Year 2 - Unit 6: Critical Approaches to Creative Media Products

Unit 6: Critical Approaches to Creative Media Products

Task 1:

Quantitative:

A review from IMDb

Audience ratings - An audience rating is a figure based on a sample of statistics which shows how many people like or dislike something, this could be anything from a tv show to a game but in this case it is based off peoples opinions on a film. Big Trouble in Little China has had an overall rating of 7.3/10 on IMDb and 6.9/10 on Rotten Tomatoes. On Rotten Tomatoes there is a total of only 38 reviews counted, 31 of those reviews were positive and 7 were negative. On IMDb they have collected 345 user reviews and 190 from film critics so far. However, without counting all of the reviews I can't get a specific number of positive or negative reviews. The average rating on IMDb is 7/10 with a rating of 8/10 only 2% behind, it was rated generally a little higher by men than it is by women with only 7,328 women voting at an average of 7.1 and a staggering 76,648 men voting with a little higher average of 7.3. It is surprisingly rated the highest by people who are under the age of 18, this number is a 7.5/10. As this is the highest rating on average this doesn't seem to bode that amazingly well for the films reputation, however this  overall review and rating still makes the film better than average and even quite positive. People between the ages of 18 and 29 rated the film an average of 7.2/10, there is rating of 7.4 that is the average from 30 to 44 year olds. The lowest review was surprisingly from those of the age 45 and upwards as a 7.1/10, this is quite shocking as this category of people is the films target audience.

Qualitative:

What a focus group may look like

Focus Groups - It is a research technique used by a company as a marketing strategy, the use of this method and all of the others definitely gives these companies the best possible answers to any of their marketing questions. These groups are most likely filled with a small amount of people, generally this number can range anywhere between 6 and 12. They are probably from within a target audience that is specific to the product or service in hand. The group participate in a planned discussion that is supposed to draw out its audiences perceptions about a certain topic or area of interest. It should be be a non-threatening and receptive environment so that the subjects feel comfortable enough to share their true thoughts and feelings. This research technique helps to see alternative ways of gaining information from consumers without using a simple and non-engaging survey. They are flexible and gain the advantage on others who have the ability to talk to their customers. The people who are taking part may vary in things like gender, sexuality, race, religion and backgrounds etc but the topic is fully constant. After scouring the internet to try and find any sort of focus group research relating to Big Trouble in Little China I came up with nothing that appears to be of use. I am guessing this is probably because the majority of the films audience is over the age of 30 and the concept of discussing this film seems too outdated to be worth the effort.

Possible answers from a questionnaire

Questionnaires - These consist of a series of questions which are used to gather information from the people who take part. It was invented in 1838 by the Statistical Society of London. Its main advantage is that it is cheap to set up and how it does not require as much effort as verbal surveys. The possible answers that are given are most likely going to be from a multiple choice selection, this makes the given data much easier to compile and average out. However, these set choices as answers can frustrate some users due to how they cannot fully express their opinion if it is not fully there. Unless the questionnaires are done in many different formats and languages some subjects may not be able to read the questions on their own. This research method can be very useful if you know what specific factors you want to explore by the fact that you are able to make multiple people answer the same question and get similar answers. A questionnaire can ask a large range of questions varying from things as simple as what age, gender or ethnicity someone is to what genre of games, films and music they like. This means that a company could use this to explore their target audience, so for the film Big Trouble in Little China the writers could've figure out what language they should use based on the age and gender of the people interested in the film. This could've made the film appropriate for larger or more specified audiences, I'm guessing because of how old the film is I cannot find any questionnaires based on the film.

What an interview my look like

Face-to-face Interviews - This is a data collection method in which an interviewer directly communicates with the subject with a specific set of questions or from free will. This choice can take a long time to complete but allows the interviewer to acquire the same information from a questionnaire but much more in depth, not only this but it also allows the recognition of body and facial language to be taken in and considered. The response rate is generally increased and the feedback can be a lot more reliable and trustworthy. If someone writes down on a questionnaire that they are 30 year old male and they are lying you can't see that clearly but if they were to come to an interview you could generally take a guess as to whether they are lying or not. The fact that these interviews require staff to perform them is probably the biggest disadvantage to this method because that can cost an awful lot of money to gain the right kind of interviewers. The interviewer may not know what to note down which could lead to a lot of wasted time if nothing becomes of that collected information. This could be because the interviewer has some biased opinions and would rather not have their subjects opinion noted. These interviews could however help to find out more information for a companies business none the less. Finding out what a person likes in a more intimate setting often makes the interviewee more comfortable to give their full opinion. This can help the company cater their considered product more intriguing to larger audiences. Like all of the above their was no such interview of Big Trouble in Little China's audience, it was more of the actors and other people who took part in the movies creation.

