Year Eleven Focus Group:
Josephine and I conducted a focus group consisting of three year eleven students who were all female. We first showed them a trailer of the film 'SKET', a British Urban Gangster Film that consisted of an all-female gang instead of the typical male gang. Male gangs are predominately shown in Gangster Films but for our film we want to do something different and out of the norm. Then we showed them a second trailer of the film Lights Out, a Horror Film.
Firstly, we asked the girls what they did like about the trailer and one mentioned the fact that the Sket trailer was different and gangster, “street” films as she called it, usually have males featured in the film but this trailer featured girls. Another girl stated that she found it more interesting to see the girls’ perspective on how a life of crime is like. From this, I am fully aware of how our all-female gang will be perceived. Our target audience will like them, enjoy watching them and also be able to relate to them.
Secondly, we asked the three young females what they didn’t like about the trailer. One explained that she didn’t like the transitions in the trailer and felt that scenes were moving in and out too quickly. She felt confused sometimes and felt that there should have been a longer build up between scenes, to also create dramatic tension. They understood the plot of the film clearly from the trailer, something that needs to be the same for my own film trailer. However, what I don’t want to do is give away too much information within the trailer and bore my audience. I want to give away just enough information for the audience to want to watch the entire film.
Another key moment in the trailer that the girls said stood out to them was a bus scene between the female gang and a group of boys who were harassing them. A girl mentioned that she felt the tension increase in the bus scene and there was a lot of suspense as you wanted to know what happens next. In my own film trailer, I want to create a lot of suspense and tension, two key emotions that will be beneficial in making my target audience want to wait long enough for the release of my film. The scene between one of the female’s siblings and a dangerous drug lord was another key moment in the trailer that the girls found interesting. It was filled with a lot of tension and the heartbeat sounds in the background made everything seem even tenser and edgier.
Next we showed the girls the Lights Out trailer before moving on to asking them questions about it. From the Lights Out trailer, they liked that it was scarier than the first trailer we showed them. We weren’t surprised by this because Lights Out is a horror film, its main goal being to frighten the target audience. One of the girls mentioned that the trailer had a good build up from the beginning, something that I plan to create with my own trailer. I want there to be a good enough build up from the very start to capture the attention of my target audience from the very beginning. I don’t want them to lose interest and I want them to remain focused on the trailer until it finishes.
In addition to this, we questioned the girls about what they didn’t find interesting. One stated that she felt the trailer “revealed too many scenes” and could have worked on showing less in order to make it “more interesting.” I think from this I can connote that showing less is more and probably best. I want to shoot just enough scenes for my trailer but when placing all the shots together I need to try to avoid to reveal too much about the film plot. A goal of mine could be to create ambiguity within my trailer, so that the scenes are left open to interpretation by my target audience and they can determine what they think will happen in the film by themselves.
When asking the females which trailer they preferred they said, Lights Out, which was a surprise to us. We thought that they would choose Sket because of the all-female gang. But, they prefer the horror trailer because there was a lot of tension created between scenes and even though they felt that too much information was given out in Lights Out, they felt it helped moved the trailer along. Even though the girls said they preferred Lights Outs, when making a choice between trailers that give out too much information or just enough, they chose trailers that give out just enough information. The Sket trailer gave out just enough information but not in a smart, concise way. For my trailer, I want to give out just enough information but also create a lot of tension and stir enough emotion within my target audience in wanting to watch the entire film. Tension is definitely an important element of trailers because it keeps the audience interested and engaged with the trailer.
Year Twelve Focus Group:
The second focus group Martha & I conducted was a group of year twelve students with three boys and four girls. We showed them the Sket trailer first of all and asked them what they liked about it before showing the trailer of the horror film, The Conjuring.
