George Smith

For our thriller, we decided to create it to meet the needs of a young target audience between the ages of 18-24.

We felt that this age group was an appropriate choice, as the style of our opening sequence is like ‘The Shining’ which also appeals to this age group.

Firstly, we chose to use a young actress to fill the role of the protagonist. By doing this we allow the female audience to empathise with her knowing what it might be like in her shoes not being the dominant sex, but the male audience will still be wanting something bad to happen for the thrill. The target group would also be aware of her style and think it is a norm.

The darkness of the corridor conveys a sad, lonely and cold environment, something which our target audience will have fear from. Many are scared of the dark and knowing that this is a horror a long dark corridor with a room at the end can create tension and the fear of someone jumping out at them. Also the darkness creates a sense of claustrophobia. This all heightens the fear factor.

Young males in our target audience often take a fancy to the supernatural. We decided to incorporate this into our opening sequence, with the antagonist being slightly unreal, weird and scary therefore, creating a threat and the feeling of your privacy being invaded. This again, is something a young audience will share a similarity with as when people are young there are less options of freedom.

We attracted our audience through a number of conventions. Seeing as our opening was to a thriller, a key aspect which we wanted to use was blood, super-natural and a sense of loneliness.

These are key to creating a horror, and they definitely will appeal to our target audience.

The blood used in the sink, this created an immediate sense of horror to our target audience. This helped to create a heightened tension and an un-real event occurring, which seems scary to the audience. This is the start of the tension building sequence including doors slamming and unreal figures, which is not only created visually but also through sound. For example, the eerie ambient sounds which run throughout the piece.

The idea of a young girl, traveling alone, living out of a backpack adds the, she is the victim, factor. If is was a member of the audience, seeing that would automatically make me believe that she is going to get hurt and most likely wont make it all the way through the film or will at least die at the end.