This magazine is deadicated to horror movies. The masthead and type of font that is used, is the first thing that allows the audience to make this connection. The colours used are red, black and blue which is common among horror movie posters and magazine covers.
The masthead can be disected into, 'fan of gore', however 'Fangoria' makes the magazine sound more mysterious and reminds the audience of vampires- which are associated with horror movies. The name can also suggest that 'gorier' films feature in this film. The font is shaped to replicate the shape of vampires teeth, while being coloured red reinforces the idea of blood and death. The shape of the masthead, especially the 'F' and 'A' frames the image and seems to point towards the image drawing attention to it. Thus also making her red eyes and red lips stand out more. The main character - who the audience assume to be Natalie Portman-is wearing so much make-up and is heavily edited so seems more like a creature rather than a human being- which is what the movie is all about. Natalie Portman plays the role of a ballerina, who gets to dance the main role in swan lake. The director wants her to have more 'sex appeal' and Natalie Portman's character is not entirely comfortable with this. Her character starts to be more confident, shuts her mother out of her life and self-harms in the form of scratching herself. The marks left by the scratching turn into raised bumps and at the end of the movie the audience see that feathers were 'sprouting' out of her back. As the audience see the feathers surfacing they predict that she is a creature as no human has feathers. The character seems to have a mental illness of some sort and starts having illusions and hallucinations. She becomes obsessed with her dancing role and transforms mentally and physically into the dancer's part she is playing.
-Please see below for example
The strapline above the masthead reads ''Darren Aronofsky's dance of death''- this links to the whole storyline of 'Black Swan' which also focuses on the psychological being of the main character. The strapline also links to the topic of death to dance, which reminds the audience that 'Black Swan' is not a typical film about ballet, rather a deadly and dark thriller.
The make-up makes the character abnormally pale, and the audience can only tell that she is human by the faint small amount of hair we can see- which suggests that the character that the ballet dancer is playing has overtaken her personality. The eye make up resembles a swans wings however as they are dark it goes against the idea that white swans are pure and innocent- which implies that the actress was pure but has been englufed by the character she is playing and has become evil. Again the idea of good versus evil is brought into consideration, especially since the rest of her face is so pale contrasting with the dark eye make-up. The idea of her character now being evil is reinforced by her eyes being so red- which could be linked to the devil. Despite the darkness and evil suggested by the make-up, the character remains extremely beautiful. This of course, links to swans, as they are seen as exceptionally beautiful creatures. It could also be said to pay homage to horror tradition and the deadly female characters that used beauty to ensnare their victims.
The other 'sell-lines' or rather names of other films, are incredibly simple. This allows the audience to focus on the main image and for the main image and sell-line to dominate the cover of the magazine even more.
The movies name 'Black Swan' appears near the bottom half of the magazine and is in red, upper case font. Red is usually associated with love and passion or the devil, hell and evil- in this case the latter is what we associate all of the red imagery with. There is not a main sell line- althoug it can be argued that 'Black Swan' is in place of the main sell-line, and those that have seen the trailer or the movie, or even the poster will be enticed to buy the magazine. Smaller 'sell-lines' or stories are either side of the main image, and are coloured black, red and blue- which reflects the make-up used on the main characters face. Having sell-lines placed either side of the magazine cover is an unusual convention as many magazines focus their most important sell-lines on the left hand third. Sell-lines appearing on both sides of the main image will allow the target audience to spot that this is a film magazine easily without searching through the array of other magazines.
As this magazine focuses on horror movies in particular it seems unconventional to use a plain white background on the cover of the magazine. Most people associate the colour white with being pure and innocent- a large contrast to the articles and features contained in this magazine. However having a white background allows the image of Natalie Portman to stand out extremely well and make a large impact on the audience.
A banner is employed at the bottom of the magazine cover and contains four different stills from different horror movies. Each image is of a slightly different horror sub-genre, e.g. the image with blood on the persons face indicates that, that movie is of the slasher sub-genre. Using an image of a film reel allows the target audience to realise more easily that this is a movie magazine. Regular readers of the magazine, who may not be huge fans of 'Black Swan' will have knowledge that they have a range of sub-genres to read about- just by glancing at the film reel.
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