To further my research I carried out a questionnaire on 10 students at my college to discover how my target audience perceives films in the thriller genre, and to find out which options for my final piece would appeal to them the most.
For my first question I asked the students at college how old they were, and the majority were 16 years old and a few were 17. This identifies this age group and people around this age as my target audience, which is the age group I suspected as the target audience anyway.
My third question surveyed how often my target audience watch films from the thriller genre, and my results highlighted that even though the majority enjoy these films they rarely spend time watching them. The majority of the students answered that they watch thrillers monthly or rarely, with only one student saying that they watched one every week. This may be because this particular age group doesn't have a particularly steady income, so they cannot afford to go on multiple cinema trips or buy lots of DVDs. However, these answers have confirmed that they all spend some of their free time watching this genre of movie, so this reinforces the fact that the thriller genre is popular with this age group.
The next question asked my target audience what their favourite thriller film was. Surprisingly they all had similar answers even though it was an open-ended question, which suggests that the narratives they enjoy are all similar in structure and perhaps revolve around similar themes. The Hunger Games was the most popular answer, which revolves around multiple characters from different areas of the globe battling to the death in an arena and a love triangle between three of the characters. This can help to influence some of my ideas as The Hunger Games is also based on lots of suspense, tension and mystery, so I will try and incorporate these themes into my own narrative.
For this question I asked the 10 students what they would associate with the thriller genre, so I could receive more ideas on what conventions I should incorporate into my thriller opening. The majority of the students answered that they associated thrillers with tense music and suspense, which I will try and feature in my opening as much as possible in order to create a sense of mystery and anxiety for the audience. I will also incorporate some non-diegetic music throughout my opening to reinforce the suspense and tension that I will create through strategic camera angles and narrative enigmas.
My second last question was used to highlight which colours my target audience would like to see featured in my title credits throughout my thriller opening. The majority of my audience agreed that the colours red, grey and black would suit my title credits best, as these colours are often seen in thrillers and the colours red and black connote danger and anonymity, whereas grey/silver is often associated with negativity which would suit my narrative well.
Izzy and I had multiple ideas for what we should name our thriller, and narrowed it down to 4 options that we think would go well with the narrative. We then offered these options in the survey to see which title our target audience likes the best and is most intrigued by. Mark My Words received the most votes which Izzy and I also liked the best out of our options as it suggests that some form of revenge has taken place or will take place in the rest of the film, and creates a sense of intrigue and mystery.
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