To what extent do your three main texts target a mainstream audience?

Monday, March 27, 2017

To what extent do your three main texts target a mainstream audience? 30 marks.

In order to appeal to a mainstream audience, it is important that a film does not alienate particular demographics, which can be difficult in cases where the premise of the film focuses on specific demographics. For example, Pride, directed by Matthew Warchus is 2014, focuses on two demographics in particular: the Welsh people and homosexual people, but also touching on gender and age representations broadly.

In regards to the uses and gratifications theory, audiences often choose to consume a text based on whether or not they are able to relate to or identity with the themes and characters within said text. Following this theory, since the representation of homosexual people and Welsh people have been explored within the film Pride, those demographics are likely to be effectively targeted by the film. Creating representations that audiences can relate too are something that many films do effectively. Such as in Kingsman: The Secret Service - directed by Matthew Vaughn in 2014 - in which a range of national, regional identities and classes are represented to create a broad representation of many demographics, therefore likely to appeal to a mainstream audience. However, with films such as Pride which do not represent such a breadth of different demographics, there are many audience demographics who may not relate to the film, in which case other methods must be used to appeal to a mainstream audience. An example of this could be through the use of star power.

Many films use high profile actors and actresses - as well as high profile directors and other key contributors - to appeal to a mainstream audience. This is evidenced in both Kingsman: The Secret Service and Pride. Kingsman: The Secret Service employed actors such as Colin Firth, Michael Caine and Samuel L Jackson and Pride used actors such as Bill Nighy and Andrew Scott, all famous names who are likely to be known across demographics and therefore appealing to a mainstream audience. Likewise, this is used within Skyfall, directed by Sam Mendes in 2012, who used a cast of names including Dame Judi Dench, Daniel Craig and Ralph Fiennes. Skyfall is also an example where the director of the film may have also helped in targeting a mainstream audience, having directed other successful films such as American Beauty in 1999.

A concept similar to star power which also relies on reputation is the fact that belonging to a franchise is likely to appeal to a mainstream audience as popular franchises such as James Bond become clearly present within public and media discourse. This is true for the film Skyfall which is the 23rd film within the James Bond franchise.

Another way that films are able to target a mainstream audience are by communicating universal themes. Within all three films, the concept of family/community is communicated, which is a concept that most audiences are likely to be able to relate to, referring back to the uses and gratifications theory.

Whilst many films initially target particular demographics, such as Pride, they are also able to target a mainstream audience by ensuring that they use methods such as communicating themes that most people are able to relate to within the content of their film and other methods such as employing cast and crew that are well-known by the mainstream audience.

You Might Also Like

1 comments

  1. I think you're right in saying you answered a different variation of question opposed to audience targeting, your answer explores more of audience appeal than targeting. However your answer has a sophisticated writing style and you include relevant contextual details to support your points. Your structure is effective and you have fluidity from one point to the next. Maybe a more in depth concluding paragraph would ensure you are answering the question correctly if you were to link that back to the given question?

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe