Passion Pit

Passion Pit are back, and it's a big one. 

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How important is cross media convergence and synergy in production, distribution and marketing?

Cross media convergence and synergy is where two or more types of media come together, e.g. a comic and a youtube clip, to make something else, e.g. a film. They synergy is when different elements of a company work together to promote related products for e.g. a film.

For the synergy side, the partnership of two or more institutions ensures a larger effect and is beneficial for each company in expertise and costs.  See Saw Films formed a business with Paramount pictures USA, this allows for control by Paramount over their product/film. They did this because  they have experience and size in the marketplace [cinemas, stores, online, etc.] which all help in the distribution of a film. Film 4 were another institution that also joined up with another institution, Celador Films, who are the makers of ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire’. The technological convergence is also key for their film Slumdog Millionaire, with Boyle using new software to add special effects in editing; the use of blue screen and also using new types of digital cameras to shoot with. Slumdog Millionaire’s early US distributor Warner Independent went bankrupt and wanted to take the film straight to a DVD release. However, A business relationship with the French Company, Pathe helped to distribute the film and create the poster, trailer and also the UK website. In the U.S.A. Fox Searchlight took over. This shows without without the synergy of the other companies, Slumdog Millionaire possibly wouldn’t of even gone out into the cinemas, due to a lack of funding however they were helped out at the last minute.  However, a film such as Tron Legacy wouldn’t really have to worry about this too much. Due to them being such a massive company, and owning so much worldwide and being in the ‘big 6’ companies, they have plenty of contacts that helps to keep everything within their own name. They did however use Sean Bailey as he is known for being particularly strong within Disney for his works in Sci-Fi film productions.

For marketing, convergence of media occurs when multiple products come together to form one product with the advantages of all of them; marketing on phones, and internet, downloadable films straight to computer and phones, Blu-Ray DVDs can carry more features, therefore are used as they are preferred by many of today’s customers. Other people come in which helps to enable the feature of being able to save films on the SKY digital player, and also on Freebox Satellite television. Furthermore, people make games for the film, on all different kinds of platforms making it available to millions of people with worldwide online gaming also a feature. Finally people do a lot of work of uploading videos/trailers of the film onto YouTube to try and get hype around the film even before it’s out.  See Saw Productions  use websites, blogs which give access to ongoing filming of their films, chat rooms to discuss the film and even downloadable screen savers. As we can tell, despite there being a fair piece of marketing, there still isn’t loads, and this could be to do with the fact that they are only a British Company with budgets far from those in the American Industry. Once again this is apparent when considering Film 4, they can only use the cross synergy to a certain degree in their marketing campaigns due to a lack of budget. Therefore they try cheaper alternatives in an attempt to still get a good marketing campaign for their film. These include, Trailers, which they used clips of the public recommending the film, they had their website which was used for discussions from fans. Film 4 also released clips, ringtones and screensavers which could be downloaded onto a variety of different platforms so that they could still attract people over the internet. The fact that they produced so many posters helped the film in terms of ‘word of mouth’ marketing, as for a period they were everywhere and you couldn’t get away from them.  Totally on the other hand we have Walt Disney with their film Tron Legacy. Walt Disney have no issues at all with their marketing budget, which is virtually limitless depending on what film it is for. For Tron the overall budget was  $170,000,000 obviously not all of this was for their marketing campaign, however it shows you when a film has a budget of that size, they can afford to get the film marketed extremely well. Walt Disney had a lot of Technological Synergy for their marketing, including toys being made by Be@rbrick, Oakley even designed 3D sunglasses for the film. They teamed up with Daft Punk for the soundtrack, which was released prior to the film’s release which was to of believed to of attracted a lot of viewers who wouldn’t have necessarily been overly interested in watching the film, however as they had seen that Daft Punk were involved, decided to go and watch it, one YouTube member even commented on the trailer saying about how this saddening fact had actually become the majority of people at the cinema watching the film. They even took the Daft Punk scenario as far as making dedicated film posters totally to Daft Punk themselves. Disney even went to the extent of creating a crackable CSS code for their fans to attempt to crack and then get even more behind the scenes footage, trailers, news etc.

