The Matrix Poster Analysis

The setting

The background hints towards a futuristic setting, but is very vague on giving a visual description of where they are. The setting also connotes the sci-fi genre, due to the coding on the walls. It's also very dark to represent an older audience, as they'll be more attracting to a serious, professional looking poster. Children are attracted to brighter, more colourful posters as it's more interesting to look at.

Props

They're all holding guns to connote action as a sub genre, stereotypically enticing the male gender. The other demographic group the props will typically appeal to are males in the age range of around 18-40, as they're more likely to be interested in violent scenes. The star vehicle has the largest weapon to connote his power.

Costumes

They're all wearing very dark outfits, with three of them wearing blue and the star vehicle wearing black, to emphasise his importance in the movie. The only woman on the poster is shown wearing tight clothing, as back when this movie was released females were popularly used as sex appeal as a way to attract some males to watch the movie. The female can also be used to represent the female audience, to attract a wider range of people to see their movie in cinemas.

Type of shot/camera angle

It uses a long shot, so as to display the entire length of each character. This gives the poster an opportunity to show off their outfits, posture and large props (as Keanu Reeves is holding at the front); these all help connote the genre and tone of the movie. A slightly low-angle shot is used, to make the characters appear more intimidating and powerful.

Lighting

A lot of the light is centred around the star vehicle to make him stand out clearly against the others, and to emphasise even further his importance- this is backlighting, the process of illuminating the subject from the back to make him the first thing most people will look at. 

All posters can include:

• Film title
• Main image
• Institutional logos
• Production information
• Tagline
• Release date/information
• Box office lure
• Plug
• Rating
• Quote/review and reviewer name
• Website link
• Social media logos