Media Studies, A Level, Critical Evaluation Question 2

1. How effective is the combination of
your main product and the ancillary
texts?
By Louis Piper

2. Synopsis
Our film “Rendezvous” is a romantic comedy that tells the story of a male teenager’s
tragic Valentine’s journey where we believes his life-long crush finally tells him that she
likes him back. After a journey that leads him to the worst date ever, he discovers that
she instead loves his best friend. We gave our film a certificate PG as our target
audience is teenagers and we wanted our audience to be fully engaged, and we
believe that not all the audience viewing the film would be able to relate to our
characters and plot if the film was a certificate U. The film contains no bad language,
violence or sexual behaviour- only as far as a kiss, so it definitely wasn’t a 12a and we
believe that some parents may not want their young children seeing a typical “teenage
kiss” so we therefore gave our film a certificate PG. Our film was inspired by a range of
films that all influenced individual scenes; “The Inbetweeners” and “Reality High”
influenced some of the events in our film, and the plot of our film was inspired by our
A2 Journey exercise short film, where we developed the storyline from the 1 minute
clip into a 6 minute short film.

3. Our Project Aims
The ‘Uses and Gratifications’ theory can be applied to convey what our aims were for
our media product. We ultimately wanted our audience to feel pleasure when viewing
our product through our relatable and likeable characters and a realistic plot,
furthermore, our film could give our audience escapism; our film’s target audience is
teenagers so creating a film with teenaged characters allowed our audience to escape
from the pressures of their high school/college life and to be entertained by relatable
and friendly teens where their only pressure and worry is if the girl of their dreams
wants to date them. We aim for our film to give our audience relaxation when
watching the film and emotional satisfaction when the credit sequence rolls. In order
to entertain our audience we created relatable and likeable characters and a realistic
plot, we additionally inserted comedy into and throughout our film to create a ‘feel
good’ feeling all the way through as well as cheerful music that is guaranteed to make
our audience smile and feel happy and cheerful. In order to make our film successful,
we created a film poster and radio advert to broadcast our film to wide audiences and
promote our film.

4. Poster Synergy
Our film poster maintains synergy with our film as both include images of the main
characters and both create and convey a positive and cheerful vibe. By including
images of our main characters, our target audience would easily be able to connect
our film to the poster, thus enticing in our target audience and advertising and
promoting our film to wider audiences.
The image of the male character is
centred at the front of the poster is the
largest image suggesting that he is the
main character. Furthermore the image is
a capture from a scene in the film, the
image suggests that he is a slightly
comedic character. Moreover, by using an
image from our film, we are maintaining
synergy and further connecting our film
to the poster, helping to promote our
media product.
The image of the female
character is placed behind the
male one suggesting that whilst
she is a main character, she is the
second main character. The image
of the girl shows her to be an
attractive girl alluding to her
beautiful character being a key
part of the film; the boy fancies
the girl etc.

5. What the poster conveys about our
film
Our poster creates a happy and cheerful vibe through
bright colours, animated and bright images and scenes
from the film that are cheerful and comedic; the bright and
comedic images help convey key themes from our film. The
inclusion of our two main characters wearing different
expressions further reflects themes; the male character
resembles the comedy in the film through a daft expression
and smile, whilst the attractive female character represents
the romance- this of course is emphasised through the love
heart background.
We additionally used clip art to insert images onto the poster, clip art was successful as
their animated images hold fun and playful connotations which is important for our
poster to convey as our film is family friendly. All of these aspects helped contribute to
the success of our film. In addition, the film poster successfully conveys key themes
within our film.

6. Inspiration for the poster
Film posters are common and successful way of advertising a media product to wide
audiences and enticing them to watch our film. Film posters can also be shared
through cross-media convergence as images of the film posters can be shared via
smart phones, which further creates success within the product. Film posters often
convey themes within the film and important information- a film poster is arguably
vital for any film’s success. In order to create a successful film poster in order to
advertise our media product, we researched into film posters of the rom-com
subgenre followed it as a guide for designing ours. First things first, the poster must be
eye-catching! We gained inspiration from a range of posters, we decided on a bright
and vibrant colour for the poster as brighter colours are more likely to attract
audiences to the film, plus after doing research we discovered that rom-coms use
bright and vibrant colours. Furthermore, we used a screenshot of Isaac’s excited
expression as he begins dreaming of his date with Isaac- this is inspired by posters that
allude to their characters’ traits and plots within the film. The Proposal suggests that
the female character is the more dominant out of the two, and in our film, Isaac
appears to be the most excited for his and Harriet’s “Rendezvous”. Plus, we decided to
use a background that conveyed themes within our film; popcorn, cinema, love and
romance, post-it notes.

7. The female character
alludes to her dominance
and clearly wants the male
character to propose, on
our poster, Isaac looks
overly excited and as if he
is dreaming about his date
with Harriet, whilst Harriet
looks less interested about
the date- both posters
allude to the events within
the film

8. Poster Drafts
First Draft: This was the original poster we chose for advertising
our film however after reflecting on it, we believed the poster
looked too busy and the fonts could be more ‘cartoony’. We
wanted a cartoon effect as our target audience is teens and
young adults and we believe a cartoon effect would appear
more friendly and thus attract our target audience, and
potential wider audiences looking for a family friendly film.
Second Draft: This was our second poster we chose
however we felt that the image was too animated, we liked
the font and title however we wanted the visuals to look
more naturalistic, with a cartoonist effect on the titles.
Furthermore, our film is called “Rendezvous” however it
can’t be a rendezvous with just one person, we believed
this looked more like a French film oppose to a rom-com.
Third Draft: For the third poster we combined the titles
from the second one, and the visuals from the first, and
we heavily favoured this poster, however there was a
ghostly shadow by the side of Isaac’s head and Harriet’s
side. We wanted our film to be perfect in order to attract
our target audience so we had to remove the shadow in
order to perfect the film and engage our audience.

