'Insidious' Genre Analysis

'Insidious' is a 2011 psychological horror. The opening of this film is typical of one for that of its genre- everything from the mise en scene to the non-diagetic soundtrack fits with the expectations of that of the genre of this film. The titles and the non-diagetic music that goes with them also fits with the codes and conventions of this sub-genre. The main target audience, like I have mentioned in some of my previous posts, would be people of a similar age to those typically displayed in this type of film- usually young, ranging from mid teens to mid twenties. The narrative of this film fits in with the expectations of the genre. Typically, the narrative would be a young person who is put into some sort of danger, and along the narrative some less important characters to the narrative die, along with a couple of characters who may be important to the narrative. In this film, someone who is very important to the narrative dies near the end, which is what is normally expected when you go to watch a film like this. The audience get their audience pleasures because they are going to watch this film for a certain reason- they want to see what they are expecting to see, so when they do see what they are expecting they get a feeling of satisfaction and that is why you tend to get the same target audience whenever you release a film similar to this in the same genre or sub-genre of this film.

The non-diagetic soundtrack plays a big role in fitting the codes and conventions of this genre. The music is eerily high-pitched violins and piano noises at the start of the film when the credits are being shown. Typically, this type of music would be played to scare the audience because they are aware something bad will happen because the music is full of suspense and tension. The diagetic sound is quite a lot less noisy, and doesn't play a big part in what the audience can hear at the start of this film. Again, this fits in with the codes and conventions of this genre, because most of the music will be a non-diagetic soundtrack or voiceover. At the start of some films like this, there could be a voice over explaining parts of the movie or something like that. Although this film doesn't contain that, a lot similar to it made by similar companies have that in the opening of films of the same genre.