bottom.

Post Credits Scene

• Text does not give a definite date – a convention of teaser trailers.

Use of Colour

• Very dark throughout.

• Bright, flashing lights used to disorientate.

• There is a quick shot of a white hospital environment – this can be associated with madness.

• Figures often contrast with background.

• Use of red blood, to indicate violence and horror.

Costuming• Jacob wears casual clothing that implies it may be winter (e.g.

Coat, scarf).

• Other actors have had make-up and prosthetics applied to create a frightening appearance.

Non Diagetic Sounds

• Somewhat ambient background music – hard to hear over other sounds.

• Loud screeching behind other noise.

• Dramatic voiceover by an omnipresent narrator.

Sounds

• Heavy use diagetic sounds – e.g. Train, rattling lights, hospital bed wheel, an explosion, etc.

• One line of diagetic dialogue – “Help me!” –from the protagonist.

• Other diagetic ‘dialogue’ comes in the form of screams and growling noises from human/human-esque figures on-screen.

Representation

• Human characters are all white.

• The protagonist is a male in his 20’s-30’s.

• The only human female we see appears to be insane or some sort of horrific hallucination.

• Human-esque figures appear to be white too, where skin is visible.

Review

• Rapid, disorientating cuts, with overlayedshots to make a terrifying effect.

• No captions throughout.

• Effective use of disturbing sound to accompany visuals.

• Non-diagetic voiceover with minimal dialouge.

• Reveals very little of plot.