EVALUATION QUESTION 3 - What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
Distributor
Three definitions

Definition 1 (Wiki)

A film distributor is a company or individual responsible for the marketing of a film.

Definition 2 (taken from BBC)

In terms of shorts, a distributor is an individual or organisation who will represent your film at festivals and markets around the world and who will attempt to sell it to television (including terrestrial, cable and satellite), airlines and other companies that show short films. The major short film distributors in the UK are (in alphabetical order): Dazzle, Futureshorts, Network Ireland TV and Shorts International. See the distributor section of our Related Links: Exhibition & Distribution – Shorts for information and links to these distributors and others.

Definition 3 (BBC)

In terms of features, a distributor is generally an organisation who handles the theatrical release of a film in a particular country as well as the marketing and circulation of films for home viewing (DVD, Video-On-Demand, Download, Television etc). Often feature films have different distributors representing them in different territories and different distributors handling the home-viewing circulation. Independent film distribution in the UK is generally managed by indie distributors such as Metrodome, Optimum Releasing and Momentum. See the distributor section of our Related Links: Exhibition & Distribution – Features for information and links to these distributors and others. 

My definition 
Distributors are the middle men between producers and exhibitors, producers often pre-sell distribution rights to finance production. Michael Leigh and Ken Loach do this to distribution companies in European countries e.g Spain, Italy, Germany and France. Working Title sometimes do this but low budget films often rely on this technique. Distributors often attempt to create hype during production and pre-production. They are primarily responsible for marketing and decide upon the release dates, it remains conventional to stagger release dates across markets, e.g Love Actually is heavily related with Christmas as they used a seasonal release strategy (DVD came out just before Christmas and was first shown on Tv around Christmas as well) as well as the posters and CD covers had connotations of Christmas. Saw and Paranormal activity franchise are now associated with Halloween. 

This is a blog further explaining distribution 

Top 10 distributors of 2014
The Big Six Distributors

The big six distributors are:                                  The rest are:
Warner Bros. Pictures                                          New line (subsidiary of Warner Bros)
20th Century Fox                                                 Lionsgate 
Paramount Pictures                                             Dreamworks SKG
Universal Pictures                                               Miramax 
Sony Pictures Entertainment 
Walt Disney Studios

The majority of the Big Six also own subsidiaries that concentrate on art house pictures (e.g.Fox Searchlight) or genre films (e.g. Sony's Screen Gems). Miramax is an Indie, formerly owned by Disney, Dreamworks is an Indie but have a distribution deal with Disney and New Line  is a Warner subsidiary.

The current Big Six distributors 

 The current Mini-major studios 

The leading independent producer/distributors—Lionsgate Films, is referred to as a "mini-major". (Wiki) But due to its recent success has led some to insist on talking of a 'big 7'.
In 2010 Lionsgate generated $513.9 million in grosses and was far ahead of the other mini-majors, none of which reached $100 million. And more recently their success with distributing some of the Hunger Games franchise. 

These are the top ten distributors of 2014. They are all part of the big 6 and own the largest shares in the film distribution industry. As well as this they are conglomerates and own many subsidiaries. However, as successful these companies are many of them are not suited to distribute our film. This is because they specialise in working with big budget films containing an A-list filled cast not a small low budget Indie film. StudioCannal however have distributed a much larger variety of films ranging from thriller to horror to rom-com and period dramas. They have also distributed social realist films such as Mickybo and me. 

StudioCanal is a distributor which acquired the UK-based distributor Optimum Releasing in 2006. It is owned by General Electric which is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in New York. It has links to Working Title as both are subsidiaries of the conglomerate General Electric.  (Wiki)

Suitability of Big Six
They distribute movies focused on a global audience therefore their films appeal to a majority of consumers, for example the four quadrant strategy like in the film Avatar, so that their gross is a large a sum, due to the increased numbers of people who will go see it, this strategy would be used when making a tentpole film. The four quadrant strategy means that the film must appeal to a female and male audience as well as a youthful and more mature audience. If a film uses the 4 quadrant strategy it will have aspects that will appeal to all 4 audiences The film Avatar successfully achieved this, making worldwide $2,787,965,087, it's action and military aspect appealed to a male audience (especially youthful) and the romance attracted the female audience. The fast paced and exiting nature of the battle scenes would appeal to a youthful audience whilst the slower appreciation of nature and creatures is more likely to appeal to a more mature audience. 