9. The Final Poster
We decided on this as being our final poster as
we were happy with the visuals and text from
our third draft, and it’s overall content, apart
from the ghostly shadow next to Isaac’s face, so
we tidied the poster up and removed the
shadow giving us our final poster image,
keeping the synergy throughout our media
texts, alluding our audience to the plot, and
attracting our target audience, and hopefully
wider audiences through our bright and vibrant
images and a family friendly, romantic and
comedic imagery.

10. Radio Trailer
In order for a radio trailer to be successful, it needs to convey enough about the film in
order for the target audience to feel engaged and attracted to the film, and to
additionally convey it’s genre and what events are likely to occur- in order to attract
wider audiences. The trailer needs to find the perfect balance as it wants to convey
enough of it’s story to engage the audience, without revealing spoilers, and thus
making seeing the film pointless. The trailer should additionally contain what aged
certificate the film has been rated in order for audiences to judge whether the film is
appropriate, and of course whether they’re legal to watch it. Most radio trailers
contain quotes and audio from the final film which helps them convey the plots genre
and events which are likely to happen in the plot- plus introducing characters, it also
helps engage the audience. Following on from this, in order to attract audiences and to
present their films as a “must see” movie, the radio trailers often include critic’s
quotes (positive quotes) which are short but effective and help promote the film and
persuade audiences to come and watch. All of the narration is often played over a
sample of the soundtrack which always suits the genre and helps engage and excite
audiences. Radio trailers tend to end with the revealing of the release date or when
the film is likely to be in cinemas which excites audiences and draws numbers into
local cinemas.

11. What does our radio trailer convey about
our film?Here is the link to our radio trailer; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnO104_HmwE
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In order to maintain synergy throughout our media product, our radio trailer began
with Isaac’s monologue that he also begins the film with, furthermore, his speech also
alludes to the plot of the film which is key in order to attract our audience into viewing
our film. 0:06- A school bell rings in order to convey the setting of the film (being a
college/high school) as well as attracting our potential audience as it alludes to the
teen genre. 0:08- our soundtrack then plays in the background as our main song is a
‘feel good’ number which should attract the audience and give our film a ‘feel good’
appeal. 0:12- a voice over then advertises the film to be released in summer and a
tagline; “follow Isaac’s journey” in order to engage the audience and introduce our
main character. Clips from the film play throughout the radio trailer in order to engage
the audience and allude to the plot and the film’s events. “Will you be my Romeo?”
“I’ve waited for this day all my life” these quotes from the film allude to the romantic
genre as well as suggesting character relationships and engaging the audience. 0:31-
“But the question is, will he ever find his true match?” is another hook line which
draws the audience and entices them into watching our film and following Isaac’s
journey.

12. What does our radio trailer convey
about our film? (continued)
0:36- the radio trailer then credits the singer/musical artist of our main song- Siine ~
You need a friend. 0:40- after the singer has been credited the actors are credited, as
well as having quotes from their characters being played after their name. This is to
keep the actors names refreshed in their mind which could attract wider audiences as
some may be a fan of the actor. 0:46- the film’s production company is then stated in
order to draw wide audiences and to credit the production company responsible for
producing the film. 0:51- “Rendezvous” the title of the film is said at the end of the
film in order to keep the film’s title fresh in the audience’s mind. 0:53- the voice over
then ends the radio trailer by stating where interested audiences can find out more
information; “check out our website for sneak peaks”

13. The Uses and Gratifications Model
The Uses and Gratifications Model is what we based our aims on for our film. In this
model, the audience are active and use the product (the film) for their own
gratifications and/or pleasures. Developing this model into our aims, we wanted our
audience to use our film in order to gratify their needs of escapism and pleasure, due
to our target audience being teens, we wanted them to seek pleasure in our film and
immerse themselves in it, allowing them to escape from their day to day pressures and
stresses. We felt this model would be effective and more likely to be successful as our
target audience should be able to relate to our characters and are therefore more
likely to comfortably immerse themselves in our film, seek pleasure from their viewing
experience and gain a release from all stresses and worries.

14. How effective the combination of our
ancillary texts and final product was overall
I believe the combination of our ancillary texts with our final product was effective as
we were able to engage our target audience to our film as well attracted wider
audiences due to our success in the advertisement; radio trailer and film poster. I
believe they combined well as the ancillary texts helped attract audiences and the
final product entertained our audience- which was one of our aims, furthermore, I
believe the combination was effective due to the continuous synergy throughout both
ancillary texts and our final product creating a large advertisement platform and an
enjoyable film which entertained and suited our target audience. I believe the
combination was so effective because of our thorough research into real media texts;
we researched into radio trailers and posters that are of the same genre as our film
and analysed every aspect of our research to which we used as guidelines for our
ancillary products. Whilst using real media texts as guidelines, we made sure to keep
synergy between our final product and ancillary texts so that the combination was
effective and successful and so that throughout our journey of creating our final
product, we were able to convey the genre so that we could engage and attract our
target audience, thus creating a successful product.