Without a target audience set it would make creating and advertising a film much more difficult. A producer and director can limit down an audience through two different types of audience research these include; primary research and secondary research. Primary research is when the research conducted is original and it has not been copied from anywhere else. Secondary research is completely different to primary because you are not conducting the research you are using other people’s research and using it as a way to form a basis for it. After either secondary or primary research has been conducted it then falls into another two different categories which are Quantitative research and Qualitative research. Like primary and secondary research, quantitative and qualitative research is completely different. Quantitative research is when the research produces data and information into numbers and percentages; this can be reviewed in either a table, pie chart or a bar chart. Qualitative research is research that looks at people’s views, opinions, preferences and overall behaviour towards the film.
Films usually target one of the three main categories of audiences; these include main-stream, alternative and niche. A mainstream audience is the majority of people and the films aimed at this category are usually action or romance. Alternative films are usually films that are on a low budget and independent, these films aren’t usually shown in big name cinemas like Odeon or the Vue and they are usually shown in little film houses or film festivals. An example of alternative film would be “The Diary of a Teenage Girl” this is because it doesn’t really have big names starring in the film and also it goes against the norm and sends out a message that not everyone would want to accept. The message the film sends out is the true life of a teenage girl that they are having sex and they do swear and they do drink. Usually the main difference between mainstream and alternative is that mainstream usually sticks with stereotypes of characters and alternative sends a powerful message about either stereotypes or just society in general. A niche audience is when the film is aimed at an audience who like certain things, examples of this would be a wildlife documentary is only aimed at people who like wildlife and animals because if you aren’t into them things you will most likely be bored. A niche film would be “The Wolfpack” because the film isn’t everybody’s cup of tea.
Another way to pick your audience and looking at the different kinds of people that fill our society these consist of; age, gender, social class, religion, lifestyle, geo demographic, sexual orientation, and regional identity. Regional identity is where you come from for example if you were producing a British film you would pick whether the target audience would mostly be northerners or people from the south. Film producers acknowledge the age range of their target audience because the taste of someone between the ages of 6 and 12 is completely to someone who is between the ages of 18 and 25 and there taste is different to someone who is between 40 and 50. 6-12 year olds wouldn’t really like an action packed film and would prefer to watch something like The Lion King or Frozen. People who are between 18 and 25 would typically watch more mainstream films like The Inbetweeners and the James Bond series. Gender is acknowledged when choosing the target audience because if you are making a romantic comedy film it would be aimed at females. Romantic comedies are aimed at more of a female audience because stereotypically we see females as a gender who craves romance and love. Religion is taken into account because if you were producing a film that was making humour about a certain religion you wouldn’t be aiming the film at that religion because it could be seen as offensive. Social class is measured is measured in a scale that is called the ABC1 scale.
A = upper middle class
B = middle class
C1 = lower middle class
C2 = skilled working class
D = working class
E = working class
Each of these groups of people would enjoy seeing a different genre of film for example someone from an upper middle class and a middle class background would most likely want to see a film with a powerful message behind it or they would like a more documentary styled film.
So when the producer decides on an audience they have to use the advertising opportunities to meet the needs of the target audience.
The film the Martian advertises itself in a way that makes it difficult to tell the gender of audience they are aiming for. They have done this by making two different posters which are aiming to each gender. Both posters feature formal and direct modes of address. When a poster features formal modes of address it means that it uses sophisticated language or it uses a more formal font, when a poster uses this setting it is usually being aimed at a more of an adult audience. The genre of film is heavily portrayed in both posters because of either the settings and because of the space costume. A more direct mode of address is when the character is looking directly at the audience; another example of a poster that features direct mode of address is the poster for the latest addition to the James Bond series: “Spectre”. By keeping the same modes of address in each of the posters the producer is securing the age of audience the film will be aimed at. One of the main differences between the two posters is the colours that are used; on the poster that is targeting more of a male audience hasn’t really had any other colours added to it other than the natural colours which are captured in the original photo. On the other poster which is mostly aimed at a more female audience has got a lot of artificial colours which have been edited into the poster, these colours are mostly orange and yellow which are seen as more feminine colours than masculine. When analysing the posters you have to rely on basing everything on stereotypes.
Other than how the producer sets out the poster the setting for the trailer also determines the audience. The trailer for the film is set on mars and in the NASA building, this determines the audience to be male because we think of NASA as very male dominated and mars is like a typical location for a science fiction film so it makes me think they have gone for a stereotypical target audience. The characters featured in the trailer are unfairly split between gender which is typical for a science fiction film to do. In the trailer there are about 10 different men and only 2 women. Depending on the roles of the women in the film determine if Radley Scott has taken the film in a more unique way by making a statement or whether he has followed the herd. In majority of science fiction films the audience usually see men taking lead in the situation and basically being the overall hero and the women is either their little assistant who never seems to have their own opinion or they are the stereotypical damsel in distress.