The Dark Knight Rises 
Even though the big 6 want their films to appeal to a global audience, the American audience  make up 50%(moving now more to 40% as China's film industry is developing this shown by The Dark Night Rises) of the total gross of the money made from the film industry, due to their ticket prices being the most expensive in the world at around $8.17. This fits with the Gant rule which states that 

'an average significant hit has 10 times the amount of box office in the USA than the UK. We tested this by looking at Hunger Games Mocking Jay part 1. It made £22m in the UK and $258 in the USA proving the Gant rule.'

Total Lifetime Grosses (of the Dark Night Rises)

Domestic (USA):	$448,139,099	41.3%
+ Foreign:	$636,300,000	58.7%

Warner Bros (the number 1 distributor in the world during 2014) distribute films like Green Lantern budget $200m, Inception $160m and The Dark Night Rises with a budget of $250m. 

This films budget was huge and way bigger than many of their other action/superhero films i.e Green Lantern $200m and their original production of Batman in 1989 who's budget was a mere $35m. This film made $1.005 billion. 

American Audience
Our film will be focused on relating to the British audience so it wouldn't be suitable for an American audience, as it's not familiar 

• the rural Yorkshire setting 
• strong accents 
• the mise-en-scene which contains many British films, books and artists that would not be familiar to an American audience

therefore it's very unlikely that any of the American distributors would consider working with us as we are an indie film company. However, though it is very rare, some such films do break through to the American market e.g Slumdog Millionaire, The Full Monty, Secrets and lies and Billy Elliot. These films usually reflect the American dream, this is where the underdog succeeds shown through the feel-good ending. This appeals to the US audience as it includes the 'American dream', as people want to get away from the harsh realities of life. Working Title, even though they are a British production company, they prioritise the US audience when choosing cast, locations, genre, representations, narrative. This contrasts greatly with Warps approach, as their films have next to no appeal for a US audience as the regional accents and settings are difficult for them to understand, and social realism is not a well known genre however there is a successful example i.e Billy Elliott as it received world wide audience. 

Submarine - A directly comparable film?
Our film is heavily influenced by Warps ( an independent film production company based in Sheffield and London) Submarine. 
Submarine (Richard Ayoade, 2011)

Produced by Warp Films (+9); UK distribution: StudioCanal 

Budget:$1.2m

Box Office: $467,602 (domestic); $397,057 (foreign)
The scenery shots and bedroom scene were inspired by Submarine. It made a box office gross of $ 4,581,937 which for Warp was a substantial amount. Therefore there is already a current market and audience for this film so it will be less of a risk, meaning that we would be a good choice of producers to work with. It was also well received across seas as its international box office came to $467,602, in Australia $219,292. Therefore this is anchorage to distributors that our film is not too much of a risk. StudioCanal did a very successful job of distributing the film as we can see from the total gross. 

Self Distribution
Another option would be self-distribution where we would distribute our film ourselves. This in the 21st century is possible due to digitisation, which supports innovative methods of research. Positives of doing this would be:
1. We would have full control over the right of our film and choose where we want it to exhibited as well. Corey Geenop after signing with a distributor to distribute his film 'Wandering Rose' in America, lost all control of this film's trailer and even its tile. It was changed to 'Demon Baby'. 
2. We also get to keep any cut of the money that would have been used to pay the distributer. 
Negatives:
1. It could be very time consuming due to extra work and would take time away from working on other aspects of the film.
2. We would need to be trained legally so we could be sure that the distribution rights that we are signing would not prevent us from exhibiting our film else where.
Warp, when self distributing their film Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee, came up with good marketing ideas, for example creating downloadable Christmas cards and collapsed the cinema release window as they promoted a fake cinematic release campaign to advertise the DVD realise by getting interviews. This is proof that even if you are self distributing unusual and ingenious ideas can work massively in your favour. But as we have minimal funding (micro budget) there is limited chance that we would get distribution. A good example of self distribution is Hinterland by Harry Macqueen in 2015 and Warp's All Tomorrow's Parties which was funded by the crowd. The before mentioned all have VoD releases. Le donk and scor-zay-zee cleverly faked a cinematic release to create buzz. Many use this technique of touring the director along side the Q + A events. This marketing technique was used for the films Four Lions, Wondering Rose and Hinterland. This was key in creating the buzz that helped Four Lions receive an extended distribution following their unexpected high box office. 

