Audience research

For our audience research we decided to use questionnaires. We used about 50 people to answer the questions-some from school and some from outside school. This means we managed to get a range of answers from people who might know a lot about thrillers or who don't know anything at all. This is what our questionnaire looked like-

1.What is your favourite sub-genre of thriller? Tick one

Psychological Political Crime Horror

Action and Adventure Supernatural


2.What scares you the most? E.g. birds, the dark.


3.What would expect to see in a thriller? E.g. blonde woman, forests.


4.What setting do you think is most effective for a thriller?


5.Do you prefer to see straight cuts or fancy transitions (fades, dissolves)?


6.Would you a rather a thriller made you think or used clues?



7.Do you think voice overs explaining what is happening in the narrative are useful?

Yes No not sure

8.What sort of music would you use if you were making a thriller? Tick one

Strings Drums Harmonious Piano

9.Describe a character from a thriller you have seen, including their name if possible and why you like them or think they are effective in their role.

10.What is your favourite thriller and why?

From reading through the questionnaires we have found that psychological thrillers are the most popular. We think this could be because it means you have to think which is also what was highlighted as being preferred to using clues. From this we think that our thriller will be good as it is going to make the audience think about what has happened, who has been hurt and what is going to happen next.

Many said that the dark and being alone are things they are scared of, so again we have used these concepts in our opening.

Strings and piano music are the two main instruments that people thought were good for thriller films. So, we are using these in our score.

As for settings, the main places were forests, the city, somewhere dark and deserted, or places that seem normal eg. houses. So we have shots filmed inside a house and in a forest near a river. This way we can get the best of two settings to appeal to a wider range of people.

Posted by Beth and Stef