Audience interview - 17 year old student

We conducted a personal interview along side our audience survey's to find more out about our audience. I asked a number of questions to draw to qualative data aswell as our previous quantative data. He answered in that 'Shutter Island' was one of the Psychological thrillers he mostly enjoyed recently, and he saw this because of the trailer that he saw. This tells us with a good enough trailer marketed in the right way, we could gather a strong audience to come and see our film.

In the interview he was impressed from the trailer of 'Shutter Island' and talked about how the high action scenes and locations most of all made him go to see the film. We learnt that people like to be 'thriller by mystery' in the genre we have targeted, we should remember this quote as it is useful and vital to the making of our film. Also we were told that the audience like to 'not be able to trust what they are seeing'- we need to to promote this concept in our short trailer.
The film 'Black Swan' came into conversation and although our interview guest didn't enjoy the film that much, he liked the way in which it was marketed and produced. He remarked on the fact that the film was a bit 'weird' and 'strange' sometimes the audience prefer in this genre to not go over board with an elaborate concept. He also spoke about how in almost all Psychological thrillers that there was a central character that events happened to, he pointed out that they should be 'interesting' and 'convincing'.
Overall we learnt from this interview that our audience have specific tastes in our genre and that we should meet the guidelines that people expect from a Psychological Thriller.

Audience Research and Analysis

Main target audience profile

Our audience's age would be core, 15-24- so it ranges from teenagers to young adults. From our survey we have concluded that Psychological thriller as genre is neither male or female orientated, this is due to that fact that pretty much all films in the genre have a central character that the world seems to distortedly revolve around. Although our age seems to stop at 24, we believe our genre would also reach an older niche audience of educated 24- 32 year olds, past those ages there is a decline of 32+ people going to the cinema. This niche audience is because in Psychological thrillers, you have be slightly more intellectually gifted to grasp some of the ideas and concept as they tend to be rather philosophical.

Certification, Marketing and Distribution

We would want our film certification for a 15, the violence included would not be too strong but more towards the torture element. Our horror element would also add to this due to our choice of genre- this would not be constant but would be shown quite a lot in our final scene. The language would also be of a 15 certification, strong but not using words that would raise it to an 18. 15 attracts the core audience because of the certification, we don't believe that it would be an 18 as our content would not be explicit enough. We aim to have our trailer certified as 12A, so it can be shown on TV from 7.30 in the evening onwards and can be shown in most cinema screenings.

Audience Pleasures and Intertextuality

Our audience would be a cognitive one- they have a desire learn and think through problems. This explores other sub genres within our film such existentialism, where you are made to this about the deeper things in life, this again links to hyper reality. Hyper reality is prominent topic and technique applied to our genre this is shown in films such as 'The matrix' and 'Shutter Island'. Our audience would not be entirely cognitive though our audience also are slightly affective- they want to explore emotion and sympathize. This is not completely true of all Psychological thrillers but has been used to create effect in many films, but has been in 'Donnie darko'- a film which influences us greatly.

Psychological thrillers are globally incredibly popular, 'Shutter Island' was the top of European and Asian DVD and Blu Ray sales- this shows the global influence of the chosen genre.

Our film would have to have appropriate and interesting themes to catch this global cognitive audience. From our survey the themes people like to see are:

. Horror Element

. Warped Perception

. Confusion

. Central Character

. Intensity

. Darkness

. Twisted Behavior

. Believable Dialogue

Quantitive Analysis

For a successful film we need to listen to what our audience want and say- we should look into these theme and how in incorporate them into our trailer. In one of our interviews some said in question to 'what catches your attention in trailers', they answer ' I am most interested by the overall locations and action that happens in the film, this because I can get an idea of the vibe of the film'- this tells us the audience like to see a range in trailers, so they can distinguish what they will get from seeing the film.

60 % of people we surveyed said they actively made an effort to watch trailers, this tells us trailers are vital to the success of films, in our trailer we have to make sure we include all aspects of a Psychological thriller- to promote our film. Web 2.0 has proved ever dominant as 91% of people watched their trailers on youtube, so releasing a trailer on the internet proves to be the most popular way of watching a trailer.

