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.

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.

Iron Man stars the very well-known Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man and Gwyneth Paltrow as his love interest. Star theory has been used here by

bringing in a well-known cast; you’re guaranteed to get a reaction from your choice of cast. Good or bad. With Robert Downey Jr, a lot of people will already

be a fan of him, from all different types of genres as he’s played Sherlock Holmes and the Incredible Hulk, as well as being in The Avengers. He’s been in a good mixture as fans of superhero movies will without a doubt be interested

in this film. Debatably more males which is where Sherlock Holmes will help gain a different type of audience as it’s leaning more towards females which will result in people going to see it for both the beauty appeal and the action side of things. I think by casting Gwyneth Paltrow, they’re also targeting a

younger audience as she’s also starred in Glee, which is an worldwide known American TV show.

I’ve identified with reception theory in this film as it connecting to people who want a get away from real life and have a really broad imagination. Iron Man obviously isn’t realistic and I think some people like that, they like how real it seems and how it looks asthough it could be a possibility. In that way I think it’s quite childlike and by it being this way but with twists, it brings in a wide

variety audience.

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. As Iron Man first originated from the Marvel Comics, a huge percentage of the target audience will be fans of Marvel and the Iron Man franchise. As there

were two movies before Iron Man 3, people will be eager to see what happens next and how it differs from comics, as films so often do.

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. Producers use methods

such as primary and secondary market research. Primary research would be using methods such as surveys and quizzes to get people’s opinions

and what they like in a film. When a film is first brought out, before release, the producer will get around a 100 people to watch the film and

give feedback.

This way they get a big variation of opinions and have things to work on and take into consideration. Another big thing a producer and director would have to look into would be where the team come from and whether they can work with their schedule, for example if they’re going to be filming in different countries, knowing the culture and beliefs. An example of this is in the Far East with praying. If they don’t research then they could lose money because employees will have to go off and sleep, eat etc.

If I myself was to do research methods on what sort of films people like and why, then I’d do surveys of different genres and ask specific questions of why they prefer that genre and what makes it different and better to the others. 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

Robert Downey Jr. Gwyneth Paltrow.

in the UK on the 24th 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 a questionnaire; they will say what were 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. When they get this feedback they will then include favourite characters on posters to promote the film. They’ll use marketing strategies. If an audience liked a line in the film and laughed it could become a slogan on a t shirt. Same goes with music, if they like the soundtrack and so on then it’s likely the celebrity will become more involved in the film in terms of promotion and then the artist will be in the charts. 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, both primary and secondary.

Anchorage has been used throughout the Iron Man 3 film marketing campaign, I notice mainly with the Iron Man poster. It’s about image and the first thing we see is the Iron Man. This is a way of getting people’s attention straight away no matter what their age. A young child even though they may not be able to read will recognise the image straight away and this will entice the parents to be drawn into the product. Another thing is reference to big actors and actresses that star in the film. With Iron Man it’s the main character Tony Stark as the attraction on the poster. It reads “Tony Stark returns with energy” which for fans of the past two films will indicate better things to come and they’ll have expectations and become instantly curious which will make

them want to see the film to see if it does actually live up to the hype and their expectations.

From watching the trailer for Iron Man 3 I personally think that it’s quite vague but shows all of the right things, which in my opinion is exactly how a trailer should be, it excites you and makes you want to see the film instantly, without knowing who causes what and what caused it to happen, your mind goes into overdrive. The trailer starts off with Tony Stark on the ground staring up at the camera, from a bird’s eye view. Iron Man is mainly aimed at males from the age 14 onwards due to all of the action that takes place, it’s more suited to the male gender due to it most being to do with action and slight violence, however by cleverly adding a romance into the storyline, it’s brought in more of audience as women will be more interested in the film and take notice whereas if there was no romance they wouldn’t pay very much attention to it.