Conclusion
In conclusion we have decided to go with Studio Canal as they are a successful distributer with a long history of distributing Indie films. They also have a past of working with lower budget films for example Billy Elliott, who's budget was £5m and distributing them globally not just in the Uk. Warp may have been a good distributor for us however Warp is a self distributer therefore it is very unlikely for them to pick up films that they have not produced, meaning that they probably wouldn't work with us. StudioCanal also distributed Submarine, as we already know they did a very good job and therefore have previous experience with handling a film that is very similar to ours. Therfore we have chosen to go with StudioCanal. 

EVALUATION QUESTION 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Primary Audience

Our primary audience would be 15-21. One of the reasons for this would be that this is the age group that attends the cinema the most frequently.  

If cinema going habits are tabulated according to age group it appears that there is a steady rise in frequency from the earliest age to the 16-19 age group. Thereafter there is a steady decline, which is particularly sharp between the ages of 30 and 39, when the claims of parenthood are probably most exacting. Among persons aged 60 or over, only 11 per cent attend the cinema once a week or more often, and it is worth noting that this is a smaller percentage than in the age group 0 to 4. - Uk frequency of cinema visits 

Usually a film's central protagonists reflect that age of the primary audience, for example in ours our protagonists are 16-17 years old and fit within our primary audience. After looking into genre research this was the most common target audience that we found. This already tells us that there is a market for our rom-com social realist hybrid.

Mainstream audience vs niche audience 

There is a big difference between the usual media language of an Indie film production company such as Warp and a studio or big 6 subsidiary like Working Title. Working Titles approach is primarily centred on widening audience appeal beyond the UK, a 'commercial' approach. Warp's style is more focused on giving 'positive representation to minorities and under privileged that would be invisible or negatively stereotyped by a Working Title film', for example Richard Curtis's film Notting Hill featured a predominantly all caucasian cast even though Notting Hill is a well known African American area of London. We chose to feature a mixture of both. We have taken common conventions that are frequently used in Working Title films and from Warp films. 

Why research genre audience?  

• Financiers must be persuaded that a project has good profit potential.

• Distribution companies demand to know the lead actors and comparison films to convince them the project is a solid concept that can be successfully marketed.

• Quirky films are less likely to gain the big money support of the distributer. Simple, often used formulas being preferred by the movie business as they are seen as safe bankers.

• To help widen the appeal to a secondary audience consider your casting, BBFC rating, locations, music and mode of address.

• Same old rom-com formulas help widen the potential audience.

Social Realism Audience

Box Office
Social realism cannot compete with many genres in terms of mainstream mass 

box-office appeal. I began by looking at the all time box office figures for the American 

market on boxofficemojo.com. By doing this I discovered that in the top 200 films there

 was no social realist films included in this figure, but then looking at the top 20 all time

 box office figures in Britain, I found that 'The Full Monty' came 18th. I also discovered 

that most of the British all time top 20 were franchise's making it hard for other films 

to get into it as the audience are already familiar with the first film released. On looking

 into further detail on 'The Full Monty', I've found out that it is an exception that shows 

you can have a block buster social realist film. I also counted that it had 28 distributors 

in countries including Japan and Argentina and that it was distributed by one of The Big 6, '20th Century Fox'.

Age
Usually in a social realist film the age rating is 15 or above for example in 

'East is East', 'West is West', 'Slum Dog Millionaire' and 'This is England',

 all of the age ratings are 15 or 18. This is generally because the target audience 

they are trying to promote their film too is an older age group. This is because 

social realist films don't have as much action as the youth of today want and

 is not the typical story line they will be interested in. On saying that some age

 ratings can be below that  for example 'Bend it like Beckham'. This is because

 he is an icon and idol to young children therefore the film he makes needs to be

 suitable for this age category as they are the main target audience. Another factor

 to age is teen characters. This is shown in 'Billy Elliot', 'This is England', 'Sweet Sixteen'

 and 'Submarine' as all of these films have characters that teens of today can relate 

with, making it easier to empathise with them and understand the character. In some

 cases such as 'This is  England' it is a problem as the age rating is an 18, therefore

 not allowing the younger teens to watch it.

International Appeal

Billy Elliot
Cover

International appeal is a huge factor as it will bring in most of the

 income to the film. This means that it needs to appeal to people in 

different countries where they have a different language, accent, 

economy, political views or generally an idilic film preference. This

 is proven in the film 'Billy Elliot' as it made a huge $21,995,263 in 

America alone. This was all down to the typical American idilic movie

 as it reflected the American Dream.

