Survey Responses!

Over the past few days I have received 48 responses to my survey! I am so glad that I now have such an insight into my target audience.

In order to encourage mainly young females to answer the questions I posted a link on my personal Facebook and Twitter accounts asking my friends to complete the survey. 

I then posted a video asking my 455 YouTube viewers (mainly young females) to complete the survey. 

After analysing my results I can't say I found anything too surprising. Most responses were predictable. I am pleased to say that 40 out of the 48 who answered the survey were actually female and 35 of these are within my desired target age group of 16-24. Now, this could seen be as negative and a creation of bias, however, if I wish for this to be my movies target audience then I must pay close attention to what that audience desire to see. Filling in an anonymous survey, my audience are also more likely to give honest answers.

The results of question three were particularly pleasing to me. I found that the comedy and horror genres were the most popular with 30 votes each. This clearly proves that horror is a genre popular with a younger, teenage audience. I myself am not particularly interested in the comedy genre but I accept that it is equally as popular amongst young females. I now definitely intend to create a movie opening of the horror genre for my coursework.

Least favourite film genres inspired a less clear response. Each category seems to be equally disliked by a few. However, historical clearly came top with 22 people stating their dislike for it. This may influence me to stay away from a horror movie opening set during another period (for example, as in 'The Others' or 'The Women in Black') and focus on present day; a time which is much easier for young people to relate to.

Question five, asking how often the audience actually view horror movies, also created quite a positive response. Only 3 people claimed to never watch horror movies. Most- exactly 18 or 37.5%- claimed to watch horror films once every month. This is pretty frequent again expressing just how much my target audience clearly enjoy this genre.

Question six made it very clear that characters and acting are highly important to my audience. These are the faces they will be forced to stare at on screen for an hour and a half. I think I need to be extra careful when deciding who should perform each role in my own film. I obviously want talented actors who will be able to portray the emotion of fear. I also want an actor to be able to perform a convincing death scene. I think for a young audience it is also important to use actors of a similar age group to themselves to create a connection. Attractive people are also ideal.  A beautiful actress attracts a male audience who see her as a sex object but also a female audience who view the female as someone they can relate to and see themselves reflected in (uses and gratifications audience theory- personal identification).

Looking at sub-genres only 1 person actually said Gothic was their favourite! Just 8.3% chose Slasher and 10.4% chose Documentary. Supernatural and Psychological thriller were the clear winners. I will bare these two most popular sub-genres in mind when creating my own horror movie opening as they are clearly enjoyed most by my target audience.

 

The next few questions allowed the audience free expression of their own personal opinions. They were asked to fill in text boxes explaining what they like and dislike about the horror genre in general. Common responses for positives were interesting storylines, sudden plot twists, the suspense, jump scares, watching with friends, likeable characters and a sense of dramatic irony (e.g. in Alfred Hitchcock movies the audience often know what the characters do not). 

 Many people clearly dislike the bad acting in many horror movies as well as predictable, unrealistic and boring storylines. I must take care to make my project creative and unpredictable, ending my opening on a cliffhanger. Again, it is highly important that I choose the best actors possible in order to make my film appealing. 

Popular answers for favourite horror movies were Orphan, The Others, Let Me In, Black Swan, Psycho and The Women in Black. I will remember these titles to look at for inspiration in the near future. Reasons for these being chosen as favourites were mainly due to having a more complex storyline that keeps the audience thinking. Clearly my target audience are out for something deeper than a scare.

 I have definitely decided to target my movie towards young people leaning slightly towards the female audience too. I think I must complete more research into this target audience. I plan to interview a few members of the 16-18 age group in order to collect some more information before I actually begin my planning! I will work on this from Monday the 11th after I have returned from a trip to Los Angeles.