Target Audience

Target Audience

The target audience for our film would be combining elements of the target audience from thriller, drama and fantasy. These genres are all combined in our film due to its inspirations coming from films such as Donnie Darko, Twin Peaks and Labyrinth.

Common themes in thriller movies would be violence and psychological issues. This would be unsuitable for a younger audience as they wouldn't understand and may feel uncomfortable. Trust Fall would probably fall into the psychological side of the thriller genre due to its surreal features and twists in the narrative. This would suggest that the film would appeal to an older and more intellectual group of people. However, due to its fantasy elements, a young adult audience would most likely be attracted to Trust Fall.

To understand our target audience, we interviewed 10 audience members who had watched the psychological fantasy thriller, 10 Cloverfield Lane. This film was a great example to work with as it incorporates elements of thriller and sci-fi/fantasy and had the certificate 12a meaning that there would be a wider range of ages.

We asked 12 audience members how old they were in order to establish what age was most popular with this genre and style of film. Our results told us that the ages of 18-25 were most popular with this film. Also, we found this film was successful and enjoyed by this age group as it received 100% positive feedback. This tells us that people between the ages of 18-25 are both interested and enjoy this genre.

It was important to find out whether the audience were interested in the genre. Our results showed that thriller was the most popular. This was surprising as the film was a hybrid of sci-fi and thriller and is a sub genre of horror. This was a good sign that thrillers are a well received genre.

This was really inspiring and reassuring as when we asked the audience whether or not they enjoyed the film they had seen, they all responded with yes. This was good for us as 10 Cloverfield Lane ends open ended, similar to ours. This could've been a risk, but the audience seemed to enjoy it.

It is important to establish how the film attracted their target audience in regards to advertisement. Our questionnaire told us that the films most effective form of advertising was TV trailers with just over half the votes and the internet with just under. This tells us that in order to reach our target audience with advertisement, the most effective way would be through TV trailers and internet exposure on social media sites etc.

It's also important to consider the audiences favourite films in order to understand what they like in films, as in the style, narrative and themes. The films which came up, all shared similar styles and themes. Fight Club, Inception, 12 Monkeys and Donnie Darko incorporate narrative twists and distortion in attempt to confuse the audience and create a sense of mystery and suspense. Blue Velvet focusses on mystery and surrealism, giving it a dreamlike aesthetic which we hope to replicate in Trust Fall. Kill Your Darlings is an example of a film which combines other genres along with thriller such as biography, drama and romance and The Shining is a perfect example of a psychological thriller which incorporates dream like and surrealist features. 

We also asked whether the audience liked twists and cliffhangers in narratives. All answered with yes, however they had different reasons for it. Some said it was because it creates more suspense and excitement however, others said they preferred there to be some kind of closure to the narrative. This tells us that our target audience will enjoy the twists involved in the film, however we need to make sure that the narrative is structured in a way which isn't too abstract or open ended.