Kidulthood Trailer Deconstruction

 

Distributor: Revolver

Revolver Entertainment is one of the top distributors on the UK. This company has been associated with other urban dramas such as Ill Manors and Offender and would therefore be an appropriate thing to consider using at the beginning of our trailer. Showing the production company or distributor at the beginning of a trailer is a huge convention that we aimed to conform to. 

The trailer begins with the simple display of the title of the film. This immediately introduces the theme of the film to the target audience with the name 'kidulthood' linking to the adolescent characters and narrative. The typography of the title is in black and white, so as to conform t the genre conventions and make the title clear to read. By editing this to slowly fade out, an atmosphere of mystery is created hinting at the violence and danger in the film. 



By starting with a fast paced number of straight cut edits running parallel with the music, the audience are intrigued to see more. The shots involve a quick flash of scenes including 

The trailer begins with an establishing shot to introduce the urban setting of the film. This city skyline shot is an important feature of all urban dramas, featuring as a way of showing the dark and gloomy aspects of the city. these often show a council estate or blocks of flats. These shots are usually filmed when it is dark, or dismal weather outside reflecting the character's lives.

The close up shots of drugs are very quick but still convey to the audience that the film will tackle the theme of drugs- an issue that is stereotypically used in urban dramas. This is the fist shot that presents the theme of crime in the narrative. The lighting here and throughout the trailer is mostly natural and thus works well with the social realist theme.

This particular mid shot of the character smoking is very visually effective and is something which appears more than once throughout the trailer. This therefore suggests that we should consider filming a smoking scene so as to conform to the urban drama conventions. Many of the scenes involve the characters having their hoods up, conforming to stereotypical representations of youth in the media.

The point of view shot of the feet stomping and kicking towards the camera makes the scene appear a lot more brutal and forces the audience to sympathises with the character being beaten up. This works very effectively and is something we are particularly interested in experimenting with.

Shots of just their feet as they run away adds diversity to the visual aspect and helps to build tension appropriately.  The lack of colour in some of the shots throughout the trailer has inspired us to experiment with black and white filters over some of our footage in order to create an effective impact.



The violence in the film is presented in the trailer through scenes such as this one in which weapons such as baseball bats are seen. This is something we could take inspiration from and easily recreate in the production of our trailer. By using a point of view shot here, with the bat swinging towards the camera, the trailer has broken the fourth wall and created something which will scare and thus excite the audience.