These days there is a big difference in the way that films are produced, distributed and marketed. This is mainly because of the ever growing new technology we have in today’s film industry. I believe that with the big six companies dominating 90% of the films worldwide we have to look at them directly for film production and distribution as nowadays 90% of films at some stage will go through one of those company’s whereas years ago, despite their being ‘bigger’ companies it wasn’t so dominated by the big companies.

I believe that the internet and new technology has changed the marketing side of the films dramatically. With people now being able to make DVDs, Blu-Ray DVDs, online interviews with cast, producers, directors, film trailers games, downloadable pictures, screensavers, ringtones, soundtracks etc things have come a long long way from when they just made a short trailer and a film poster, and even before that when there was just posters.

To compete with the American dominance British companies have adopted a few new strategies, which are all really based around the same kind of thing; word of mouth.

i've not finished but want to sleep now

Language & History

What information is conveyed and from what sources does t seem to be taken?
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Both posters have exactly the same bottom third of the poster, giving information on the release date, a list of the leading actors/actreses and then the credits at the very bottom.

There are obviously big differences between the two posters, the left one Geoffrey Rush has his image on the right hand side above his name. It has several quotations from different magazines, film critics and newspapers. The varying range of good comments from different people/organisations shows that it has been recognised by various people, and therefore would appeal to a wide audience. For example, they have included a quote from 'GLAMOUR' magazine, this would be appealing to a female audience and would get them in to watch the film. The words they have used for the front cover that are very british. For example, 'Majestic' 'Exquisite' 'Terrific' 'Fills You With Joy'. This all helps to aid the british feel of the film with using these typically british words.

The poster on the right has a picture of leading star Colin Firth, with his image on the left hand side, above his name. This poster doesn't have the quotations, this time it has 'God Save The King' this is a clever play on the words. It is just using the words of the national anthem and using King instead of Queen. This could appeal to a religious audience with the inclusion of 'God' and maybe this would make them interested in watching the film.

There's an in-balance in the image to text ratio, on the left poster, this is however done because they want to sell the film on how it's been recieved and the good comments it has had and not particularly on Geoggrey Rush's performance in the film. The right hand poster also has a lot of words on it, however this one has less words, and they have carefully put the words around Colin Firths' face, this was done so that they could not only sell the film on it's relation to religion and The Royal Family, but also the fact that they have Colin Firth starring the film, who is, at the minute one of the biggest british male actors, so it's a good selling point.

The colour in the posters are royal and luxury colours; Blue, Gold, Black and White. All of the messages on the posters are very british, and the image suggest that things are serious, by Colin Firth's facial expression, howoever Geoffrey Rush's facial expression is suggesting that he is looking at Colin Firth who is then looking at us as an audience.

The King's Speech is a 2010 British historical drama film directed by Tom Hooper and written by David Seidler. Colin Firth plays King George VI, who, to overcome his stammer, sees Lionel Logue, an unorthodox Australian speech therapist played by Geoffrey Rush. The two men become friends as they work together, and after his brother Edward VIII abdicates, the new king relies on Logue to help him make a radio broadcast at the beginning of World War II.

How is the mise en scene constructed to convey the setting, the period and the social status of the characters in the shot.

The costumes are obviously the main way in which the period of time is set, with expensive looking dated clothing, which would of been worn at the time. The lady in the shot is also looking up to the man implying that the men has more power than the lady. The man is also shown to have more power aswell, by the use of props; the man is holding a drink, which we assume to be an alcoholic oneat that. The lady is however shown to be wealthy and still with some power. She is wearing a long pearl necklace, with a fur coat and then topped with an expensive looking hat to show her wealth off.

Distribution

Having produced a film you need to get it into various cinemas. 

A film distributor is company or individual responsible for releasing films to the public either theatrically or for home viewing for example DVD, Video-On-Demand, Download, or Television. 

If a distributor is working with a cinema, the distributor secures a written contract agreeing the amount of the gross ticket sales to be paid to the distributor by the cinema. 

