LO2, Task 3: Audience

Hello I'm Josh and today I'm going to be talking about the different sections such as Age, gender,

Cast Away is rated a 12 certificate as it contains Strong language, and violence/self-harm. Also designating an audience to the film, you would see the audience to be young adults upwards, ages 21+, also with the film being an adventure, action genre, people who like to travel or adventure outside may find this film be more appealing.

Gender

The gender ratio for the film Cast Away is almost even but due to the adventuring and action I have given it a 60:40 rate towards men, as the main character is a male and stereotypically males are into action and survival stories.

To back up the gender ratio, different scenes in the film help split up the gender. Scenes such as the one where Chuck is  trying to make a fire and he impales his hand, this would stereotypically be aimed for men as people think men would be more involved and interacted with violence.

Also in the film there would be scenes where the female gender would be more intrigued, as in one scene we see Chuck return back to the USA and he drives up to his wife's' house, and the environment around helps create a romantic theme which would appeal to women, a dark rainy night and Chuck and his wife, both meet outside and hug each other, the typical lines to create a romantic, sad scene "I love you" are shared between the pair.

Another scene which appeal more to the males watching the film would be Chuck trying to escape off the island, it makes the audience feel tense and gives a rush of excitement, as they don't know if he will survive the ocean, and he is putting all his effort in to escape and survive, survival would be aimed for the male gender as stereotypically they are seen as the stronger gender and that they could bring themselves to a state of being able to get back. Determination and courage are to key emotions in this scene but these still effect both genders.

The main character within the film is a strong male, which is made out to be a hero of his own story, and he is an ideal self to what men want to be, he looks strong and independent, the males would see him has a model that they would like to follow.


Age - Ideal self, metaphorically

The film is not always full of action and excitement so younger audiences may easily get bored of it, while the older audiences (20+) may find it more intriguing, the different scenes are all needed and each mean something else but the younger ages may not see that, they may just see it as a boring scene and they may not see the deeper meaning of it.

The ages of 20+ kind of mix in with the concept of the film metaphorically, as Chuck has to survive on a stranded island, but a young adult at that age could have just finished university, so they could see the situation as how are they now going to move on from uni and survive out in the working world and bring in money. Although it is no where near the same type of survival as Chuck is in a dangerous situation which could take his life.

With the film having scenes to make the audience feel sympathetic and also gives you mixed emotions whether it be happy or sad, the scene where the pair meet after the years Chuck spent on the island is a scene which is meant to make you happy for character but also depending on your state to make you cry as well, but the younger audience will not see it the same way as the older audience would see it as the it is more likely that an adult has been through the same thing unlike a young teen/child.



Lifestyle and spending power

The National Readership Survey is a joint venture company in the UK between the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA), the Newspaper Publishers Association (NPA) and the Periodical Publishers Association (PPA). It provides audience research for print advertising trading in the UK.

The lifestyle categories I have given for my movie would be the affluent achievers and the thriving greys, this is because these people are higher classes who earn a more considerable amount of money, also they have a larger disposable income. Also I would say that they would have either not had children or they have had them and they have grown up and are now in university or they own their own property as the parents would then have a larger disposable income as they don't need to fend for their children anymore.

Thriving greys may relate to the film Castaway as it is about an exotic, desolate island people with a high disposable income are able to visit islands such as these which are actually holiday destinations. They are more open to visit these kinds of locations than others who still have kids to look after thus meaning they have a less disposable income. Thriving greys also are deemed to have worked quite high up in the ranks at the placement where they were working, thus giving them more money, also they would be around the age of retirement so they also have more time as well as the money to spend on going on holiday and traveling.

The groups I would put my audience into would be ABC1 as they would all have enough money to do the extra things such as going to the cinema to see the film, buy any merchandise and buy the film on disc after they have paid off all their bills. Also these people can afford to go on holiday abroad, the AB people would be able to go on holiday to exotic islands like the island that they filmed Cast Away on in Fiji.