2. TARGET AUDIENCE
To gain research of my target audience I used a website called
Surveymonkey.com to create a list of thought out questions that would help me to
define my target audience. I created it to allow myself to understand the audience
that my thriller would be aimed at but also to understand their preferences in
film, to understand what I needed to include and understand what wasn’t perhaps
so important in creating my piece. I decided on creating the survey through this
website as it was free, easily accessible and could be promoted through other social
networking websites. I also created a sheet of questions for those who perhaps do
not have such developed technology such as internet.. Here are my results.
3. AGE
40% of my audience were shown as
age 14-17 and another 40% were
shown as 18-24 years old. This gave
me a clear impression that my target
audience were predominantly young
adults. Which allowed me to research
into films that were targeted for this
audience.
4. GENDER
Here I found out that 75% of my
audience were female and 25% were
male. Therefore I could shape my film,
through characters, plotline and
representation to help the female
majority to be able to connect with my
piece. However I do feel that due to the
small scale of my questionnaire this
could be slightly inaccurate, in general
the target audience for thrillers are
predominantly male.
5. DEMOGRAPHICS
Through this question I was able to
learn that 50% of my audience were in
full time further education whilst 18%
said that they were in full time
compulsory education. This lead my to
see that my target audience was going to
be predominantly dominated by a
student audience. Therefore I could see
that my piece would be aimed at a
demographic group of c1c2d.
6. MOVIE INTEREST
I decided to collect this
information to gage my
audiences overall interest in films
in general. However I decided to
disregard it as I felt it wasn’t as
useful as other questions when
planning my thriller opening.
7. FILM CERTIFICATION
Due to the mature themes in our thriller we
decided to make it a twelve. The fact that it
contains partial nudity and moderate violence
made us feel like this was a good idea, however
we decided that as there was no proper nudity
or any appearance of blood, we didn’t make it
a 15 certificate. As well as this we felt that by
making it a 12 it meant that we could distribute
the product to a wider target audience as we
could use social media, and through our
audience questionnaire a heavy amount of our
viewers were younger than 15 so we shaped it
to their needs.
8. USES OF MY FILM FOR AN
AUDIENCE…
For me there are many uses of film, to
entertain, to challenge and to enable a
platform for creative criticism. I feel that
my piece is primarily useful for
entertainment with its psychological
narrative, thrill, and violence it fits
perfectly within the psychological thriller
genre. I feel like my film will encourage a
female target audience to also get involved
and connect as well as the encourage the
conventional male target audience to
become active participants in the piece.
9. USES AND GRATIFICATIONS
OF MY FILM FOR AN
AUDIENCE.
Throughout this film I use the uses and gratifications theory a lot. For example
during the bath scene when Annabelle is bathing herself it allows voyeurism. Due
to the previous scene asserting male dominance it lures them into a false sense of
control, this is attacked when Alice becomes the real antagonist not the dominant
father.. This contrast to Holly wood Cinema who usually would have the women in
the film as vulnerable and weak, having them as the antagonist challenges this
cinematic convention and allows my film to appeal to a wider, niche,, artistic
market. To help mislead the male audience I incorporate a lot of common thriller
shots so that the audience expect the women in the film to be typically weak and
vulnerable.
10. USES AND GRATIFICATIONS OF MY
FILM FOR AN AUDIENCE.
As well as this, for those who like the thriller genre, the plot begins with mystery and
there is a sense of gratification when the audience watch the plot unfold both through
the animation and through the later scenes. This is all accentuated by the enigma code.
OVERALL it is difficult to decide on a particular group that will form my audience as
I have incorporated lots of different elements in order to appeal to more and more
people. I’ve included : voyeurism, in order to appeal to the male audience to form
escapist entertainment and then reel them in with enigma, sinister and typical thriller
conventions in order to appeal to those who enjoy the mystery that thrillers bring, as
well as breaking some of the typical Hollywood codes an conventions in order to
appeal to the niche artistic market.