The distributor must also ensure that enough film prints are struck to service all contracted cinemas on the contract-based opening day, ensure their physical delivery to the theater by the opening day, they monitor exhibitors to make sure the film is in fact shown in the particular theatre with the minimum number of seats and show times they agreed and they ensure the prints' return to the distributor's office or other storage resource also on the contract-based return date. 

In practical terms, this includes the physical production of film prints and their shipping around the world as well as the creation of posters, newspaper and magazine advertisements, television commercials, trailers, and other types of advertisements.

The distributor is also responsible for ensuring a full line of film advertising material is available on each film which it believes will help the exhibitor attract the largest possible audience, create such advertising if it is not provided by the production company, and arrange for the physical delivery of the advertising items selected by the exhibitor at intervals prior to the opening day.

An example of very poor film distribution was the film, released in 2009, only got a total UK Theatrical Box Office taking of £86, a record low.

Considering it stars Academy Award nominee Uma Thurman, UK star Minnie Driver, and TV show ‘ER’ helmer Anthony Edwards, you would expect a lot more, however it was worked out that this box office sale showed that less than ten people in the whole UK who actually bought tickets. However, all of this was proven to of been for genuine reasons, the film massively flopped in America, and therefore they didn't want to spend anymore money on the film in the UK so they did the minimum that they possibly could on the film in the UK.

The film is not very good (though it’s not terrible either)

The film was released in one cinema in London only. Very little PR was done

This limited release is a tactic to gain exposure and reviews for DVD, VOD and TV sales. 

They expected to do very little business in theatres (though maybe not this little)

The distributor may have been contractually bound to release the film in theatres when in fact, it should never have appeared in theatres (but the film maker demanded it), therefore they did the minimum needed to fulfil their end of the deal.

The DVD was released on the same day as the theatrical release (figures not available yet, but let’s not jump to any conclusions).

The significance of proliferation in hardware and content for institutions and audiences

3D at the Box Office:
3D was expected to be totally taking over our cinemas, however things haven't quite gone to plan.

After 80% of those who went to see Avatar saw it in 3D it was expected to then take over becoming a norm in the cinema experience. Things have in reality not gone this way, in fact they've gone the other way, with percentages of the opening weekend sales in 3D after dropping fastly.

The British film industry have tended not to bother with the 3D films, with one of the only films being produced in 3D being 'Step Up'. This could be because that British film industry don't have the funding to put 3D in mind when they are making

The King's Speech

The King's Speech

The King's Speech is a british film that came out in 2010. It's set in 1930's Britain, The film is the private story of a famous public man, King George VI [known in his family circle as Bertie], the woman who loved him and became his queen, and an Australian speech therapist Lionel Logue, who helped him control and come to terms with the stammer that had tortured him since childhood.

Britishness

The King's Speech is a very British film. The Director was Tom Hooper a director that's always been involved in the British side of things. When looking upon his previous history he's only over recent years began to direct films that are watched in cinema, with big audiences. In 2009 he direct the film 'The Damned United' this was about the manager english manager, Brian Clough and his managerial career. This was an extremely british film, with a very british cast. Similar to The Damned United, The King's Speech is an extremely british film. First of all the overall plot about 1930's Britain. It is all about the Royal Family and the reign of different Kings. The film, for the majority of it is filmed inside very Royal surroundings; big Royal houses, old Royal cars, the same as they would of been back then. Everything about the film is very british, they have obviously done a lot of research into everything that the Royal family would of been wearing back in the 30's, how exactly the would speak, and all of the actors have been well selected to represent the characters in a very british way.Colin Firth, in today's film industry is most probably the most sought after British actor, and was perfect for the lead role. The other actors around him were also perfectly selected, Helena Bonham was selected to be Colin Firth's wife in the film, once again a great choice, she's known to be one of 'the UK's finest' and also to be very versatile and her part in The King's Speech was played exceptionally well. The film was mainly targeted at a UK audience, however also with the USA in mind. 

