Harry McHale - Poster Analysis #3: Illegal Activity

Media Language
From first viewing this film poster, a lot can be determined in terms of target audience as well as genre of the film. Firstly due to the fact that the poster shows a young teenage boy overlaid onto a dark black and grey background (colour), suggests that the film is probably aimed at audiences that are 17 and over, and with the likelihood that it is aimed more towards the male population instead of the female population. This could be connoted from the typography of the word 'illegal', bringing in stereotypical connotations that the person doing the illegal activity is the boy on the poster. This could be backed up further from the way the boy is in the centre of a long shot, with a bright light from the background emphasising the fact that he is the main character in the film. Looking deeper into the poster, a lot is revealed from the background images. Most notably the graffiti sprayed onto the garages and walls of the alley. This instantly tells the audience that the film is mainly about crime as well as the fact that the boy could be from a working class background. Now looking further at the boy's clothing (costume), a lot of stereotypical judgements can be made of the boy. Firstly because of the way he is wearing tracksuit bottoms, a hoody and a baseball cap, the audience assumes that the boy is from a minority background, this is also backed up from the way the boy's skin colour suggests that he could be from a ethnic minority background. The bag that he is holding also suggests to the audience that that is his equipment used when carrying out the 'illegal activity', hinting at possible theft. Finally when looking at the typography at the top of the poster (knowledge is power) the audience recognises that the boy obviously knows something that only few people know and so when it comes to doing the 'illegal activity', he gains some sort of power from it, either from friends or family. 

Representation
The overall meaning behind the film is shown in the representation of the poster. Like I said before, due to the fact that he looks as if he comes from a Afro-Caribbean background, it suggests that he could be economically different compared to the rest of the population, or perhaps his family are. From this it then leads to assumptions that he goes out of his way to steal things for his family to live on, this could be anything from food to money to technology. Because of the fact that we cannot see his facial expression, we cannot determine whether he is unhappy or not, however by looking at his posture we can determine that he is likely unhappy or angry; obviously by having the view of a facial expression would help justify this. From the iconography of the image, we can tell that the character is very lonely. This is highlighted by the fact that the streets that he is walking down are abandoned, and although this could be trying to say that he does the crimes when no one is about (during the night perhaps) I believe that the poster is actually trying to portray how the character feels inside his head and how perhaps he feels in comparison with the rest of society.

Audience
Due to the fact that there is no age certificate on the film poster, we can only assume who the film is aimed towards. However because of the fact that the film features the main role of a teenage boy and that the boy would do crimes to help himself or his family (things that the teenage demographic would be familiar with) I believe that this film would be age rated either a 12a or 15. I believe that it wouldn't be anything more than this as the poster does not give us any indication that any violence (or things similar) are a part of this film. 

Narrative 
By looking at the film poster we can determine that the narrative would likely follow a linear narrative (start to end). This is because the boy is trying to get to the end of his families needs and so has to go on a journey to get there, however because of the fact that he looks as if he's half way through his journey, it could perhaps suggest that it is not a linear narrative. 

Genre
Like I said in the first paragraph, it seems as if this film is a thriller or maybe a action/adventure. This is because the boy seems to be on a journey and so will likely face troubling times ahead, as well as the fact that he is clearly doing things that are illegal, and so may get in trouble with gangs or the police. 
Finally a interesting point that I believe could be important in the film is the way the title looks very familiar to popular thriller/horror film 'Paranormal Activity', which could possibly suggest that weird or supernatural events may take place throughout the film, however I may be wrong.