Evaluation two: How effective is the combination of your main product and the ancillary texts?

How effective is the combination of your main product and the ancillary texts?

The main purpose we created our short film was to further enhance the push forward within mental health issues especially amongst males. As Edward throughout is subject to depression, anxiety and self harm through the loss of his wife and previous underlying issues. We also intentionally wanted to establish the visceral side to the film and for also both the primary and secondary audience.  We were able to also conform to  the stereotypical psychological-thriller genre conventions throughout whilst also subverting elements i.e. showing the male as the protagonist whilst also covertly displaying his emotional side. Another factor to take into consideration is how were aimed to display these particular themes and conventions throughout the distribution stage and in particular marketing. When the film was finished, we all individually worked on a film poster that would initially incorporate these themes and display a stylistic approach. This was to highlight how our film was not just ‘another’ psychological thriller, but was an upcoming short film that would drive one to question themselves. We also recorded and edited a radio trailer for ‘virago’ that would offer intensity and intrigue the listener. 

When i was constructing the poster for ‘Virago’ i was influenced by numerous of films in particular; the blair witch project(1999), the kings of summer(2013), 10 Clover field lane(2016), Allied(2016) and Phoenix(2014). However these films were not all from the same psychological-thriller genre. This was due to how I wanted to gain an overview of what films targeted at the same primary target audience offered, and whether they all had similar conventions. This therefore allowed me to see that anonymity of one character was prominent throughout. However those that subverted from the psychological genre had different intentions for their anonymity i.e. the coming of age film: the kings of summer,  was to initiate the idea of the 3 male protagonists all had equal status within the film.Whereas ‘allied’  was to symbolise how the protagonist felt in relation to how he felt he was unable to know the true identity of wife and what he has become. As pictured above i thoroughly annotated the posters in order to establish how the poster intrigued the viewer and how much narrative was shown/denoted.

the final film poster

This is reflected within the final poster we all decided on as group that kurt had originally designed. We decided to go with Kurt's design, due to how it appeared overtly professional, as it included the main 5 elements we aimed to include:  age rating, reviews, social media, billing blocks and our production company ‘iris productions’.More over we decided to go down the direction of our primary colour scheme being monochrome with hints of red segmented throughout. This was to reiterate the physiological-thriller genre,  as the black was to denote the emotional side (psychological) and then the red was to reinforce the physical harm (thriller) that Edward has to experience. We also included Key iconic themes throughout the poster; the bird that is within the centre of the motorcycle helmet that Edward is featured within and the helmet itself with the gloves crossing over the front of it. As mentioned earlier a key feature that appeared across films in the our chosen genre and age range; anonymity is also established within the film poster. As through the showing of only the helmet and no official characters, it leads the viewer intrigued and doesn’t imply that a particular gender is the protagonist.We decided upon this due to how we aimed to allow the viewer to focus upon our key iconic themes and for them to piece together the story. The contrast between the bird and the helmet was to also connote how the inner Edward is trying to escape the confined life he is within emotionally and which many individuals can relate to on an emotional level through i.e. loss of a loved one, accident or life stresses.

Viral marketing: 

Through researching the viral marketing domain, i was able to find out that films both within the independent and mainstream sector relied heavily upon this method, as it was able to reach a larger global demographic. Initially allowing both films to invest in profit and also extend their viewing across global boundaries. Therefore prior to the final decision upon what form of marketing we would initiate, I did research into understanding what contemporary film watchers initially want and would want films to offer. I conducted a questionnaire that asked numerous questions upon what forms of marketing they would prefer and whether they would prefer to see marketing methods directed in the viral direction  i.e. youtube adds. When analysing the results of the questionnaire in  particular question 3 'where would you prefer to see a film advertisement; I gathered that 100% who answered it wanted to see film advertisements within the digitally rather than physically. 

If we are able to extend both budget and time,  we would go more in the direction of viral marketing. For instance, such as online web chats with the cast of the film to gain intrigue and allow the audience to interact and feel a personal connect with the film. We did some examples of traditional marketing in bus stops  within public areas. We decided upon this due to how bus stops don't acquire only a specific demographic of people as both middle age, young school children, teens ad the elderly both use the public facilities. This allowed us to also target our secondary audience. However some of the bus stops would be interactive and would allow the users to click on i.e. the social media links and visit the i.e. twitter page or go on to their own device and tweet us to further engage. Viral adds such as the pepsi max one that inserted images into the location of the bus stop to excite the audience i.e. an octopus coming through the floor and grabbing a citizen and when they went around the bus stop to find out the pepsi max logo appeared and they were now in the image. 

Interactive bus advertisement of the film poster 'Virago'

Radio trailer

We wanted to also to create a radio trailer that would both conform to the themes of the psychological genre and also reiterate both the mood and the emotional tone of the film. As the film lacks voice overs we wanted to include would specifically within the radio trailer that was performed by Chris, one of our group members, moreover we also included non-diegetic music that is actually featured within the short film; motorbike engine, the natural scenery noises of where the wedding between Edward and Elizabeth took place. We decided to include these two main factors, due to how we wanted to almost set the scene for the listener and allow them to focus emotionally.  Another factor to take into consideration is the style of the voice over, as we conformed to stereotypical voice over features of a heavy voice. We decided to conform as this would initiate the viewers intrigue and allow them to recognise that this is in fact a trailer for an upcoming film due to previous films conforming. The voice over also doesn't include much narrative as we wanted to focus on the voiceover including the name of the film, reviews off critics 'film of the year, the cast and how the film is coming to cinemas in the near future. 

In conclusion i feel that through using these two methods of marketing for our film, we able to resemble how contemporary film directors will market their films. For instance through doing prior research and also questioning whether widening their marketing decisions to not only include their primary audience but to also include their secondary audience could be established through this research, as our questionnaire enabled us to do. Overall i firmly believe that we were able to in a stylist manner illustrate; the cast that were in the film, key tones and mood, the psychological-thriller genre and also allow our target audience to both interact with the film in  numerous methods that would work in reality i.e. the film poster on the bus stop and target those who may be more digitally aware (radio trailer).