Main Ideas

Our plot can be associated with multiple genres but its mainly linked with the horror genre. However, some aspect of the trailer follows conventions from the thriller and action genre, thus making this films genre as a hybrid.

Here is a brief summary of what the plot of the story may be:

·        A new ‘secret’ unreleased game comes out in which a group of 4 teenagers are curious about it.

·        They decide to look more into this game and order it online.

·        They all get a copy of the game.

·        The games main theme is violence in which they are a player who has to survive in the ‘riot city’.

·        As things begin to happen in the game, they begin to come across similar situations which have happened in the game.

·        For example, one of them gets ‘robbed’ in the game, the next day, the boy himself gets robbed in the similar way.

·        This begins to happen to the rest of the group and two of the four ended up dying in brutal deaths similar to their game characters.

·        In the end, as the two teenagers are left on their own, they begin to research the game to find out what is doing this.

·        They find that the game was unreleased because the original owner was brutally murdered and has ‘cursed’ or started haunting the game.

·        One of the teenagers already knew this and has played a joke on his friends by not telling them.

·        In the end, he tried killing his final surviving friend on the game to cover up for himself, but he himself died as he was killed at the game soon after.

Target Audience – The target audience of this films are young adults/teenagers along with ‘gamers’ because they are more likely able to relate to the film. The plot surrounds the idea of a new 'illegal' game being released which then begins to parallel with reality as situations in the game begin to occur in real life. This can be a unique selling point and can further appeal to a broader target audience as 'gamers' are able to relate to buying a new game. In addition, because the film is set on a specific genre, it is guaranteed to attract some sort of audience as there are groups which prefer the mysterious and violent/gory features of a horror film.

Institution – Paramount will make this film as it is known for producing successful horror films. Their movie list of horror includes success films such as the ‘Friday the 13^th’ movie series, ‘My Bloody Valentine’ and ‘The Ring’.

This film is unique from the other horror films as the main villain is found in the end to be as one of the character who is believed to have been ‘innocent’ of any crimes.  In addition, all of the main characters die as there are no survivors.

Why would people enjoy it; Action & Horror?

Viewers who love the genre I will be focusing on, which is horror, thriller and action enjoy films of these genres because of the tension and fast pace of the film. Some scenes on the film creates a sense of suspense on the viewers as unexpected situation begins to happen, to which may frighten the viewers. The element of being surprised and having the unexpected happen is often a characteristic of horror films. Also, the addition of the action genre along with the horror adds a different aspect to the film, as there are more ‘fighting’ scenes which is a clear identification of an action genre film. By watching these types of films, its a temporary escape from reality to which the audience can be entertained and be placed into a different characters perspective. 

Uses and gratification

Blumler and Katz’s uses and gratification theory suggests that media users play an active role in choosing and using the media.  Users take an active part in the communication process in which they decide when and how they use the media presented to them.  The theorist say that a media user seeks out a media source that best fulfils the needs of the user.  Uses and gratifications assume that the user has alternate choices to satisfy their need. Users often consumed the media for different reasons and in different ways.
Why people consume the media:
Diversion – To create a sense of feeling which allow the viewers to escape from the reality to forget problems in their lives
Personal identity – Viewers, sometimes tend to watch the media in order to find an aspect of their identity to which they may construct their identity based on a character in the media and to learn behaviour and understand values.
Obtaining of information – Viewers consume media in order to gather information such as news and documentary to expand their knowledge.