Questionnaire Analysis

These graphs are based on the number or people who selected particular answers opposed to the percentages of people, there were 25 questionnaires completed in total.

I wanted to know the gender of the people filling out the questionnaire as if the results differed through males and females this shows a how males think differently about horrors to female however this was not the case and there was no link between the answers given and the gender of the persons filling it out.

This question gave me an idea of what teens would like as I was focusing my research mainly on their age range. Although it was also important to get a general overview of people’s opinions and to see whether age had any correlation to what types of horrors they preferred. There was no direct link between age and the opinions expressed however this could be due to the fact that I only surveyed 25 people and these 25 people may be very differing in opinion.

The results of this question enabled me to gain a general opinion of the conventional victim or what people believe the conventional victim to be. As the majority of opinions were that a female victim is better I am going to use a female as the main victim in my horror opening. I did wonder whether the reason that female victims were popular was because of ‘male gaze’ however many females also wanted the victim to be female.

I felt this was an important question as if we were marketing our film the internet is a prime tool which we could use for advertising as all the people I surveyed used the internet.

This again helps us to understand what methods of advertising could be effective, as the majority of people use facebook this would be a great place to advertise. Internet advertising is far more cost effective as you don’t have any hard materials to purchase.

This gave me an insight into what people really enjoyed whilst watching a film, although most people did choose psychological some also picked more than one genre this suggest that although on the whole people do enjoy psychological other factors such as the films composition and acting can influence the opinions of audience members.

Non- linear films are popular with a lot of people however I do feel that as the majority of people I asked were media students they enjoy a more in depth challenging film than people who go to the cinema for something to do although films such as the hangover have a non-linear composition and are mainstream. I personally enjoy non-linear films but linear is also popular, I think other factors also come into play as such as how the film is composed simply having a non-linear film isn’t going to attract an audience. Non-linear and linear opening are important in establishing the rest of the film, if a non-linear opening is produced it brands the film as a challenging film which usually has a bit plot twist whereas a linear opening is much more conventional. We are going to use a linear opening as we want our film to be as generic and mainstream as possible as it will attract the largest audience of mainstreamers.
It is important to establish the tone of the film through the opening, in the opening there needs to be either conflict or a dramatic event which hooks the audience into wanting it watch the rest of the film. If the opening is boring an audience member won’t want to watch the whole film this is why it is vital for the opening to be engaging for the audience.
When asked to draw an image of what the ideal horror victim and villain would be, almost all people drew a large figure over a small figure suggesting dominance through height and also many drew masked or disfigured face which I am going to take on board and use a cloak or mask for our villain.
The main convention of a horror film listed was death this is because in almost every conventional horror there is at least one death even if this is imaginary for the character an image of a killing is in almost every horror movie an audience member has seen. This makes me think that a death must be included in our opening to draw the audience in.
The question which involved predicting the outcome of the female in the picture 100% of people wrote that she would die by some turn of fate, this shows how people are influenced by conventional horrors as they are used to the victims who die being female not male so they automatically think the female in the image will die.
This questionnaire has helped me to understand the opinions of a general section of the public. Some of the ideas expressed have shown me what to include in my horror for example death and the fact that psychological films are most popular leads me to head in this direction of sub genre. The overwhelming response was that a female should be the victim in a horror and this I will defiantly take on board and use as I personally have this opinion too.