4) Who would be the audience for your media product?
My preliminary is set in modern day London, and involves characters both male and female of an age which is over 30 years old. However, although the themes addressed in the preliminary may be more appropriate to this social group, it is not limited to this audience.
When setting the target audience for my preliminary, I researched common audiences of the genre crime thriller, as this is my chosen genre. From my research I found that crime thriller films such as ‘End of watch’ were mostly targeted at male audiences. This may be due to the fact the casting of films in this genre is mainly male-orientated. The issues raised in crime thrillers are mostly relatable to people who are part of an older age group (30-50).
The inclusion of different ethnicities in my preliminary expands the target audience, based on the characters in the film, the audience may be men and women who are either Caucasian or Black and are aged 30+, this may be because these are the social groups represented in my preliminary.
Other crime thrillers include 'Zodiac' which was voted as number 11 on uk.askmen.com’s top 25 thrillers; a website which collects the popular opinion of males. Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller was voted in first place and from this evidence, I found that crime thrillers were very popular amongst a male audience. Zodiac and End of watch proved to be mostly popular with males under the age of 18. However, the demographic for these thrillers are large.
Most crime thrillers are rated 15-18 depending on the themes present in the film. Crime thrillers such ‘Syriana’, ‘Scarface’ and ‘Se7en’ are rated R (certificate 18) in UK.
My preliminary task ‘The strange case of Amanda Deign.’ would be rated as a 12A, as there are minimal scenes of violence, no sexual references, doesn’t involve language that may be offensive and there are no scenes involving blood and gore. I decided to give my film a 12A certificate because the themes of disappearances and hatred may be inappropriate for a younger audience; this is based on the guidelines set out by the British Board of Film Classification.
In conclusion, the initial target audience for my preliminary piece would be men over the age of 20. However, due to the involvement of female character in power, the film may also appeal to a female audience as it involves empowerment of women.
Macarthy Productions