One girl stated that she liked the juxtaposition of the girl gang and powerful male drug lord. She also liked how the girl gang began to take over the streets of London, leaving havoc wherever they went. In the beginning of the trailer, the drug lord was shown mostly and he was given more dominance on the screen. Showing the drug lord beating down on a woman showed the hierarchy and influence he had over her. Then mid climax of the trailer, the audience see less and less of the drug lord and more of the girl gang who are portrayed to be quite aggressive and violent. One boy stated that he liked the inter titles of the trailer, the words that came up as the trailer was playing. He liked phrases such as “in a man’s world” and “sisterhood,” as he found it to be quite good especially as the words were being brought to life with the actors and actresses being shown on the screen. It was intriguing to read the words while also seeing the actresses act out “sisterhood” and living “in a man’s world.” Intertitles are definitely something that I will be considering for my own trailer, as they add narration to the trailer especially if voiceovers aren’t used. This could be alternative to using voiceovers. One girl stated that she liked the mise-en-scene of the trailer, it not only represented the region of the girl gang but it represented their age range. The girls were living in an urban area of London, wearing tracksuits, with hoodies up, trainers. By the girls also dressing in tracksuits they were showing a masculine side of females, dressing how South or East London boys would dress. Even though the title of the film is “Sket” which is slang for a young girl who is promiscuous, without caring about who she’s sleeping with, the film doesn’t actually show young girls who are promiscuous. It shows girls who are labelled as being deviant and troublesome. So the word sket could actually have different connotations in the film, with the word Sket being used to describe deviant females of society instead of girls who are promiscuous. One boy mentioned that they liked how the females were fighting back because you don’t see that type of thing everyday, it’s not a norm. The norm is usually a patriarchal society where females are the weaker sex but they subverted from this conventions. One girl stated that the grime music in the background fit the purpose of the film and the beat dropped when someone got hit, creating tension.
In terms of what they didn’t like about the trailer, one girl stated that she felt like too much information was given away. She was able to tell the plot of the trailer from just watching it once. She got the idea of a girl’s sibling dying, she gets involved with a gang who plan to fight back. I have to disagree with her though because I felt that the trailer gave just enough information away so that the audience are aware of the plot. It’s important for the audience to know why the girl gang plan to get revenge on the drug lord so it’s mandatory for the audience to be aware of what he did wrong to the girl gang member. I do see where she’s coming from though and I will say that when creating the trailer, there shouldn’t be too many shots placed into the trailer. Things need to be concise, clear yet still understandable and intriguing.
The second trailer we showed the group was The Conjuring, a horror, thriller similar to Light Outs, the trailer we showed to the year eleven females. I first asked the focus group what they liked about the horror trailer. One girl said that there was a lot of dialogue between characters as things were happening. There was correlation with dialogue and scenes playing out the screen. One girl also stated that she liked the fact that the trailer followed the formalistic conventions of a trailer, it had the release date and at the end it had the social media information for the film. Social media is going to be a big influence on my trailer as I want my audience to be able to search for the film online and find out exclusive content that they wouldn’t find out from the trailer. I asked the group if the release date makes them want to wait for the film and some of them stated that it only depends on whether or not the film has sustained their attention enough. It would make it more exciting if the trailer was interesting and exciting enough.
One girl stated she didn’t like the trailer because it fit into the typical horror genre conventions, of someone of white ethnicity always being attacked by a deadly supernatural spirit and the cliché storyline of people coming together to try and fight against something evil. It follows the same theme as a horror story and same elements such as a haunted, horror house, possessed daughter and son. One boy stated that it wasn’t anything new, it basically followed the same storyline as many horror films out on the market today something many people have already seen before. One girl also mentioned that the film had the same general beginning, with the perfect family that has something evil come against them and destroy them. One boy mentioned he found the trailer quite long and that it should have been slightly shorter.
I also asked the group which trailer they prefer, they mostly stated that they prefer Sket. One girl said even though both trailers were quite lengthy, Sket told a story without giving too much information. It showed some of the important parts from each different scenes whereas The Conjuring followed a chronological structure, showing almost all parts from the film. They took up every scene and made it into the trailer, whereas Sket was more random, different parts of scenes. Sket also used music that correlated with the environment of the girl gang, which was grime. The Conjuring used a variety of sounds, mostly dialogue which created quite a plain tone at times. One boy also stated that Sket was more relatable in terms of some of the slang used by the girl gang and people from urban areas of London.
Key Learning:
From carrying out a focus group I have learned that people have different views on how trailers are presented to them. Both the year eleven students and year twelve students had different opinions about the gangster trailer and horror trailer. I’m glad to know that both groups preferred the subversion of a girl gang rather than a typical male gang that is predominately shown in gangster crime films. By carrying out a focus group I have drawn out the attitudes, feelings and reactions of students to two different trailers and hopefully able to get a similar understanding of how students will react to my own trailer. I will take into account all of the points stated by my focus group students and compliment my own trailer with their input. I have also made a decision that an ideal target audience for my film trailer will be from ages 16 and over because they’ll be easy to entertain and get engaged with my film trailer.
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