We asked 'What trailer of the past year has caught your attention the most and why?' The most answered trailer was Harry Potter Deathly Hallows and the reasons were

. ' Because it was constantly shown on the internet and put in my face'

. ' Exciting and fast paced'

. 'The CGI was amazing'

This gives us an outline to what our audience enjoy from trailers. Many people answer Black Swan and talked about it being, 'weird' and 'very twisted' these are themes we need to have and promote in our trailers. 46% of people in our survey said they were very likely to see Phycological thrillers and 38.5% of people said maybe- this shows we have a popular genre and we have to create something unique and innovative to attract our active audience.

'Inception' was the most heard about film with 79% saying so. This shows that Physiological thriller can dominate the mainstream film audience and with an interesting and unique concept our film can succeed. Doing the surveys were incredibly useful and an effective way of finding more about our audience.

Survey

Click here for survey


Survey to Take to get information about our audience that we can analyse

What are the conventions of your chosen film genre and which aspects of trailers in the genre influence you?

What are the conventions of your chosen film genre and which aspects of trailers in the genre influence you?

I have chosen to use the hybrid genre of psychological thriller, famous films that represent this genre are ‘Donnie Darko’, ‘Black Swan’ and ‘Shutter Island’ recently. The classic and original psychological thrillers pioneered the genre, this films being ‘Mulholland drive’, ‘A clockwork orange’ ‘Physco’ and ‘American Physco’. The director that mostly inspires me is David Lynch, films such as ‘Eraser Head’ and ‘The elephant man’ especially grabs my attention because they have an element of completely absurdity.





This simple yet very effective trailer, has a bold image and only really contains shock factor and complete mystery, I would hope to include the idea of shock into my teaser trailer. I think only going down this route would be a mistake as a trailer like ‘Black swan’ give more of an eerie essence and promotes the vibe to the film. In the trailer you are made to feel uncomfortable and feel like you are sat in the wrong chair- I like this feel that the genre has and I want to pick up on this.





The idea of isolated perplexed central character is used in every psychological thriller, Natalie Portmans’ character in ‘Black swan’ is similar to many- they start out seemingly human and as the course of the film continues the spiral of mental decline is inevitable. The audience are made to sympathise with this character and are made to be in their shoes, this makes you as a viewer almost undertake the Psychological part of the thriller.





‘Shutter Island’ really portrays this ‘solo’ mental quest in the thriller, you are made to toy between the opinions and powers of others in the film, this make it entirely thrilling, with a good strong concept behind your film it can really involve your audience. ‘Shutter island’ has a hyper reality inbuilt into it, I would love to try and tackle this idea and involve into my film trailer. This concept has proved to be very successful with films such as ‘inception’ and ‘The Matrix’- two huge block buster films of our lives. Again this central character is completely vital in ‘shutter island’ played by ‘Leonardo di Caprio’.

‘Psychological thriller is a specific sub-genre of the broad ranged thriller and Horror genres. However, it often incorporates elements from the mystery and drama genre, in addition to the typical traits of the thriller genre’-definition-Wikifilm
The genre includes many elements this means you can have a strong influence of one genre over another to create an individual feel and concept. An example of the dominance of another genre is drama in ‘Mulholland Drive’ which although is a Psychological thriller, has a very raw and dramatic feel as opposed to a film like ‘Scanners’ which has more of a futuristic vibe to it.


I would like to inject my film trailer with a horror aspect to it, as I have done previous research about horror I understand how I could interlink both drama and horror together. In psychological thrillers the horror is more from the mind rather than reality- this allows creativity to a concept. One of my favourite examples of this is Kubricks classic ‘The Shinning’.





The trailer in my eyes is very effective, the story line is simply explained and gives a real feeling of panic and horror with the added Psychological breakdown thrown in amongst it, the idea of a character alone in their own mental world is again shown here. The music is far less background in this trailer compared to the others as clearly ‘The shinning’ is more Horror based as we here the classic screech sounds. A great deal of the trailers use similar effects to establish the genre, one of the key ones is flashing images, this give off a feeling of confusion and lack of control- everything that a Psychological thriller should be about.





Although now it seems very dated ‘Rosemary’s baby’ was once incredibly disturbing for a modern audience, the idea that in our normal world a paranormal event can overwhelm our lives is common in many of these films. I am really attracted to the religious twist some films use, especially in this as a woman is impregnated by the devil- it adds controversy and the core audience it really excites them. Also ‘the wicker man’ has a similar vibe I would love to try and re create something modern, that has the same aesthetics of these films.