Exhibition Issues

The King's Speech did extremely well at the box office. It did a lot better than was even expected of it, with even distributor Momentum Pictures's wildest expectations being exceeded with a £3.52m opening weekend, including modest previews of £227,000, this outshining many other film's that have done well in the UK - considering the opening grosses of Slumdog Millionaire [£1.83m],Calendar Girls [£1.88m], Atonement [£1.63m] and Pride and Prejudice [£2.53m], it's clear The King's Speech has taken a huge leap forward, even allowing for the current inflation.

The film also do incredibly well considering the time of release. With the release date so close to another huge British film '127 Hours'. There was a lot of discussion as to whether The King's Speech or 127 Hours would suffer, and it was the latter that did.

Exhibition Reviews 

The film has been  critically aclaimed by most respectable organisations. The Guardian wrote a really good review on the film, it talks about the 'skilfully written and impeccably played scenes' and also, saying how 'overall the film is a major achievement, with Firth presenting us with a great profile in courage'. It was nominated for 14 Baftas in 2011, which was the highest amount of nominations for any film, the film was nominated for a number of the big awards, including  best film, outstanding British film, best director and best actor, for Globe winner Colin Firth. Firth, the lead role in the film,  was also nominated for his 'exceptional' performance in almost every category. 

In terms of Oscars, The King's Speech was nominated for twelve of them. Comments from critics such as 'Firth more than makes up for that with what is one of the great performances not just of this year but in cinema history.' Shows just how amazing Firth's performance was in the film and he has, justifiably been noticed for this.

Other reviewers have criticized the film, as not being award worthy, and just a 'worth seeing' film.

It was criticized by The Guardian , for having the representation of certain people wrong; 'The film is not without its odd faults, the truly annoying one being the representation of Winston Churchill'. Christopher Hitchens is critical about aspects of the film's historical accuracy and how this may wrongly influence the movie-going audiences as to what actually did happen back in those times. The Telegraphs criticizes the film for things such as they used the font Helvetica, despite it not being around for another 30 years. Also, things such as women wearing hosiery without seams when seamless stockings did not arrive until later,  a frustrated king throwing down his speech only for it to reappear in his hand the next second and the use of a plastic model biplane when the ones of the time were wooden.

The film also features a Tiger Moth plane with a registration which did not exist until 1941 and 

refers to the now Queen's younger sister as "Princess Margaret" when she was known 

throughout her childhood as "Princess Margaret Rose".

  However, these reviews are the minority, with the majority believing that it's definitely worth the awards it has already won.

There's been a lot of youtube reviews of the film, in particular in the USA. It has been received well out there also.

Distribution

Exhibition In Different Stages:

Promotional Screenings - Cinemas - Hospitality - DVD Rental - Pay TV/ VOD- DVD Retail - Free TV - Library

• Digital Video production is changing this
• A film recoups most of its budget through DVD
• There are 45 international territories in which the rights to exhibit films are regularly traded
• 20 internaltional markey places e.g. Cannes, Berlin, Venice, Sundance
• Sales agents for film rights tend to use the same set of generic internal percentages to make esitimates as to how a film will sell internationally
• Europe 39% Far East 16% North America 33%
• Only Europe & Asia tend to buy these films.
• A film exhibition sale is generally a 75-25 split between a vender cinema/retailer/TV & a distributor, deducts 35% commision and costs 'off the top'.
• Cinema hasn't been seriously affected by the recession.
• 40% of independant British Films never gross more than 100k at the box office
• opening in over 100 screens significantly increases cost
• 49% of all DVD rentals are now generated online

Royalty Model                                                       Off The Top Model

Distributor Pays                                                    Distributor tasks 35%

Producer a 35% royalty                                       Commision + 25% cost

• Supermarkets have come to dominate DVD sales, pushing the average retail price of a DVD to £7.42
• Supermarkets - 23%  Audio, video, specialists 35% Mail Order: 15% Generalists - 18% Wholesalers 9%
• Pay Per View + Video on Demand tend to be more profitable as the costs of sale are born by the TV platform.
• Subscription & free TV fixed-free licensing deals depend on the performance history of the film.
• Recoupment is organised into a corridor & made from a central collection account
• 55% of your money pays for debts.