[FILM PLANNING] Questionnaire and Results

In order to research key elements of thriller movies, and to help give an idea of how our video should look, I decided to send out a questionnaire asking people about their views on  thriller films. Click here for the questionnaire.

By looking at the data gathered through the questionnaire, I have found a number of key elements I should aim to include in my film opening. These elements consist of different genres, themes and other film elements that are more popular than other choices on the questionnaire. Click here to see the results of the questionnaire. 

From the data, I can see that the most popular thriller genres are Crime/Sci-Fi thrillers, wth Action and Psychological films not being too far behind. As well as this, action and psychological themes were also incredibly popular.

In the opening scene of a thriller, people prefer to see some sort of conflict relating to the backstory of the film, with a mix of a monologue and a soundtrack over the top. With regards to soundtrack, the most popular choice was an orchestral soundtrack, although other suggestions were modern music and dubstep.

Some ideas for the characters have come from the questionnaire as well – while not much came up about the protagonist, the idea of an insane antagonist was very popular. The antagonist should also be more powerful than the protagonist, with occasional shifts in power.

Visual style can be based on opinions from the questionnaire, too. The idea of an urban setting had the most votes, while popular visual styles were those of The Matrix and The Dark Knight Rises, which are both very urban, slightly surreal locations.