This document analyzes the results of a pilot questionnaire about thriller film preferences. It finds that most respondents were female, between 16-19 years old, and preferred romantic comedies and psychological thrillers. Respondents also favored a strong independent female lead character and plots that are slowly revealed and leave viewers questioning. The document concludes that an effective thriller plot should include unexpected elements and twists to shock and intrigue the audience.

1. ANALYSIS OF PILOT
QUESTIONNAIRE
Alex, Alice andTom

2. GENDER OF RESPONDANTS
We found surprisingly that the majority of our
target audience that answered questions on our
pilot questionnaire were female.We were
surprised because it is widely known that
although many women do enjoy thriller and
horror films they tend to be more male
orientated genre’s in terms of the main male
protagonist and female damsel in distress.
However this could be due to more modern
films trying to incorporate a female audience
more, for example both ‘Friend Request’ and
‘Silence of the lambs’ have a female
protagonist.

3. AGE OF RESPONDANTS
Most of the participants who answered our
survey were from 16-19 years old, with only
two participants over 28.We think this is
mostly due to the fact that nearly all the
people who answered the survey were from
our year in school. For our final questionnaire
we will try to branch out further to both older
and younger people to see if we have chosen
the ideal target audience. However the
answers being given by 16-19 year olds is
extremely useful because this is our chosen
age range to aim the film at.

4. PREFERED GENRE
Most of the recipients actually preferred
the rom-com genre, this could
stereotypically be because the majority of
the people who took the survey were
females and that genre tends to be more
geared towards them. Psychological
thrillers however a close second in
favourite genre’s as well as horror, which
is good to know that the members of our
target audience are fans of the genre
elements we are aiming for.

5. CINEMAATTENDANCE
A lot of people who answered the
survey tended to go to the cinema
once a month.We feel this question
however narrowed the time frames
down too much as there may be
some people who find themselves
between categories may struggle to
answer the question.The reasoning
behind this question was because
one of the first places trailers are
aired are the cinema showing up and
coming films.

6. CINEMATRAILERS
This question was a follow on from the
last one, this would tell us if trailers at
the cinema have any influence on
people if they are paid attention to.
People are more likely to watch the
trailers if they are eye catching and
draw their attention in meaning our
own trailer will have to be very eye
catching from the start to attract
people’s attention.

7. PLOTLINE IDEA
The purpose of this simple question was just
to try and understand if our plotline idea
would be appealing to the target
demographic that we would be aiming the
actual film at. Some people did say no, but
perhaps this could have been the older
recipients who perhaps don’t like the idea of
social media as it is not as big a part of their
lives as it is for teenagers.

8. MAIN CHARACTER
A lot of the people who answered the
questionnaire answered that they would
prefer to see a strong independent female
character for the main protagonist.Arguably
this again could be due to the fact that most
of the respondents were female, so this
question may provide different answers if we
were to ask it again with more male
respondents this answer may differ.

9. PLOT
Most people prefer plots that are slow
revealing and leave them questioning
throughout most of the film.This may be
because one of the central ideas of the
thriller genre is to leave the audience in
suspense until something extremely
unexpected is revealed. A lot of people may
find the idea of an obvious plot boring and
not see much point in watching the actual
film itself.

10. We left this an open question so we could get a real indication of
what people want in a thriller and would excite and intrigue them.
The response's were similar in terms of having unexpected elements
throughout to keep the audience shocked and in anticipation. Plot
twists were also very common elements of the thriller genre which
will hopefully be evident in our own production.