Question 5: How did you attract/address your audience?

Q5: How did you attract/address your audience?

To make our thriller appeal to our audience, we listened to what kind of conventions our audience wanted within a thriller opening and tried to include these in our thriller. Our audience wanted a thriller that contained a strong use of props, was fast paced, included a young child within it, created enigmas and had a good storyline element. We feel that we very easily filled these demands and that we have created something which is exactly what they wanted. We created a Vox Pop to thoroughly research what things our audience wanted



We made sure to create enigmas in our thriller opening. We did this by showing a board filled with newspaper clippings of young girls and reports of missing children to create enigmas that make the audience wonder where these children are now and what has happened to them and by who. Each clip hints as to what is happening in context of the film before the action actually takes place. It also creates enigmas as to what kind of person has created this and why. It portrays the character as being very obsessive and stalker like which causes the audience to wonder why this person is doing it too and what intentions do they have. We used low-key lighting to make it seem even more mysterious and we never gave away the identity of our antagonist so that it is clear that someone threatening is present within the film, however his identity is not yet to be revealed and it will not occur until later into the film. This will create suspicions on other characters that would later enter the film and keeps people guessing as to who it was at the start of the film. As well as this we also used audio clips from previous missing child cases to make it seem like this is something that has happened before and that these are the voices of the families that have had children who've fallen victim previously. We placed a reverb effect over the audio too, to make it sound like echo, so that it created more of the idea that these are memories that perhaps go through his head. So this creates enigmas as to whether or not he has actually done something like this before and how many children have previously fallen victim to him. Our audience said that they liked having enigmas within a thriller because its what engages the audience into the thriller and wants them to continue on watching the film for the enigmas to be answered. We got this information through doing our Vox Pop.



Another element we used within our product which was something that our audience wanted was a small child within the opening because they considered it quite creepy and unnerving to have someone so young in such a dangerous situation. We made her appear to look like a normal child as well, like your average school girl, to make it even more unnerving. Movies tend to avoid the reality of such events by making the child appear older or the violence not as threatening, so we thought by using someone so young and making her look so realistic it would be unnerving to the audience because it is confronting them with the harsh reality of these events. We told our actor to run through the forest and appear afraid which makes her look innocent and makes people feel sorry for her because she's confronted with something so dark which someone of her age should never have to go through. By using such a young child, people instantly feel sorry for her and feel the instinct to protect them which could cause them to instantly hate the antagonist.


We also used a wide variety of props because our audience said that a good use of lethal props was really effective. We used three main props in our thriller. These were leather gloves, a bottle of liquid and a cloth, and a piece of rope. All these props were supposed to insinuate danger and death for the targeted victim. The gloves represent how he is trying to avoid leaving any fingerprints so that he isn't caught for the crimes he has and is about to commit, the liquid and cloth represent that he is going to drug the child and so she is unconscious as he kidnaps her and the rope represents how she is possibly going to be strangled or tied up. We structured these clips to come in just after she's first introduced so that the audience immediately know that this child is in a lot of danger and that this character is intending to put her into a great deal of danger and possibly murder her. This linked to the feedback that our audience enjoy a movie that has a good plot line but is also fast paced and brings them to the edge of their seat.

Our product recieved a lot of positive feedback from those who watched it. We uploaded it onto our social networking sites and in total received 93 likes and many positive comments. Two people however mentioned there was one small fault and that was that the audio mentioned that  the 'child went missing on Saturday but she is wearing a school uniform.' However the audio is not about the child who is featured in the piece and is in fact clips of other children that have gone missing so the child missing on the weekend and the one featured in our product have no link. Within our Vox Pop, we received positive comments as well. People liked our thriller opening because it was faster paced than our previous cut and they loved the soundtrack that we put in because it really fitted into our piece and it made it incredibly realistic. The repetitiveness and the speeding up of the voices also created a lot of tension and excitements. They don't think that there are any improvements needed in our piece and overall they thought it was incredibly effective.
Our thriller links to other similar thrillers such as Se7en. Within the opening of Se7en we see a lot of close ups of sharp props and items that provoke the thought of danger. The identity of the criminal is never shown within the piece and all that is shown are his hands as he works on his books of victims and uses all of these sharp and dangerous tools. This links to our thriller because we also used an anonymous villain within our opening piece who is piecing together information about his victims and only his hands are shown throughout the scene handling the tools. The Se7en opening attracts the audience because it makes them want to watch on to find out what this person is creating with his books and why. It makes them want to understand what is happening and who the people are within the books are. So it also creates similar ideas in our opening because we keep our antagonist's identity hidden throughout the opening and it creates enigmas as to what he is doing and is going to do with the newspaper clippings and what his motif is. It is also located in a forest which is similar to The Hunger Games in which over 20 children fight to the death in an arena disguised as a forest. This isolates them completely from the outside and means that they can easily get lost and can be injured or killed by stumbling blindly through the forest alone. It also traps the children with one another and therefore puts them in complete danger. It is easy to get lost within the forest too and so it is an easy placed from them to completely get trapped within the forest and puts them in incredible danger. Our audience wanted to watch more from our thriller to find out what was going to happen to her and see if she'd be safe in the end.