target audience results- miss miller

We carried out this research to help us see what would be best to include in our opening scence and what would appeal most for our audience. From questioning 40 people it has come to the conclusion of what people prefer in a thriller and what they do not, this helps me create my opening scence as i know now what to include for it to appeal to a wider audience of people and what bests suits the age range I have chosen my thriller to be for.

We asked a range of people ages 12 to 18 plus how old they are. Most people who we questioned were in the age range of 18 and higher as this is whom our opening scence is going to be created for, so we thought it was best we knew their thoughts on films.

Secondly we asked more males then females, this is because males are sterotypical to prefer watching a thriller film, so typcially they would know what is best to have which would appeal to a wider audience. Although we also asked females as they tend to watch thrillers less we wanted to see what they do and do not like about it, so we could include more into our scnece which would encourage females to watch it too.

Seeing as the majorty of the people we asked were age 18 and above, the prefered age ceritifcate to watch was age 18. Although 14 people liked watched aged 15 and 5 prefered certificate 12, age 18 came out best with 21. This is because the people questioned explained how films of a higher certificate are more endepth and intrige the viewer to watch further and find out more. The people asked who prefered a certificate of 12 and 15 said it was because it was easier to watch and less of a narrative behind it, so they didnt find it confusing.

From our results we found that what people liked to see in a typical thriller was an hidden identity being used. Which has influenced us further to include a hidden identity in our own opening scence as this would appeal to those we have questioned and help create tension and suprise, which is sterotypical to a good thriller, linking onto this i found that they also expected to see a murder or kidnap in a thriller, which i will try to use in my opening scence linking the hidden idenitiy together so it appeals to the audience more.

We found out that most of the 40 people questioned like a sequel to the film, if it was interesting and carried on from the previous film, from this we also found that the audience liked to see a cliff hanger, this would help the director create more money as the audience would go see the sequel. Which is why in my opening scence i am going to end on a cliff hanger, as this would cause the audience to pay more attetion because they want to know whats going to happen.

For our opening sequence we wanted to include sounds as this helps create tension and builds atmosphere making the opening scene more indepth and making the fear factor increase.When we asked the 40 people what they would prefer to hear the majorty said that they like to here tension building sounds such as a ringing or heartbeat as this helps them relate to the victim and makes them more vunreable.

Following on from this from our results we found that most people prefered to see people of a similar age to them and random people being the main focus on screen rather then a celebrity, as this helps them relate more to the film and helps them build a relationship with the character. This helps us as when we make our opening scence we will include people who are of age as the film is setted for so it will be open for a wider audience. This then linked with the question 'what characters do you like to see' we found that most people prefered victims. This may be because the audience will have a more emotional bond with them because they can see the pain their going through, also that it would make a film more intense when more killings are included, as this relates close to the thriller range.

In my opening scence I will set it in a dark location as this is what the majorty of people voted for as this helps create tension and uses the theme of hidden identity well, which also will help relate it to a typical thriller.

Although the majorty of people asked were male and the questionaire was based on thrillers, a range of people said they would prefer to see other sub genres included, such as horror, crime, romcom, sci-fi,gangsta and others. This may be because it will help add a better narrative and appeal to the wider audience, also helping the audience relate to the narrative more as it will include other narratives.

The main purpose most people found they prefered in a film was for it to either scare you or entertain you. Which is why in my own film I want to base it on creating a higher fear factor but also including a story line.

From doing this research i found it helped me alot and influenced me on including a range of factors into my own opening scence, helping me create a higher fear factor and having a wider audience who would enjoy it.