Evaluation question 5.How did we attract/address our

audience?

Approximately 15 students watched our thriller and took part in answering evaluation questionnaires of the film and its content. As a group our aim was to perceive how well the target audience was attracted, if they enjoyed it, and also to gather feedback on the most negative and positive elements of our opening sequence. Over 90% of the feedback consisted gave positive comments with rare elements for improvement and constructive criticism. Taking aboard this feedback, the previous audience research, which was done whilst in the planning and development stages, we found to be accurate (targeted demographic of 16-25+).

Evaluation questionnaires were filled in at the time of viewing by a selection of students from year 12, both male and female. The responses we took away from this is relevant and interesting as the age group is specifically the same as our target audience, so from this we can see if we used the correct genre conventions and themes to attract a teenage audience. If I were to do this project over I think it may have been slightly beneficial to collect feedback from a variety of age groups to discover how the wider audience’s opinion and how it differs to the opinions that we collected. 

 

The conclusions that we drew from our evaluation questionnaires filled out by our peers is that we can see that the audience thought the storyline and the originality of the mise-en-scene was the best technical elements of our thriller, receiving specific appraisal on multiple occasions. The worst element was the narrative structure with feedback stating that it lacked uniqueness. Every person stated they would carry on watching the film and it held their attention formed by the suspension, especially the final shot of the assailant holding the gun. We addressed and engaged our audience through soundtrack and non-diegetic music. The music, which we used, was urban, punchy, exciting and relevant to our storyline, which is crucial in relation to our plot and themes. From the evaluation, we can see the soundtrack was agreed to be one of the main elements which helped to build suspense and engage the audience as a thriller should; in the high drama scenes the music reflected the action. 

The location which we used in our thriller, were challenging to the genre convention. For example the swimming pool location is original an idea that is indie to an extent. It is not essentially a genre convention, though it does engage the younger audience, which is the demographic we were originally aiming for regardless. 

Originally we intended the ending to show the man being shot and falling into the swimming pool with a large bang indicating that the man had indeed died, during the editing we decided not to include this as we thought there would be too much action to fit into two minutes. We orientated the storyline so that all the action leads up to the climax at the end. We decided to do this to create suspense and engage the audience.  The ending we chose this builds the anticipation as it clearly bridges the storyline to where it would continue if the film were to continue. Personally I feel that if we had gone with the first option the suspense would have been broken and the audience would lose interest. Because the audience don’t know whether or not the man died it encourages them to continue watching our film thereby making the suspense drag out longer.

Originally we intended the ending to show the man being shot and falling into the swimming pool with a large bang indicating that the man had indeed died, during the editing we decided not to include this as we thought there would be too much action to fit into two minutes. We orientated the storyline so that all the action leads up to the climax at the end. We decided to do this to create suspense and engage the audience.  The ending we chose this builds the anticipation as it clearly bridges the storyline to where it would continue if the film were to continue. Personally I feel that if we had gone with the first option the suspense would have been broken and the audience would lose interest. Because the audience don’t know whether or not the man died it encourages them to continue watching our film thereby making the suspense drag out longer.