How Does She Look? Women Displayed on Movie Posters : A
Multimodal Analysis of Posters of King Kong

Wanling Huang

doi:10.18686/ahe.v7i21.9518

How Does She Look? Women Displayed on Movie Posters : A Multimodal Analysis of Posters of King Kong

Wanling Huang

Abstract

In modern times, movie posters, as a form of visual art, are essential in human communication. Employing images, texts, colors, and other symbols, meanings are realized to convey information about the movies and gain publicity. Taking Kress and van Leeuwen's visual grammar theory as the theoretical framework, this paper analyses the posters of horror movie King Kong from three dimensions: representational, interactive and compositional meanings. A movie poster is more than just a visual stimulation with aesthetic values to
intrigue the audience. When examined from a sociological perspective, it also creates a public discourse sphere in which women are gazed
upon, and the balance of power is constantly dynamic.

Keywords

Visual grammar; Multimodal discourse; Movie poster; Horror movie; King Kong

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References

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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18686/ahe.v7i21.9518

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