1. Iron Man 3, belonging to Marvel and now a massive film franchise has just been released;
directed by Shane Black, produced by Kevin Fiege, and distributed by Walt Disney and Motion
Pictures, the film was set for success. To add to this, it also stars the very well-known Robert
Downey Jr. as Iron Man and Gwyneth Paltrow as his love interest.
How did they know what we would want to see? What did they do to find this out? I will
be going into detail about just how the producers and directors achieved what they
did. Focusing in on target audience and why it is so important.
By the film being distributed by both Walt Disney and Motion Pictures, the films audience is a
massive variety of people ranging from extremely young to old. As it’s Disney it’s always
going to be quite child friendly and of course by Iron Man being available in a toy, children are
extremely likely to recognise him on posters and let on to their parents they’re excited.
However Iron Man has a love interest and action side to it which most definitely appeal to the
older demographic. Everybody wins. This means families can go together and so on which
brings in more money. By using already famous actors and actresses, they can play on this
and make the film more appealing by in a way exploiting them and saying what they have
already achieved and how good they are. By doing this, which will be advertised on posters
and on television in an advertisement, it will make people think the film is bound to be good.
Robert Downey Jr. Gwyneth Paltrow

2. Finding out what the target audience is for films is extremely important for producers.
By finding this out you can then piece together what sort of thing the audience will be
interested in and what will appeal to them, equalling a successful and well received
movie.
By finding out the target audience, they will then know who to cast in the film and the
type of music and events that take place.The four main types of research are primary,
secondary, quantitative and qualitative.Iron Man 3 was released in the UK on the 24
th
of
April 2013, however before this release, there will have been two private screenings,
one of around 100 people where people are invited to go into a cinema and watch the
first cut of the film. What we call an intimate screening. Once the people have watched
the film, they will rate the film via aquestionnaire; they will say what was good and
what in specific they enjoyed about it, what was bad and then how they can make it
better and more appealing to the audience. They will then take said research and re
edit where needed. For example if people aren’t fans of the ending that will be
changed, to do this they will get the cast back. Rather than losing money they will put
more money in to make the film better. Whether it is to do with special effects or
storylines. The second post production test screening will be to an audience of around
400, which is the usual amount of people who go to the cinema. This screening will
take place after they have re-edited the film and adjusted it. They will then get more
feedback on the film from a wider variety of people. By doing this they will get a firm
idea of how successful the film will be. The bigger post production screen testing will
be gathering mainly Quantative research where they get statistics. Responses will be a
little bit to do with re – editing and more of the questions asked will be about what the
audience thought of the storyline and who their favourite characters are. When they
get this feedback they will then include favourite characters on posters to promote the
film.The film has to suit the audience and be what they want to see. If the audience
aren’t agreeing with the film or getting attached to certain characters (hero/villain) then
the film will flop. The audience of films effect every part of the film, be that pre-
production, production and post-production. For example if a film is say targeted for
children then the prime time for the film to be released would be in the summer when
children and most likely to be out with parents and will have more than likely seen
posters/billboards up advertising the film, bringing it to their attention. Whereas if a
film was more towards an older demographic, it wouldn’t be that much of an issue
when the film was released. The target audience for Iron Man 3 ranges from young to
old as fans consists of children who are fans of the toys and an older audience who
have followed Marvel and are big fans of the Iron Man franchise.To find out the target
audience of Iron Man 3, many different kinds of research have taken place. I’m going to
be naming a few throughout this article.