Homework

Releases this week from today (25^th September) to Sunday 28^th September

As you can see there are 13 movie releases this week:

·         The Equalizer, is a Hollywood film which lies in the action| crime| thriller genre.

·         Honeymoon, is another Hollywood film which lies in the Horror genre and for the opening weekend on 12^th September, it cost $4,131

·         Maps to the Stars, is yet another Hollywood film which is in the genre of drama, the budget is estimated to have been $15,000,000

·         What  We Did on Our Holiday, is a British comedy film which is a comedy

·         Ida, is a Polish film which is a drama and spent $55,438 on the opening weekend

·         Human Capital, is an Italian film which is a drama and its budget is estimated to be €6,000,000

·         Spiderman Lost Cause, is the second British film to be released this week in the UK and lies in the Action | Comedy | Drama genres. Its budget is estimated to be £7,000.

·         The Record Keeper is a Sci-fi film which is the fourth Hollywood film to be released this week and its budget is estimated to be around $800,000.

·         The Last Impresario is a documentary Australian film to be released this week.

·         Like Sunday, Like Rain is a drama | Music film which is an American Film.

·         The Sentimentalists, is a crime film which is a Greek film

·         Down Dog, is a British comedy which is due to be released this Sunday

·         Welcome to No Man’s Land, is an English Crime film also due to this Sunday.

Production 

The stages of making a film include:

·         Development – ideas, scripts, screen play, budgeting, etc.

·         Pre-production- auditions, cast, film crew, props, venues, makeup artists.

·         The shoot

·         Post production – editing, special effects, music, posters, advertisements made

·         Marketing

·         Sales

·         Distribution- film is distributed and screened in cinemas.

List of main American film producers:

Lions Gate Entertainment:

·         Canadian-American

·         was formed in Vancouver on July 3 1997

·         Headquarter is in Santa Monica, California

·         The CEO is Jon Feltheimer who has held that position since 2000

·         The founder is Frank Giustara who is also a philanthropist

·         Lions Gate was recently renamed as the studio is now the owner of Summit Entertainment

DreamWorks:

·         Is an American animation studio

·         Established in 2004

·         The headquarters are  in Glendale, California

·         Creates online virtual worlds, television programmes as well as animated feature films

·         The CEO is Jeffrey Katzenberg

·         It was founded in 1997

·         The founders are: David Geffen. Steven Spielberg and Jeffery Katzenburg

Columbia Pictures:

·         American Film production and distribution studio

·         It is a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment and a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony

·         Founded in May, 1919 in Los Angeles, California

·         Its Headquarter is at Culver City, CA

·         Was founded by Joe Brandt, Jack Cohn and Harry Cohn

·         In the 1950s it had established its most popular series of film including, Boston Blackie, Blondie, The Lone Wolf and many more

20^th Century Fox

·         Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation was founded in May 31, 1935

·         Its founders are William Fox, Joseph M. Schneck

·         The CEO and chairman Jim Gianopulos

·         20^th Century Fox owns 10.6% share of the US and Canadian Markets.

Viacom

·         American global mass media company

·         The CEO Philippe Dauman

·         Its Headquarters is in New York City

·         Its founders are Tom Freston and Sumner Redstone

·         It is the conglomerate of Paramount Motion Pictures Group and it also owns Nickelodeon Movies  and MTV Films

·         It was created in on December 31 2005 as a spinoff from CBS Corporation

The ownership of the studio has an impact on what films the studio makes based on their genre of movies.

An independent production is when a person has control over everything including editing, ideas, camera work etc.

DISTRIBUTION

Distribution means the action of sharing a film amongst a number of recipients e.g. Cinemas.

A film distributor is a company that is responsible for the marketing of the film and a company that may set the release date to when the film is going to be made available doing.

The traditional way of distributing a film is to catalogue their film at festivals and markets.

The newer way of distribution deals is that the studio makes a licensing agreement with the distribution company and determines how many copies of the film to make; the distribution company shows the screening to potential buyers. The buyers the negotiate and liaise with distribution company and finally the copies are sent to the theatres a few days before the opening day, tickets get sold and in the end the theatre sends the copy back to the distribution company and pay due to the agreement they had.

Film festivals usually occur once a year that provide opportunities for unknown filmmakers to get their film in front of a real live audience and to have their films reviewed by professional critics and give people a chance for them to make distribution  deals with distribution companies and to get their film screened at cinemas.

A distributor may decide to release a film on one particular weekend rather than another as one weekend another film may come out, which will decrease the amount of people coming to see the film as they may want to see the other. Another reason may be that the distributer may want to release the film during the weekend of a bank holiday so that they will know that a lot of people would attend, making more profit for him/her.

Distribution is vital for the film chain as it is the process where the film can be bought by major distribution companies and can make your film well known, locally and even globally. Distribution is the transitional stage where the film has a chance of being a big hit, but many people need to be careful as to which distribution company they choose as if they cannot secure a distribution deal then your film may not be able to progress and expand.

MARKETING

Marketing is the process in which the studio promotes the film by doing market research and advertising. It makes the film at the new product development stage.  This is different to distribution as marketing promotes your film, and gives you a direction of exactly what age group and genre it is aiming for.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paFgQNPGlsg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNKy9QOeDhI

Films are promoted to different audiences in different ways depending on the audience you are promoting it to. For example, if targeting a film for 15-18 year olds, then social media such as twitter, Facebook and MySpace are a great way to promote a movie via hash tags, links to the trailer and so on. Whereas if you were trying to promote a film targeted to families, the advertisements would be shown on newspapers and bus ads, as it allows a variety of people to be aware of the film.

EXHIBITION

Audiences get to see films on a variety of platforms such as in cinemas, on apps e.g Neflix, at youth centre on their tv e.g. Sky Box Office, on gaming platforms such as Xbox, PS4 and online. So films nowadays are very accessible as they are on different platforms which allows them to reach to a bigger audience.

The box office of a film is used to refer on the success of a film depending on how many tickets have been sold.

The money is received both to the distributer and producer due to the agreement they had between them on shares.

Cinemas make their money mostly on refreshments such as popcorn, nachos, drinks, sweets, chocolates and just overall junk food that you would normally eat whilst watching movies. Cinemas also make lots of money from the different trailers and advertisements that play before the film actually starts.

Cinemas encourage audiences to visit rather than watch films at home by showing a variety of 3D movies. Cinemas also encourage people to visit by having using convergence, by having promotional codes on cereal boxes and by having entry competitions to get discounts on films at cinemas. Cinemas can also just provide good service, by having an excellent sound system and by giving their viewers the best time at the cinema, and this will encourage people to come back.

Ancillary markets are non- theatrical markets for ‘feature films’ such as:

·         Home video

·         Internet streaming

·         Pay per view

·         Television

BFI stands fir British Film Institute and is a charity governed by Royal Charter that specialise in film distribution, exhibitions, publishing, festivals and so many more to encourage the developments of the arts of film, moving image and television across the whole of United Kingdom. The BFI is the world’s largest film archive that contains over 50,000 fiction films and approximately 625,000 television programmes.