The Main themes I have come across whilst researching the genre are:
Reality
Perception
Existance
Identity (often confusion with identity)
Life and Death

These are constant themes that can be applied to all Psychological thrillers, one film that explicitly shows these films is 'The Machinist' featuring Christian Bale- the story of insomniac, who ploughs throgh a banal life but in his own sense of reality.



This fantastic film particularly cares for the identity theme as he doesnt know himself or can trust himself I would like to apply this to my film, as it adds a create deal of drama to the genre.

Film Trailers

Trailer Questions
1) What cinematic techniques are used to establish mood and tone?
2) How does the trailer establish the themes and narrative?
3) How does the trailer establish genre?
4) Who is the target audience and how is this audience targeted in this trailer?
5) What is the reason/ effect for using the director's name and previous work?

1) First of all a dark and suggestive orchestral soundtrack is used, the sounds also link with events from the trailer, for example the bass increases when the water ripples to enhance the serious and existential tone of the film. There are lots of close up shots and Leonardo Di Caprio to show his main and leading role, and how he emotionally reacts during the film, this helps the viewer gain and understanding of what sort of mood the film should follow. An action slow motion is shown to portray the high intensity and quality of Inception, it shows that it is a high concept and high budget film that should and will gain a Blockbuster status. A voice over taken from the film is louder than the music and roughly explains the philosophy from the narrative of Inception, this helps the audience to understand the tone of the film, and hope to establish genre. Only scenes of emotional intensity and what looks like occurrences of disasters are really shown to push the idea of dark and futuristic tone.

2) Themes of the existential are brought up throughout the voice over, this is directly establish but the meaning can be lost due to the incredible cinematic. The theme of a dystopia are brought about as the bending world is shown, also an example of the CGI that is used heavily through out the film, this is also true of a POV shot through a window and a city on fire, tying in with a typical disaster movie theme. Narrative is not portrayed as especially fluid in the film, we can understand that Di Caprio is a central ‘hero’ character who is trying to save himself in a changing mind warping, dangerous planet, and that he develops bad and good relationships with people.

3) Genre is established through the full on soundtrack that stays at the same high tempo throughout the trailer, this shows its an non stop action type film. We soon find out that the film is no so typical and has an existential genre to it , (similar to The Matrix) we learn this through the voice over and scenes of un typical disaster scenarios, such as the cup tilting. The action side is made very clear with Di Caprio in a suit running with a gun ( James Bond- Hero character) and a rail car steaming down a main city road un controlled.

4) The core audience age of 15-24 I think is the audience target age, as most of the characters are fairly young who are central to the piece, the age correlates with the action genre in which this age its appeals most to. The action adventure audience are particularly targeted as action scenes dominate the trailer, although there is the niche market of existential film viewers target at the same time. Another niche are CGI fanatics where in the trailer its is clear millions of dollars have been spent to create a realistic future environment.

5) ‘From the Director of ‘The Dark Knight’’ is used to show off that the director of Inception has created a previous Blockbuster, and this is almost treated as a guarantee that Inception will follow up to the previous standards. Film enthusiasts will also know instantly from this fact given in text that Nolan is also accountable for ‘Momento’ and ‘ The prestige’ which are two other very well received films, this showcasing in the trailer acts as a pull factor for the market of ‘The Dark Knight’.
1) How does this trailer promote and focus on the big star? (look at camera work, editing, sound...etc..)

2) Action films are thought to appeal to a predominately male audience. How does this trailer target both a female and male audience separately?

3) How does this trailer use editing to create atmosphere?

1) The trailer heavily promotes Angelina Jolie as ‘Salt’, this first establishing shot of a close up of her this tells the audience that she belongs as the central and key character. There are many other clips of her close up, this allows and audience to adjust to a the actress and we see dialogue with her and man to establish what sort of role she will be playing. The tagline question is used ‘Who is Salt?’ and later indirectly the titles answer with bold silver font ‘Angelina Jolie this helps to create hype around the character. Jump cuts are made between the different stages and images of ‘Salt’ this makes her seem like a strong and unique character.

