Harry's textual analysis of a horror magazine front cover

Fangoria is an internationally-distributed US film fan magazine, specializing in the genres of horror, slasher, splatter and exploitation films, with the whole magazine series being in regular publication since 1979.

The fact that Fangoria specialize in a sub-genre like ‘Slasher’ made it very wise to do an analysis of one of their magazine covers as ‘Slasher’ is the sub-genre our trailer will be based around.

Cover I analysed

Now lets move onto the magazine cover itself.

The main image, on the cover, is off a mid-close up shot off a woman staring at something to her right with what appears to be an infected left eye, blood coming out of her mouth area dropping down onto her cleavage area and she also has deformed teeth in an almost zombie/vampire-like manner. This image, of this woman, is very graphic and horrifying thus giving the audience the idea straight away that the magazine, in question, is of the horror genre. The fact she has blood dripping from her mouth, has fang-like teeth and the fact she is staring blankly at something to her right could mean that this woman has indeed attacked, and possibly murderer someone, and that she is on the lookout for her next victim to draw blood this. This woman is also wearing nothing but a low-cut top with lots of cleavage showing, this could mean that ‘Fangoria’ still stick to the idea of ‘sex sells’ and that their intended audience would be of the male gender, as it would be males who would be attracted to an image of a woman in a low-cut top with cleavage showing, no matter even if she does have blood pouring out of her mouth.

This idea of ‘sex sells’ is further shown when a heading just above her breasts says ‘JENNIFER’S BODY’- showing that the film, its intending to promote, is about a woman named Jennifer and her body. The tagline underneath that is in fact a play on words. It is a play on words because the woman being pictured is ‘Megan Fox’ and the tagline says ‘Megan Fox will eat you alive’, whilst some men might like the idea of being eaten alive by Megan Fox, in a sexual manner, this tagline is more being used in connection with the image she is in and the danger she possesses and the blood around her mouth shows that they actually mean she will eat you (feast on you) alive.

The title can also be seen as the most important part of the magazine, it can be seen as this because the text ‘Fangoria’ overlays the womans head, rather than be focused behind her. This shows that the editors want the title to be the most seen factor upon the cover. The title of the magazine being ‘Fangoria’ also has connotations of horror as it makes us (the audience) think that a Dracula-type person will be involved inside the magazine, as they have fangs, and can thus give us an idea as too why the woman, in the main image, has such deformed teeth. The font of this heading is also in a vampire-like way, as the ‘F’ and the ‘A’ trail of at the bottom of each letter, much like the stereotype of vampires teeth where their two teeth on the side of the first two in anybody's mouth are bigger and longer than the rest of everybody's set of teeth. The font is also in Red, showcasing an added idea of blood being apparent in this magazine and giving the audience a fear of being hurt. To the left-hand side of the title is also the word ‘Fangoria’ again re-written and the number 226 written next to it, giving a reader the information that this is the 226th issue of this long running, successful magazine. The date, in which this issue was released, is also giving but instead to the right-hand side of the title. The word written being ‘SEPT’, showing this is the September issue of Fangoria.

Issue to the far left and date to the far right

The use of colours in this cover are used to a bare minimum to keep it simplistic but effective. The only colours used for Red, White, Yellow and Black. This does enough to give the audience the idea that its a horror magazine as Red connotates danger and Black keeps the audience on their toes as they don’t know what will appear next etc.

To help any sub-heading stand out from the main image it has to be written in a different font and different colour to the main heading. Hence why ‘PANDORUM’, ‘DISTRICT 9’, ‘CARRIERS’ and ‘GRACE’ are all written in their own respective fonts and in white colouring, so it stands out from the massively Red title.

Although, saying this, one sub-heading isn’t in white colouring. This sub-heading is ‘I SELL THE DEAD’. Rather than be in a White font, it is similar to the title and is in Red font. Reason for this could be pointed towards the fact that the word ‘DEAD’ is used in this sub-heading and Red indeed connotes death and so it was suiting what the sub-heading had too say.

The tagline, under each sub-heading, is written in Yellow for all of them and just gives a quick run down on what the film being mentioned is about. E.g; ‘CARRIERS’ tagline is ‘worse than swine flu’ showing why the film is called ‘CARRIERS’ because they’re carrying a flu.

Just like any magazine, this one also has a bar-code which states how much the product is and where it is released. With Fangoria being $9.99 and being sold in the USA and Canada It also follows conventions any normal magazine as it is placed at the bottom left of the image.

Underneath this bar code is also the link to Fangoria’s website. This would help any audience be able to further their interest in the magazine and travel onto the website to look up any additional information, that they seek.

In terms of lighting an audience quickly gather that this magazine will be quite a dark, evil magazine. This is because the image of the woman is shown in a quite low-key lighting and the whole background behind her is completely black.

behind Megan Foxes shoulder