Section B

Film comsumption habbits Media AS from mcgeoghann

 

Defining British Film

A film can be classed as a British film if it meets 3 out of the following 6:

-Has a British producer

-Has a British production team

-Has a predominatlety British cast

-Has a subject that informs British experience

-Has a British identity as identified by sight and sound magazine in the review section

 

A cultral test for a film also identifies weather the film is a British film or not. This is a points based test where the film needs atleast 16/32 points to pass the test. There are 4 sections the film can be awarded points for:

-Cultural content (up to 16 points)

-Cultural contribution (up to 4 points)

-Cultural hubs (up to 3 points)

-Cultural practitioners (up to 8 points)

For more information: http://www.bfi.org.uk/film-industry/british-certification-tax-relief/cultural-test-film

 

British Films

Skyfall:

Bond's loyalty to M is tested when her past comes back to haunt her. Whilst MI6 comes under attack, 007 must track down and destroy the threat, no matter how personal the cost.-'http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1074638/'

-Cultural content

The film is all about British people and British spies. James Bond tries to stop a mysterious organization from eliminating a country's (Britians) most valuable resource. The film is also set in the UK. Infact it is set in London, the capital of England.

-Cultural contribution

Skyfall represents a British culture. It focuses on the British government, especially when they are upset with 007 for losin g a list.

-Cultural hubs

The location is very much located in England. Most of the film is shot in London, the capital of England. A lot of shot are by Westminster and on the Embankment, whcih for a lot of people, represent Britian. The theme song of the film is also sung by Adele, who is a British Singer/Songwriter.

-Cultural practitioners

Most of the actors in Skyfall are British and the film is about British people. For example the main two actors in it are Daniel Craig and Judi Dench. Both these people are born and live in Britian. It was produced by Sam Mendes who was born in Reading in 1965.

The genre of the film can be either Action, Thriller or Adventure. The theme of Skyfall is protecting the countrys agency.

The film earned £94.3 million in the UK and has reached £1 billion worldwide!

 

Inbetweeners Movie:

'Four socially troubled 18-year-olds from the south of England go on holiday to Malia.' -http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1716772/?ref_=nv_sr_3

-Cultural content

The film was set in the UK for the first 20 minutes before the four boys set off on holiday. However the rest of the film was set in the country Malia as the boys went on a 'lads holiday' there. The four main character (Will, Jay, Simon and Neil) are all English actors from the UK.

-Cultural contribution

The Inbetweeners Movie represents the stereotypical life of four teenage boys and how they act when they are together without their parents away from home on holiday. This gives the film a very British feel.

-Cultural hubs

Most of the film is set in Malia and on the streets where there are lots of pubs and clubs. However the start of the film was set on a normal British steet with kids playing on the street etc. However one of the main theme songs 'We no speak americano' was produced by an Australian pair.

-Cultural practitioners

 

 

 

Hollywood film from mcgeoghann

 

Uk film consumption from mcgeoghann

Uk v hollywood from mcgeoghann

Distribution process from mcgeoghann

What significance does the continuing development of digital media technology have for institutions and audiences?

Over the years digital media has developed dramatically and is now regularly and essentially used for production, distribution, and marketing. I will be looking at the film industries and in particularly the films The Kings Speech, The Hobbit and The Avengers.

 Digital media has affected the film industry immensely. To begin with in the production of the films, they have transformed from 2D to 3D.  For large conglomerates like Disney this was a really hard time as all of their block busting films were heavily using 2D animations , for example characters like mickey mouse and Winnie the pooh etc. However in 2012 they released The Avengers which was a 3D film. They had a very large budget of $100 million to do this though. Digital media has had a huge effect on the distribution of films. For example reels of film do not have to be transported all over the world and can just now be sent by technology. By doing this it saves companies millions of pounds and also stops the risk of the reels getting damaged in transport.

Secondly the distribution of media institutions has developed over the years as in the modern day it is done digitally. This is a much more sustainable use as instead of shipping films all over the world, it is done through computers so it is easier, quicker and cheaper, also this is very effective as the cinemas can retrieve the films at the correct times all over the world, and so the cinemas can display the films instantly and earn money. Meanwhile the audience will be happy as they can view them instantly as well. However this is completely different to modern day distribution as it is done all over the world, but the original Hollywood system was the beginning of film distribution. In Hollywood they would produce their own films market them and distribute them to their own cinemas for the audiences to view. Therefore the term used for this was vertical integration as they had complete control top to bottom of the whole system, so Hollywood completely monopolized the markets so no other company could show their films to the public. Consequently they were taken to court in 1948 where they won their case to be able to display their films. Moving on now a days in response of this case large conglomerates like Lucas films give smaller independent companies the chance to display their films this is called co-financing, this is useful for the smaller company as it is put under the large companies name, resulting in them getting  the recognition so that it may obtain a larger audience.

Before the internet was around, there wasn’t much marketing for films so therefore the films didn’t make as much profit. But since the internet was invented it has hugely expanded. Now, social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter means that a film can be advertised which means more people will go to see the film. For example, the film The Dark Knight had its own website for teasers, before things like this could be done; it meant the institutions wouldn’t make as much money. But now it does make more money as audiences enjoy getting involved in films. Whilst this is great for the US simply because of the size of the company, it’s not as good for the UK. The UK don’t market their films online as much as the US does, however marketing online for the UK is good and should be done more often. For example the Inbetweeners films had loads of viral marketing because they main audience was teenagers, and teenagers use the internet the most so therefore they were constantly seeing it. As well as marketing due the internet there is now also the issue of piracy. This is bad news for the media institutions as it means they’re losing money as they’re not making money back from selling DVDs. However this can be good news for the audience as they don’t have to pay for the film. As well as piracy there is a decrease in the sale of DVDs. This is due to online kiosks such as Netflix and iTunes.

