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

Through watching our final opening sequence, I have picked up upon some unique selling points that attract the audience to our film. The first thing I thought of was by the screen grab to the right. Seeing the two main characters as young girls deviates from the conventional horror film, where stereotypically the main character of a horror film is a female, alone in a setting. By looking at the two young girls and also seeing that they are linking arms hence hinting at a relationship; this attracts our younger target audience because they somewhat relate to the film. This could be considered a unique selling point.  

Something else that I picked up on that could be considered a unique selling point is the mysterious element. When looking at this screen grab you can see a smear behind a tree, which when watching the film a mysterious person runs past our lead character. Throughout the opening sequence the audience are unaware of what, who or why this person is in this forest; something that not only confuses the audience but attracts them as to see what it is. This fast paced and mysterious element could be considered a unique selling point to the film.

To gain the audiences' feedback, firstly I issued some questionnaires to some students at school of whom I consider to be our target audience. Doing this gave me confidential information of which I used to help rectify any issues that the audience had; although most of it came back positive. The group of students also allowed our group to record their feedback upon watching our rough cut; of which again mostly came back positive. They had no ideas for improvements for our piece, except giving us ideas for music to add intensity. They all enjoyed the plot and commented that they would watch the remainder of the film out of choice. This gave us the impression that we have acheived our target audience.

Upon looking on the BBFC website, I believe that our film would be certified a rating of 15. In terms of showing horror, of which is most applicable to our film, BBFC states that "strong threat and menace are permitted unless sadistic or sexualised". Being a film revolved around the basis of children, actions would not be sexualised because that was not the style of film we wanted to acheive. We wanted a more fast paced and mysterious film, to which we regulate to the certificate 15. In attempt to make our audience feel fear, we may require strong language to portray this. BBFC states that "there may be frequent use of strong language (for example, ‘fuck’). The strongest  terms (for example, ‘cunt’) may be acceptable if justified by the context". It also states that "violence may be strong". To assure that I was gaining a reliable estimate of rating, I researched into other horror films to see what they were certified. "Paranormal Activity" is the route we aimed to go down, of which is a 15. Also, after looking at the regulation for an 18 certification, I think our concept is not gorey and visually violent enough to reach these regulations.