Film Magazine Front Cover Research

EMPIRE FILM MAGAZINE

In order to research film magazine front covers, the obvious place to start was researching into probably the most well known film magazine, Empire. The magazine was first published by Bauer Consumer Media in 1989 and since then, it has continued to outsell its rival magazine Total Film. On the Empire film website, users have been voting for their top 20 covers since the magazine was first published allowing me to get a range of different covers and designs the magazine has used over the years.The covers show a range of styles and approaches into creating a successful film magazine such as Empire.

Empires regular features include; a classic scene- a section of the script from a well recognises film scene, the At Home section offers DVD news and releases- Empire's editors consider this section to be of huge importance as they believe this is a main contributor to the growth in the magazines popularity, Pint of Milk questions celebrities contact with reality by asking questions such as "How much is a pint of milk?" Each magazine includes a "Spine Quote", where a challenging quote is printed on the spine on the magazine. They usually include a mix of both obvious and obscure links to the main features of the edition. Readers are asked to identify the source of the quote for a chance to win a prize. A regular feature of the At Home section is Kim Newman's DVD Dungeon where film critic, Kim Newman, reviews the months strangest releases, usually low budget horror films. Another common feature is Celebrity Mastermind where a celebrity is given questions about the films they were in or directed. Celebrities range from actors and directors including Quentin Tarantino and Christopher Lee- at the top of the leader board and  John Carpenter and Michael Keaton at the bottom of the leader board.

                       

                        

TOTAL FILM MAGAZINE

Total film is the second biggest selling magazine in Britain after Empire and was launched in 1997. The magazine offers a range of features including film, DVD and Blu-ray news and reviews. Each monthly issue consists of a variety of full-length interviews and photo shoots with established and up and coming actors and directors, to major film previews and retrospective articles. All issues contain the Total Film Interview -an in depth interview with a well recognised actor or director, along with an analysis of their work; the Abridged Script- a parody page of a recent release and Total Film loves...