2. Audience Pleasures are provided through Genres;
These are some of the examples of how audience gain pleasure through different genres.
The genre itself offers pleasure, this is argued by Rick Altman (1999)
Emotional Pleasure – Romantic films as it engages with the audience, the storyline may link
with their love life. Horror films as it creates anxiety. For example, ‘ The Conjuring’ created
emotional pleasure because the characters were miserable and their family was shattered
due to problems that occurred in their life.
Visceral Pleasures – Horror/ Thriller/ Action. For example, ‘World War Z’ had actions and
horror which created jump scares, making the audience to watch more to see what happens
at the end.
Intellectual Puzzles – unravelling a mystery or puzzle e.g. ‘The Visit’. The puzzle was that the
two kids didn’t know who their grandparents were but at the end they find out everything.
Audience Pleasures and Genres
3. Horror film audiences may take pleasure in the appearances of certain mise-en
scene. For example, the location of the setting, how it looks and what it shows to
the audience; danger, sinister, mystery or darkness associated with the house.
For a horror film to be effective, the positioning of the audience needs to be
perfect, for example, in a scene where we are in the shoes of the victim waiting
for the killer to attack us which can be exciting and create jump scares.
The use of some camera angles also effect how audience react to certain things.
For example, the use of point of view of an innocent character can force the
audience to enter and experience the fear of the victim, the dangerous situations
we experience make the pleasure of the film final and our safety even more
substantial.
Physical effect on the audience such as the feeling of being on a roller coaster;
This can be seen in thrillers, actions and horrors. The genre of the film makes us
feel like we are on that amazing roller coaster.
Films that create suspense! I personally, really like these types of films as I feel it
challenges the mind and actually makes you as the audience think in to more
detail about every aspect of the film; makes you think about what is going to
happen next which increases excitement as we the puzzle or confusion gets
revealed slowly.
How audiences gain pleasure in horror films?