2) Putting it bluntly Angelina Jolie oozes sex appeal for the male audience and once again she is shown in this light as she has a number of tight outfits, carries weapons ( Lara Croft imagery) and is shown to be enjoying some sort of sex in the trailer. As we soon find out her role isn’t that typical and she is shown to be a strong and vastly independent woman fighting at first with the law and suddenly against, this now pleases a male and female audience, helping to widen the audience as much a possible for the film

3) At first slow motion shots and cut together to give a brief narrative and understanding of Jolie’s initial role, close ups are used to create mystery and intensity. Then unusually for a trailer a long scene is shown to promote the narrative, interweaved this scene jump cuts between this scene to show the audience what the narrative speech translates to visually in the film, this creates and air of lure for the audience as its already gets you asking questions and doubting characters within the film. The trailer is very involving and you a given a range of different shots of ‘Salt’ in various situations, this creates and tense atmosphere in which the viewer wants more from the trailer, this is incredibly successful as a trailer as narrative and tone are both made very clear.

Heartbreaker
Look at these different trailers and make notes on the difference between them and the reasons for these differences
- Look at the different tone - the editing, sound (especially v/o), camera shots
UK-
Fast paced. Familiar soundtrack. Different women. Central character displayed. Brief voice over the beginning to establish seemingly simple narrative. Simple title is shown. Followed by a finishing ‘joke’. Character to be shown in a very good light.

Europe-
Initial brief voice over. Character to be shown in bad and scandalous light, not
very likable. Titles of other actors displayed. Far less raunchy compared to the UK.

French-
Character shown in a clumsy selfish light. More characters are introduced, the team of 3. Voice over again used much like the other, all three use same shot of slow motion feet walking. Also uses a joke but this time at the beginning of the trailer.

MAIN DIFFERENCES:
Order of trailer narrative

Portrayal of Main character

How the character turns out

Horror/Psychological Thriller Trailer Analysis

Grave encounters immediately establishes genre, a mock-umentry horror much like its predescesor 'Paranormal Activity' which launched this genre in to the big time. The institutions are left fairly casual due to the extreme content of the trailer, and that its not such a 'blockbuster' production.

The handi-cam style is clearly portrayed even in the trailer as it has used a theme in the titles and editing to compliment this style. Its structure and pace starts off slow and around the mid way section a montage is used to create realism and to add excitement. Sound is key to this trailer as the last two shots incorperate enhanced sound effects.

The target audience is clearly the core audience, mainly for a male audience as horror is a male dominanted category. This trailer doesn't especially brake boundaries as far as construction goes, but again this is typical for horror and usually narrative is incredibly simple and shallow.Overall I believe this to be successful, as it has key elements that have been used to full effect, and one part in particular did genuinely scare me.





Primal aims for a more adventure and historical approach in compemporary style, this is showed at first through the title which are fairly modern and technical. Also shown through the adventure like soundtrack.

We are given an idea of setting through initial long shots and characters and quickly introduced through action clips and small dialogue. There is a constant and slightly persistant use of enhanced sound effects which achieves an eerie and disturbing mood.

The trailer is effective, but the titles are quite meaningless and stressed which takes quite alot from the main peice. Elements of the natural underlie this trailer and believe this could have been used to a greater effect.




We are presented with intriging opening titles that are incredibly basic, but the information and content makes the viewer terribly engaged. We are eased into the vaticant city with a beautiful establishing long shot. Soon we are informed that 'Antony Hopkins' is an award winning actors that is staring in 'the rite'- this already gains a unique usp.

The trailer reveals a rough structure to the narrative and reveals little into the complexities of the film, this makes the films seem less deep but appeals to a less intellegent market aswell. There are more titles that fade in and out of sequences to inform the audience about the narrative. As usual there is end montage that shows alot of action and horror, follwed by an ending punchline. This trailer is very slick and hours after I even had to watch it.




We are greated with 'whats the first thing you remember...FIRE' immediately its obviously a thriller horror. The titles soon show the legendary director 'Jon Carpentor' also we are told he is actually 'the legend', this attracts the initial following audience of his films such as 'Vampires'.

Again the production of the films is shown off, and again we find out its the same director as the globally appreciated cult horror, 'Halloween'. The 'sexy woman' role which is consistantly used in horror, is put the forefront of this short of the 4 trailers, this is mainly because of 'Amber Heard's' reputation and aesthetic she adds to 'the ward' Once again a finishing clip is used to leave to audience with something to reflect on and to be scared, which is what needs to be achieved. I think this trailer is again good, but appeals to a less picky market than the other and it seems far more teen based, although Jon Carpentor has a huge adult fan base

Matrix Theory

2. Upon Neo being woken up for the first time

Morpheus: Welcome to the real world...

