practice exam question

Is it fair and level playing field in the area you have studied?

‘The British film industry has been through some amazing highs an lows over the last 100 years… but there has always been (despite some amazing creative talent like; Hitchcock, J.K Rowling and Dench) a struggle with finance.’

In terms of contemporary cinema, which I will investigate in more detail by comparing and contrasting my British and Hollywood case studies (The Woman in Black 2011 and Paranormal Activity 2007), this statement can be applied because of the balance is still tipped in favour of massive Hollywood conglomerates that dominate the market place. In this last decade, British films have seen huge financial growth due to; technological advances, government/ European funding/Lottery/grants, the Hollywood writers strike and amazing British talent like J.K Rowling refused to let Hollywood take the Harry Potter franchise.

Although, as McDougall (2008) stated Britain cannot compete on a completely level playfield as Hollywood as it doesn’t have the millions required for production, distribution and exhibition. This means that high budget British films have to get some funding from other place, meaning even though they can be classified as British films they have outside help and lose some profit, from production, distribution or exhibition from other countries.

According to the categories outlined by McDougall (2008), my British case study is a C category film. This means that this was filmed with mostly foreign money (but not USA) investment and a small British input either financially or creatively.

Interesting, although my Hollywood choice altimately attracted a Hollywood company to distribute and went onto become a massive Hollywood franchise, it started on a lower production budget to my British case study. In terms of production, my British case study had a production budget of $15 million, while my Hollywood case study had a budget of $10,000. I think this proves that British films could compete on a level playing field to Hollywood films because both of these films went onto be financially successful.

Through comparing the production information on the two films you can see the difference it made. My British filoms starred Daniel Radcliffe, Ciaran Hinds and Janet McTeer and my Hollywood film starred Katie Featherston, Micah Sloat and Mark Fredrichs. In terms of crew, the Hollywood film employed Oren Peli, Jason Blum and Steven Schneider and my British film had Richard Jackson, James Watkins, Tim-Maurice-Jones and Marco Beltrami. In terms of locations and settings, my British film was filmed in Essex, Northhampshire and Buckinghamshire while my Hollywood film was filmed in Oren Peli’s house.

Looking at the cast list and locations, it would seem logical that The Woman in Black should have been more successful that Paranormal Activity because Radcliffe is a massive global star and the production budget meant higher image quality, better special effects and better locations. However, ultimately, Paranomal Activity grossed a higher profit. There could be a number of reasons why this was the case. Firstly, in terms of the horror genre, Paranormal Activlty was a ground breaking phenomium in terms of cinematography and narrative while the Woman in Black followed more traditional horror conventions.

Paranormal Activity was a scarier film than The Woman in Black because The Woman in Black was made as a ghost story with special effects whilst Paranormal Activity was set in a normal setting of a house, which made it more realistic and believable for the audience. The actors who were filmed in the house stayed in the house for 24 hours and Oren Peli scared them so that he could actually capture their fear on camera. The way it was filmed on a home camera made it more realistic and believable for the audience too.

The other reason why Paranormal Activity was more successful relates to distribution viral marketing techniques, distribution budget and marketing strategies.

In terms of contents and target audience, the genre of my British film was Horror, the age rating was PG and my primary target audience was 12 to 30 year old horror fans of all ethnicity and in a demographic band of C1-E.My Hollywood film was a horror genre, rated a 15 with a primary target audience of 15 to 30 years old horror fans of all ethnicity in a demographic band of C1-E. The nationality of my British film is British and for the USA is American. 

The fact that both films were of the same genre meant that they were competing for a similar target audience. My Paranormal Activity Hollywood case attracted this target audience more successfully because it was scarier and was a better example of a film from that genre.

In terms of age rating (developed due to hyperdermic needle theory proving young people are more likely to be influenced by film content and therefore need protecting), research shows the most profitable target group is 15-24 years (because they have disposable income and have time to socialize), my British film wouldn’t appeal to this group because it’s a PG and this audience would think the film wouldn’t be scary if it’s suitable for younger ages. However, my USA film would appeal as it’s a 15 so will make the film appeal to this age group.