Romance

The Age of Adaline

This trailer begins with a long shot of a friendly neighbourhood, in this shot we see a boy riding a bike down the street with a fresh sky. We hear the diegetic sound of birds tweeting and the non-diegetic sound of high pitched, music that is peaceful. This is successful as straight away we can infer that the genre is romance. The next shot is a close up of a young female, the close up shot is effective as the audience are gazed by her beauty. She wears bright red lipstick, with her hair perfectly permed and her blue eyes which sparkle in this shot. This relates to the theme of a romance to have a beautiful young woman; in contradiction to the music her sweet and innocent appearance perfectly matches. However, as the police officer states she is 45 the audience starts to get curious. Again, the trailer follows the codes and conventions of a romance as we are introduced to a voice over which narrates the story of this character Adaline. We get a medium shot of Adeline and her husband at their wedding, cutting to another shot of them looking at their baby as they begin a family creating a heart-warming atmosphere.

We then get a medium shot of her driving through a dark forest and then a close up of her looking worried trying to see through the snow, we hear the gust of strong winds going by; then the high upbeat music stops as we see her skid into a gate. As the voice over says “Adelaline’s life would change forever” we hear a ticking sound of a clock, which relates to the fact that she doesn’t age due to time for her stopping. We get a low angle shot of her car falling down in the lake, we hear the waves of the river, the audience are shocked due to the shots juxtaposing from a peaceful, happy atmosphere to a dark and frightening one. However, we see a fast glimpse of lighting struck and then a medium shot of light flickering out from the lake. As the voice over says “magical” there is a close up of Adelaline rising from the water. The fiction of this film makes it more suitable for the romance genre.

The music becomes up beat again, but this time more tense due to the speed. We see a close up of her looking at herself in a photo, she stares and smiles at it fondly, like it was a memory she had many years ago however, she looks exactly the same. This all makes the audience very curious as this loves story is different from others due to the twist that she never ages. Most people would expect to never age is a good thing, but Adaline shows the dark and negative side to not aging that will touch the audience.

We get a close up of her in the car telling her daughter that she will always be her mother no matter what as tears fall down her face, we cut to an over the shoulder shot of her daughter who is a grey haired old lady. Adaline rests her hand on the back of her head for support as we can see the misery and hurt between them both. This is successful as it is unusual and still has that heart-warming touch by the fact she had to leave her to get a new identity, as she was trapped in this secret which no one could understand. From this the audience would feel sorry for Adaline and try to understand the pain she is going through.

An old man tells her that she looks like an old friend he use to know, the trailer then shows flashbacks of them 2 together. We get a close up of the young good looking boy looing down at this beautiful girl. From his glare to hers we can tell that they were in love, his background is filled with light blue sky and white clouds which can connote the brightness he is feeling. We get a panning view of the forest they are in, with the calm lake and deep green trees surrounding them this type of setting is a stereotype for where romances are set.

The music starts the sped up and we fade in and out from titles, these titles are powerful due to the sudden bang of the white screen shining through with titles such as ‘time stops for love’. We see her fall in love with a complete new man and the audience can understand that there are going to be complications again, curious to know if this is what happened to the previous man she got married too and if this one will be different. We get a medium shot of them taking a stroll through the park, again following codes and conventions of a romance setting. As well as where the boy plays that perfect gentleman role as they fall deeply in love with a girl who always has a secret that they are afraid to tell.

As the music becomes more intense and the editing shots become much quicker, the audience are even more engaged than ever, falling in love with the characters and the moving story just like they are in it. We see her running through the forest, which we can connote as her trying to run away from her problems. With the dark night and the rain pouring down this makes the scene much more dramatic and dynamic. Suddenly, we cut to the title, the music is low pitched and it leaves a dramatic finish with the title zooming in and cutting to the finishing titles.