Horror Film Magazines

I decided to also look at some specifically horror genre magazines, in order to decide whether I prefer to follow this layout, or the more conventional layout of a film magazine covering all genres, such as "Empire." I found that horror magazines have a lot more content on the front cover, rather than aiming for a sleek finish, there are multiple images and additions such as blood effects to clearly define the genre. 




I also looked at "fangoria" magazine, which had more of a concept and focus particularly on films which featured gore and heavy use of make up and costume to emphasise horror conventions. Fangoria seemed to have a more simple layout, and uses the "film reel" effect of the left hand side frequently as a brand specific convention. Within this it prints additional images of other films featured in the magazine. Fangoria appears to use a less cluttered format, with more of a focus on the horror image itself, which in the above example is clearly shown through the character's expression,pose and costume.

I have compared these two horror film magazine examples with this issue of "Empire" which features the same film, presented in a different way. The character still looks threatening, but is in a less aggressive pose. The masthead has clearly been edited to fit the theme of the issue, as flames have been added to connote with the theme of Hell. As it's empire magazine, the rest of the cover remains true to its traditional sleek look whilst incorporating this genre of film.


After comparing, I concluded that it would be most appropriate to base my front cover on a regular film magazine featuring a "horror special." My reasons for this are that I don't feel my film would fit a conventional pure horror magazine as it is primarily focused on the psychological thriller aspect, and there are few examples of typical slasher film gore or theatrical makeup. "Enclosed" is more likely to feature in a mainstream film magazine which might be covering a different genre as a one-off issue. I also noticed that most of the characters on horror magazine front covers are photographed with theatrical makeup showing their injuries/scars or making them look ghostly/gothic. Whereas none of my main characters are brutally injured or made to look supernatural. My main characters would suit the posing of a mainstream magazine more appropriately, and I will use posing and positioning to define them as part of a psychological thriller film.