Audience Classification:

Socio-economic - Theses are groupings that are broken down into different sections and divided from A to E. Band A is pretty obviously the higher earning group, they are classed as professionals like doctors. Band B has the roles like teachers and graphic designers, band C has to further categories, 1 and 2. C1 or White Collar includes occupations like junior managers and nurses, C2 or Blue Collar has semi manual workers such as plumbers and builders. Second from the lowest band is clearly D, you will find a manner of unskilled and semi-skilled manual workers. Band E has those who cannot or don't support themselves in a financial way, these can be anything from a pensioner to a student. There is the possibility of their being a seventh category but it is currently being debated. These different classes are used by companies to determine which group would be their most suitable target audience.

Difference between demographics and psych-graphics

Psycho-graphics - These can be a buyers habits, values or even hobbies, psycho-graphics are different from demographics because they explain why a consumer buys something rather than who the actual consumer is. Understanding an audiences psycho-graphics is the key to effectively reaching them. Say we were trying to create a film that would then become a game, to be successful in both ideas we would need to compare who would buy the game versus the film. The ideal situation would be to create a film and game catering to the same specific audience based on why they would want it so they would buy both the film and the game. The sort of things to look out for and link psycho-graphics wise would be what genre they like. One of the most common game and film genres is action, so if you created an action film and game its audiences would be in the masses, not only this but if someone enjoys an action game with a lot of violence they would probably enjoy a film with the same characteristics and vice versa. Big Trouble in Little China was only ever looking for its singular audience, the most likely reason that people would be drawn to it is probably because its an american comedy rather than its martial arts side.

Mainstream - Mainstream audiences are pretty much audiences where a lot of people like the same popular product. Companies will pretty much always cater to this group of people simply because its easier. Easy money, easy advertising and easy on time. Big Trouble in Little China is actually more mainstream than would be originally thought, as I stated above it is a comedy which is one the best genres for a company to have chosen due to its popularity. If we were thinking in music terms this would easily be the 'pop' genre.

If the different groups of popularity were like genres of music

Alternative - Alternatives audience are quite a lot less common than mainstream audiences, this group will generally have its own ideas of what they like and although they are smaller than mainstream ideas they still are pretty popular opinions. Big Trouble in Little China has its martial arts factor as its alternative audience, loved by many, just not as much as comedy. If we were thinking in music terms this audience would be the type of people that like rock,metal, indie or rap etc.

Niche - Unsurprisingly this audience hold the smallest amount of followers, these types of consumers very rarely share the opinion of anyone they meet. Big Trouble in Little China has a good thing going that it doesn't use any of these factors. The creators and companies tend to steer clear of these audiences to get the most out of their work.If we were thinking in music terms again these people would be fans of more abnormal genres like symphonic metal etc.

Applied:

Correlation - The correlation between Quantitative research and Qualitative research is that they both are used to find out information about an audiences wants and needs. The numerical information and the non-numerical information both have very similar research topics, they both want to find out the most information to help their product or service sell well.

How successful were my methods? - My methods I would say were fairly good, I researched as deeply as I could into the ideas and I feel as though I may have gone further into detail as others. However, I could definitely have done my own research which could've included my friends and family to get my own personal and possibly more accurate results. However, IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes seemed pretty amazing, detailed and accurate sources to use.

Task 2:

Selection of content:

The most known quote from the film

Screenplay - The screenplay of the film was specified like the rest of its content to cater to its target audience. The script is written so that the martial arts side would be kept true to so the alternative audience, that enjoy that aspect, keep their faith in it. But it has also elements of the comedic aspect to appeal to the mainstream audience, this includes the gags and long lasting ironic quotes as shown to the right. The main character is a masculine male, according to the statistics shown in task 1 the film was rated more and also higher by men. Because the film is led by such a strong male character it's stereo-typically not that surprising that the majority of its audience is male. The masculinity of Jack Burton was written amazing well by the script writers to give such a conceited and egotistical main role.

What the visuals in Big Trouble in Little China mainly consist of 

Visuals - What we see is very typical of late 80's movie visuals with the lighting being very dark and moody, this style caters itself to the audience of its time. To make its audience feel more immersed the creators of the film used stereo-typical Chinese people and surroundings, this helps to really bring out the classic martial arts feel. The creators used a handsome Jack Burton probably because this should have helped the movie appeal more to women than most martial art films do, however I did notice that there were no sexualities in the film other than straight and this is possibly because of the times. You see Jack in his truck at the very start you can see Jack in his large truck, this could be a metaphor of masculinity with the size of it. We see the electricity shown by the black magic with the static blue lights, this shows its audience that its true to its magical roots. The roads shown at the beginning are quite narrow and long with fields surrounding them, this attracts the audience that don't specifically like the martial arts genre because its not started in Chinatown. We see the rain pouring down on Jacks windscreen this helps to back up the lightning with the dark and moody lighting. The Chinese market sets the scene for the rest of film for the karate loving part of the audience, we see a lot food in the market like chicken and duck which helps the people who aren't that big on the cultural history think of the classic food that they may have ordered themselves. The betting and drinking that we see shows the masculinity of Jack Burton and his friends, this targets the male audience with the idea of them comparing to him. All of the tourists in Egg Shen's bus are white except one female, this could be their way of achieving more of a racial equality so it seems more interesting to the masses. We can see all of the guns, bandannas and black/red/ karate belts, these features are very key to any martial arts film and give the film a slightly more genuine appeal to those who are fans of it. A Chinese standoff between the gangs is shown to gather the fans of action films and the Chinese black magic is featured with smoke and lighting for the appeal of the true Chinese setting.