After I watched the film I asked a total of 20 members of the audience what they thought of the film, by doing this questionnaire I have conducted a form of primary research called an exit poll. From looking back on my exit poll answers I can see that majority of the audience was male and was under 35. More males enjoyed the film than female audience members but one of the most common compliments I received about the film is that people enjoyed how the female characters were strong and career driven instead of being the damsel in distress who is relying on the man.
Films usually target one of the three main categories of audiences; these include main-stream, alternative and niche. A mainstream audience is the majority of people and the films aimed at this category are usually action or romance. Alternative films are usually films that are on a low budget and independent, these films aren’t usually shown in big name cinemas like Odeon or the Vue and they are usually shown in little film houses or film festivals. An example of alternative film would be “The Diary of a Teenage Girl” this is because it doesn’t really have big names starring in the film and also it goes against the norm and sends out a message that not everyone would want to accept. The message the film sends out is the true life of a teenage girl that they are having sex and they do swear and they do drink. Usually the main difference between mainstream and alternative is that mainstream usually sticks with stereotypes of characters and alternative sends a powerful message about either stereotypes or just society in general. A niche audience is when the film is aimed at an audience who like certain things, examples of this would be a wildlife documentary is only aimed at people who like wildlife and animals because if you aren’t into them things you will most likely be bored. A niche film would be “The Wolfpack” because the film isn’t everybody’s cup of tea.
Another way to pick your audience and looking at the different kinds of people that fill our society these consist of; age, gender, social class, religion, lifestyle, geo demographic, sexual orientation, and regional identity. Regional identity is where you come from for example if you were producing a British film you would pick whether the target audience would mostly be northerners or people from the south. Film producers acknowledge the age range of their target audience because the taste of someone between the ages of 6 and 12 is completely to someone who is between the ages of 18 and 25 and there taste is different to someone who is between 40 and 50. 6-12 year olds wouldn’t really like an action packed film and would prefer to watch something like The Lion King or Frozen. People who are between 18 and 25 would typically watch more mainstream films like The Inbetweeners and the James Bond series. Gender is acknowledged when choosing the target audience because if you are making a romantic comedy film it would be aimed at females. Romantic comedies are aimed at more of a female audience because stereotypically we see females as a gender who craves romance and love. Religion is taken into account because if you were producing a film that was making humour about a certain religion you wouldn’t be aiming the film at that religion because it could be seen as offensive. Social class is measured is measured in a scale that is called the ABC1 scale.
A = upper middle class
B = middle class
C1 = lower middle class
C2 = skilled working class
D = working class
E = working class
Each of these groups of people would enjoy seeing a different genre of film for example someone from an upper middle class and a middle class background would most likely want to see a film with a powerful message behind it or they would like a more documentary styled film.
So when the producer decides on an audience they have to use the advertising opportunities to meet the needs of the target audience.
The film the Martian advertises itself in a way that makes it difficult to tell the gender of audience they are aiming for. They have done this by making two different posters which are aiming to each gender. Both posters feature formal and direct modes of address. When a poster features formal modes of address it means that it uses sophisticated language or it uses a more formal font, when a poster uses this setting it is usually being aimed at a more of an adult audience. The genre of film is heavily portrayed in both posters because of either the settings and because of the space costume. A more direct mode of address is when the character is looking directly at the audience; another example of a poster that features direct mode of address is the poster for the latest addition to the James Bond series: “Spectre”. By keeping the same modes of address in each of the posters the producer is securing the age of audience the film will be aimed at. One of the main differences between the two posters is the colours that are used; on the poster that is targeting more of a male audience hasn’t really had any other colours added to it other than the natural colours which are captured in the original photo. On the other poster which is mostly aimed at a more female audience has got a lot of artificial colours which have been edited into the poster, these colours are mostly orange and yellow which are seen as more feminine colours than masculine. When analysing the posters you have to rely on basing everything on stereotypes.
Other than how the producer sets out the poster the setting for the trailer also determines the audience. The trailer for the film is set on mars and in the NASA building, this determines the audience to be male because we think of NASA as very male dominated and mars is like a typical location for a science fiction film so it makes me think they have gone for a stereotypical target audience. The characters featured in the trailer are unfairly split between gender which is typical for a science fiction film to do. In the trailer there are about 10 different men and only 2 women. Depending on the roles of the women in the film determine if Radley Scott has taken the film in a more unique way by making a statement or whether he has followed the herd. In majority of science fiction films the audience usually see men taking lead in the situation and basically being the overall hero and the women is either their little assistant who never seems to have their own opinion or they are the stereotypical damsel in distress.
After I watched the film I asked a total of 20 members of the audience what they thought of the film, by doing this questionnaire I have conducted a form of primary research called an exit poll. From looking back on my exit poll answers I can see that majority of the audience was male and was under 35. More males enjoyed the film than female audience members but one of the most common compliments I received about the film is that people enjoyed how the female characters were strong and career driven instead of being the damsel in distress who is relying on the man.