Neo is awoken into this seemingly new world, which is the future world in which he believes he has been living in. Morpheus acts as a guide and mentor for the character, this helps the audience gain an understanding of the theory woven into the media text. Baudrillard's theory of hyper reality is what drives a great deal of what the matrix is and about, is what we are living in real?

Simulacra and Simulation was his theory behind mass media and meditation. The concept of Simulacra also involves a negation of the concept of reality as we usually understand it. Baudrillard argues that today there is no such thing as reality, so the world that Neo has been living in is purely fake and the ship he inhabits is really the real world.

'Welcome to real world' allows the audience to adapt to this new concept that has been similarly used in films like 'source code' and 'Inception'- in which large scale disaster events occur in a society. This relates to model figure 2) the (former) Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, which replaced a New York of constantly competing, distinct heights with a singular model of the ultimate New York building: already doubled, already reproduced, itself a reproduction, a singular model for all conceivable development.

Being welcomed into this new world shows what is possible within this theory, that the world we live in is 'just pulled' over our eyelids- we live in matrix.



3. The program

Morpheus: Your appearance now is what we call residual self-image. It is the mental projection...of your digital self. Two chairs appear in front of them, and Neo reaches out to touch one. He runs his hand along its back.

Neo : This....this isn't real?

Morpheus looks at him

Morpheus : What is real? How do you define real? If you're talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain….

'What is real' Morpheus says, this can be applied to media texts, such as the news- how can one person in another country really know what they are seeing is actually happening unless they are there. Baudrillard claims reality is like a menage-a-trois with identical twins (attractive ones, Baudrillard seems to assume), where the fantasy comprises having perfection reproduced in front of your eyes, though the reality behind this reproduction is nil and impossible to comprehend otherwise, since the twins are still just people. This directly relates to this 'program' that Neo has been placed in and that his appearance is just a 'residual self-image'.

Neo replying with 'This...this isn't real' shows humanity's ignorance and fickle nature to the fact that we could be living in a superficial earth. Point 2 of simulacra and simulation, The second stage is perversion of reality, this is where we believe the sign to be an unfaithful copy, which "masks and denatures" reality as an "evil appearance - it is of the order of maleficence". Here, signs and images do not faithfully show us reality, but can hint at the existence of something real which the sign itself is incapable of encapsulating.

7. The Oracle

Neo looks around the room, and sees he is the only adult there. Most of the children's heads are shaved. Some are playing, others meditating, or practising their gift. Neo watches in amazement, as a little girl levitates wooden alphabet blocks. He turns around, and sees a skinny bald boy sitting on the floor, holding a spoon, which sways and twists as he bends it with his mind. Neo crosses over to him, and sits in front of him, interested. The boy looks at Neo as he picks up a spoon and tries to imitate the boy's actions. Despite his best efforts, Neo cannot make it bend.

Spoon Boy : Do not try and bend the spoon...that's impossible. Instead only try to realize the truth...

Neo : What truth?

Spoon Boy : There is no spoon.

Neo : There is no spoon?

Spoon Boy : Then you will see, it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.

'Instead only try to realize the truth' this line from the infamous spoon boy, tells us how we should try to think outside of the box instead of being contained within. this is closely 'associated with the postmodernity, where the simulacrum precedes the original and the distinction between reality and representation vanishes. There is only the simulacrum, and originality becomes a totally meaningless concept'. This shows how Baudrillard's theory realates in parrallel with the media industry. this idea of a kind of pre concieved perception in our mind tie in with the 'fourth stage is pure simulation, in which the simulacrum has no relationship to any reality whatsoever. Here, signs merely reflect other signs and any claim to reality on the part of images or signs is only of the order of other such claims'. Baudrillards theory is complex and difficult to follow but in 'the matrix' aspects are used to create a strong narrative structure that involves the audience deeply, and leaves a profound effect on them, this is partly down to why it achieved such success. Baudrillard's 'simulacra and simulation' is even shown within in one of the scenes, and this adds a slight humour to piece.