Empire Magazine Cover Analysis

The first thing to draw your attention when looking at this poster is the two people staring directly at the reader, they are quite clearly not in a film pose, which means that they are in a photo shoot. These two people who if not recognized already are given a title that is only just smaller than the title of the magazine, and are themselves covereing part of the magazine itself. These two people are Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg, who are shown in a unatural inquisitive pose which could link to the type of film that they are doing, There background is not a normal plain screen either, they are given an aluminium finish backround which could link to the type of film they are doing whether it involves an influnce in modern times or working in the aluminium business.

Below the picture, is a large title saying Cruise and Spielberg, On Money, movies and their new masterpiece Minority report ( and a subtle little World exclusive title, to gain more interest from the reader). Firstly a world exclusive used around the name Tom Cruise will gain attention from people who arent even film fans so this is an excellent selling point due to his hollywood lifestyle, When the title Minority report is given the same font size as Cruise and Spielberg you know the importance of this film with it being called a masterpiece and involving two of the biggest influences on modern cinema in the 2000's.

At the bottom of the page is a picture of Will Smioth in his now familiar Men In Black costume wielding a sci-fi gun in a comical postion, this picture itself gives you a clue of a funny science fiction with Will Smith, even without the help of the tagline next to it being "Die Alien Scum, "It's men in Black II" This shows it as an important film for the year, but not quite on par with Minority report. Perhaps deliberately below the topic of Men In Black is alos the tagline "Plus! the dumbest movie ever made", maybe unintentional humour by the empire editor or a deliberate attack at the movie itself.

At the top of the page is the title "The Matrix is back" which shows the return of the Matrix with it's sequel, again being at the top of the page could link to its lack of appeal being a sequel, Next to this is the iconic image of keanu reeves wearing his sunglassses and lookin cool, and with more exclusives that make movie fans drool, the on set photo's and a conversation with the film's producer Joel Silver. This smaller advertisement shows enough importance to be on the front cover but only to be kept out of the way iof the huge exclusive they have with Cruise and Spielberg.

The page itself only portrays three films which either links to a slow month in the film business or simply showing the three biggest movies of that time, also the huge advertisement of Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg are the main selling point, as well as the inclusion of Will Smith and keanu reeves, the three films are of no real importance ot the selling of the film.

From this Cover, it shows exactly what we are unable to do, in showing two huge movie people they sell it themselves and the film they are advertising is a mere ireelivance, unlike our situation where our selling point is sex appeal and the film itself.