Sound - The sound in the film starts of very solemn with a low mood as the soundtrack, this gives its audience a variation of music so they don't bored and this certain scene needs the music to create the right ambience. We then go into some light rock when we see Jack for the first time, again this is probably the masculine side of the audience coming through with our introduction to his character.

What the typical view of Chinatown is throughout the film

Sequences - At the beginning we start with a look into the future where Black Magic is being questioned, this gives the audience a first look into what they are getting into so they don't feel like they're watching just any film. We then go back to the present day with Jack Burton again seeming very masculine driving his truck and eating fast food, once he arrives in Chinatown we see him surrounded by the Chinese culture and people which brings the audience to its main attraction. The middle of the film is filled with the action and chase of the film, this appeals to its audience because many of the viewers like action films and in this is the martial arts seeps through. At the end we have a happy scene with a little bit of romance to appeal to the romantic audience, however the masculinity comes back when Jack goes back on his own.

Construction of content:

Colours - All of the colours that have been used are generally very dark, this is linked back to the visuals of the 80's film. The main colours that are used are red which is generally thought of as the main colour for China, we then have some blue which links back to the electricity so that the audience who enjoy magical films make the connection and yellow which again is a very Chinese like colour. The colours used are not particularly very vibrant or pigmented and are very dull, however this is probably because of the equipment and style of the times, this should apply to all of the audience.

The title/intro font for Big Trouble in Little China

Fonts - The font at the beginning and the end with the credits are a very basic white font with 3D lettering. The font of the title 'Big Trouble in Little China,' is in a bold, red and Chinese takeaway font, this may be tacky but is pretty stereotypical so even simply by the title we can already tell that it will be based in Chinatown. In the middle of this we can see the same font but with Chinese lettering.


Codes and Conventions:

Jack always seems to be the one front, this could be
a show of his masculinity in protecting.

Symbolic (Characters actions) - We can see Egg Shen backing up Jack right from the start so we already begin to like him and see that not everything we see is as it seems. A possible metaphor could be how Jack crosses a large bridge in his truck, this could be to show how he became a different person. One way we can see Jack foreshadowing what will happen is when he says 'a man'd have to be some kind of fool to think we're all alone in this universe,' this would please the part of the audience that like the magical part of the film as they now know that something like that may happen or even be a key feature. The friends that Jack makes are different genders and races which again helps the creators connect to further cultures and gives a symbolism of anyone being friends with each other. There are so many cultures that are portrayed within the film, the majority of them come from the same ethnic group but they all share different views. This makes its audience believe how the Chinese cultures work.

Technical (Camera Techniques and Shots) - The only specific thing that the camera ever does is point to the main person speaking, however the majority of the time it points at Jack even when he isn't the one speaking.

Modes of Address:

1st and 3rd Person - I don't believe that the actors ever address themselves or each other in third person. All the scenes are referred to in first person in speaking and third person with the camera.

Egg Shen performing magic in his interview with his
attorney

Formal - The only real formality in the film is right at the beginning when Egg Shen's attorney interviews him about the events that happened.  This makes us as the audience see how strange this concept of formality is with this culture as they're so used to just saying what they think (at least that is what we are led to be believe from the creators).

Informal (Slang, Expletives etc.) - Jack is very informal, he is very loud, rude and makes a lot of jokes, at no point is he formal towards anyone. This brings out his cocky masculine side and appeals to the male audience. Jack also swears a lot, these expletives are mainly used by him and no one else, this appears to have the same appeal as the rest of his informality.



References:

https://www.thebalance.com/what-is-a-market-research-focus-group-2296907
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090728/ratings?ref_=tt_ql_op_4
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Questionnaire
http://www.spinter.lt/site/en/vidinis/vidmenu/face-to-face-interview
https://blog.hubspot.com/insiders/marketing-psychographics
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/mainstream-vs-alternative-media-21113.html
https://prezi.com/ynsi5tngnrvz/classification-of-audience/
https://www.slideshare.net/952501/how-media-producers-define-their-target-audience-19065483