To conclude, the significance of the continuing development of digital media technology can be good and bad. It has made a lot more money but also lost it at the same time. Due to 3D, it makes a lot more money as it’s more exciting and more people are willing to go to the cinema to watch a film. However due to technologies such as the internet and piracy the institutions are losing out on money. I believe that the continuing development of technology has actually benefitted the audience more than institutions as it is easier for them to watch films, which are now better quality in HD and 3D.

 

 

 

Criteria	Pro	Con
Quality	Has improved	Conglomerates can afford high tech equipment whereas independent companies cant.
Cost-cutting	Less equipment required, sound and audio recorded at same time	Quality could be lost
Piracy	Digital cameras and sound equipment used in cinemas to record pirate copies of a film have improved greatly in quality	It would dent profits more strongly for smaller companies who need profits. Overall however, piracy will take a larger amount of revenue from bigger institutions.
Exhibition	Now in the UK 72% of cinemas are digital.    Benefits are that prints were bulky and their manufacture ,distribution and exhibition was expensive	Piracy is stopping people from going to the cinema to watch the film.
Marketing	The promotion of films using online advertising, viral games etc.  Digital technology has made life better for low budget film makers and distributors because films now are cheaper and easier to distribute.	Conglomerates can afford to advertise all over the world, independents cannot as they don’t have the funds.

Audience as producers

The film is produced to the audience liking therefore it will be popular during exhibition

Do not have the experience of experienced producers

 

 

Warp Films and Working title

Differences between them:

• Working titles use special effects, CGI, this is because they are owned by an American company called universal studios this is an advantage as they will be better for budgeting the movie

• Working titles tend to use high budgets to make films because Working titles is a conglomerate company

• Here some examples of working titles and their budgets:

-Atonement Dir. Joe Wright Budget: $30,000,000 Gross Revenue: $129,266,061

- Hot Fuzz Budget 8 Million, Box office 80,573,774. Working titles is budgeted from universal

• Working titles appeals their movies to people worldwide

• Working titles use films that established actors in them

• Warp films is a small company based in Sheffield England

• Warp films are a independent company

• Warp films have a low budget so they wont be able to include special effects•Here is an example of a film made b warp films and the budget:

-This Is England Dir. Shane Meadows Budget: £1,500,000 Gross Revenue: $8,069,240

“Cross media convergence and synergy are vital processes in the successful marketing of media products to audiences.” To what extent do you agree with this statement in relation to the media area you have looked at? (50 marks)

                In this essay I will be discussing whether or not cross media convergence and synergy are a vital process in the successful marketing of media products to audiences. I will be looking at the media area of film and in particularly the films; For Those In Peril, The Avengers, Anna Karenina and The Kings Speech.

                Cross media convergence is when companies come together vertically, horizontally or both. Synergy means working together to achieve an objective that couldn't be achieved independently.

                The Avengers was a very large, successful film that made over $700 million in the opening weekend. They used both Cross media convergence and synergy to promote their film and raise awareness. Because of the huge success the film had and the fact they did use both cross media convergence and synergy, suggests that these are a vital process in the marketing of a film. Avengers Assemble benefited from synergy with the supermarket Walmart. They were in partnership with the worldwide supermarket who sold over 600 Avengers related products in store. This benefited both Walmart and the film as it brought fans into their stores but at the same time raised awareness and promoted the new film. Cross media convergence also supported the release of the film. They sold merchandise such as figurines and toys in the Disney store and put adverts on the Disney channel. This raised a lot of awareness about the Superheroes in the movie.

                The Hunger Games Catching fire was another successful film that made just under £160 million in the opening weekend. They used many promotional methods in order to bring in a large audience. They used Synergy as well to make people aware the film was coming into cinemas. They worked together with Subway, who tied in promotion of The Hunger Games to their food products. They had a ‘Win your own victory tour’ campaign with their chicken melt promotion. SO again, this benefited both companies as Subway sold more of their products whilst more people went to watch Catching Fire in the cinema. They teamed up with Subway as they are the largest food chain company and therefore could reach Catching Fires huge target audience. Where as if they went for a smaller food company not as many people would have seen the promotion. They also used cross media convergence such as a Hunger Games themed summer camp. This raised huge awareness of the film for everyone who attended the camp, again bringing in more people to watch the film, raising their gross.

                Looking at these two films I would say that cross media convergence and synergy are a vital process in the successful marketing of media products to audiences. However there have also been films that haven’t used synergy or cross media convergence that were a success. This suggests that maybe they do not play a vital role in the successful marketing of the film.

                The film For Those In Peril didn’t really use neither synergy or cross media convergence. They did use Synergy with Channel Four who advertised the film on their channel. This would obviously mean that some people would have known about the film but at the same time this wasn’t mass marketing. I believe that the main reason for the film’s success was the Novel that was written before it was released.

The film The Kings Speech were in the same situation. As an independent film, the King's Speech was not able to use a huge budget of Hollywood levels to market it and get it recognised. With a budget of only around £8million - £12 million, it could not compete with major blockbusters with backing from massive institutions such as Universal or 20th Century Fox. Instead, the King's Speech used viral marketing to draw attention to the film - and it proved just as effective, if not, more. The film was made just in time to enter it into several film festivals in the hope that national newspaper journalists will enjoy it and write about it in their papers.

Therefore in conclusion I do not believe that cross media convergence and synergy are vital processes in the successful marketing of media products to audiences. I say this because a film can be successful without them such as the Kings Speech. However I do think if the film has the money to use cross media convergence and synergy it does help the film to be successful. I think if they use it they will have a much bigger chance at making a much bigger profit.