How did you attract and address your audience?

Within my opening sequence of Fixation, I addressed my target audience through different ways. I identified what types of things the audience would like by doing audience research and also research into popular films of the thriller genre and sub genre of crime-thriller. My target audience are around the age group of the characters within the film which immediately gives them something to relate to, I wanted the audience to feel immense sympathy for the characters which have been murdered. I achieved this by making the voice-over a news reporter who would not feel sympathy for the killer and describes him as 'dangerous', 'unpredictable' and that 'he must be caught'.

The main character of my film is the male antagonist. Whilst the film is aimed to be split quite evenly, the genre of thriller is often more popular with a male target audience. Often films which have a young male protagonist manage to gain a female audience, the killer has a quality about his which is mysterious that a female audience may what to try and figure out.

Whilst class was not a main point of my opening sequence it is clear from deduction of surroundings and clothing that the characters are not upper class, they are likely to be from a middle class background which is similar to that of my target audience.

I have created suspense within my opening sequence by using many codes and conventions of the thriller genre. My audience will be immediately asking questions, who? why? The uses and gratifications theory states that audiences seek entertainment to fill their own needs. It is essential that the first two minutes of my film appeal specifically to my target audience and would keep people interested. Whilst the promotions and reviews of a film may be the best promotions ever, if the opening of a film being shown on Film4 for example, is boring and not appealing then people will turn over to another channel.

The soundtrack my attract a target audience, within the rest of my film I would ideally include music which is composed or sung by artists who are current and would appeal to my target audience. The thriller-genre film Drive was released in 2011 and was very successful with an amazing soundtrack and last year radio 1's DJ Zane Lowe re-scored the soundtrack with artists such as Bastille who are current, fit the film well and attracted an even larger audience for the film. The music within my opening sequence was made by me and I chose not to use a well known song because I wanted all of the focus in that moment in time to be on the storyline and the main character.

Within my film opening I feel that I successfully addressed my audience by skilfully using typical codes and conventions of the thriller genre and film, openings in general.