Audience Theory Todorov's theory

Audience theories- Todorov

Todorov's theory states that a film and a trailer can be broken down into five sections. These sections are an equilibrium at the start, a disruption of that equilibrium, a recognition of the disruption, an attempt to repair the disruption and the final stage of where the equilibrium is restored.

Here narrative is not seen as a linear structure but a circular one. The narrative is driven by attempts to restore the equilibrium. However, the equilibrium attained at the end of the story is not identical to the initial equilibrium. Todorov argues that narrative involves a transformation. The characters or the situations are transformed through the progress of the disruption. The disruption itself usually takes place outside the normal social framework, outside the ‘normal’ social events.

For example:

A murder happens and people are terrified.

Someone vanishes and the characters have to solve the mystery.

The character start to work out the pattern and track down the murderer.

The characters try to catch the murderer by setting up traps and attempt to get the police involved.

The antagonist is caught or killed and the characters live the rest of their lives, well the ones that remain.

This links in to our film trailer as you see Cory die right at the start of the trailer and you also see Connor die later on. It also doesn't link in to our trailer as we have no one trying to find and kill the killer and so instead the killer carries on going around killing and so our trailer ends with the antagonist succeeding.

Todorov's theory states that a film and a trailer can be broken down into five sections. These sections are an equilibrium at the start, a disruption of that equilibrium, a recognition of the disruption, an attempt to repair the disruption and the final stage of where the equilibrium is restored. In our film we applied three parts of this theory. The first section of the trailer focuses on the character of Cory in his house, which seems to be an uneventful scene as he seems relaxed. Then Cory is followed and murdered in the woods-showing the disruption of the equilibrium. Other characters in the film recognise the disappearance of the victim and are then targeted themselves. The trailer then ends with a bloody hand print on the door suggesting our protagonist, Rachel, is in trouble. This flouts Todrov's theory as the equilibrium is left un-restored and instead an enigma is created, leaving the audience with more questions than answers.