Gender

Gender is also another key factor in Social Realism films as it needs to appeal to

 the male and female audience. On looking into further depth about this I found out that 

'Tyrannosaur' directed by Paddy Considine does this very well. He uses violence

 with the main protagonist to promote his film to men but he also uses romance 

and empathy to promote his film to the female audience. By using both of these key 'genres'

 in a social realism film, it opens up the amount of people coming to watch it as

 it is for both men and woman. 'The full monty' also do this as even though the film

 has men in it, it has comedy and a feel good factor allowing a wide of people to enjoy the film.

The Full Monty box office figures

Tyrannosaur Cover

East is East Cover

Rom-com audience

Rom-com definition  
Romantic comedies are hybrid films which by definition from http://www.filmsite.org/filmterms10.html, means "a film or production that combines or intersects two or more distinct genre types, and cannot be categorised by a single genre type; see also cross-over " this means that the films audience has widened as it is not restricted to just one genre so it will appeal to a wider fan base, there for increasing profits. 

British rom-coms in US box office 
Using information from http://boxofficemojo.com/genres/chart/?id=romanticcomedy.htm we can see that there are 3 British Films in the US top 50 (using the total gross) Romantic comedies from 1978 to the present day. These are: Notting Hill at 21, Shakespeare in Love at 27 and Briget Jones Diary at 47. 

Box office

'Despite falling another 50% from the previous weekend, and grossing just £357,000 over the Friday-to-Sunday period, Sex and the City 2 nevertheless succeeded in adding another £1m to its tally over the seven days. One likely factor is that while the weekend for many couples is time to be together, midweek is when they might catch up separately with friends of their own gender. SATC2 is performing better on "girls' night" than on "date night", predictably enough. Over the past four weeks, the film has grossed just £5.03m on Friday-Sunday, against £9.18m from Monday-Thursday. That breaks down as a 35/65% split in favour of midweek nights.' http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2010/jun/29/uk-cinema-box-office

Romantic Comedy

1978-Present
TOTAL GROSSES | OPENING WEEKENDS

Rows: #1-100, #101-200, #201-300, #301-320

Rank	Title (click to view)	Studio	Lifetime Gross / Theaters		Opening / Theaters		Date
1	My Big Fat Greek Wedding	IFC	$241,438,208	2,016	$597,362	108	4/19/02
2	What Women Want	Par.	$182,811,707	3,092	$33,614,543	3,012	12/15/00
3	Hitch	Sony	$179,495,555	3,575	$43,142,214	3,575	2/11/05
4	Pretty Woman	BV	$178,406,268	1,811	$11,280,591	1,325	3/23/90

Read more » 

There are 27 rom-coms which have topped $100m in the USA alone, and 3 of the top 50 are British (specifically, Working Title) productions: Notting Hill (21), Shakespeare in Love (27), and Bridget Jones's Diary (47). 

There have been many billion dollar box office rom-com hits, but this still doesn't compare to the repetitive success of sci-fi and fantasy tent pole films, for example Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Star Wars, Avatar or most comic book adaptations, or the equally successful action tent pole films such as the Bond or Bourne franchises, or the Fast and Furious franchise.

BBFC ratings given to rom-coms 
From http://pro.boxoffice.com/latest-news/2013-09-11-uk-romcom-about-time-beats-riddick-with-27m-debut , we can see About time, a rom-com, received the largest gross (£2.7m) in the Top 10 Films in the United Kingdom and Ireland in September 6-8, 2013. They commented saying "It posted a comparable debut to films like 50 First Dates ($14.2M Cume), One Day ($13M), and The Time Traveler's Wife ($12.7M Cume). Universal is reporting that the time-traveling romantic comedy scored particularly well in exit polls among females over 25." This shows that rom-coms can do very well with the British public as many big hit films in the UK are rom-coms. 

Rom-coms are most usually given a 12 or 15 BBFC rating due to the lack of blood and violence that are seen in horrors and thrillers. They usually contain mild language and sexual references to help make their film accessible to their youthful target market. For example 

Producers and directors 
A company that largely produces rom-coms are Working Title, they have produced the likes of Bridget Jonesand Notting Hill both directed by Richard Curtis and which have both profited greatly globally.  Another main producer of rom-coms' is Woody Allen who has directed the likes of Annie Hall, Mighty Aphrodite and Scoop.

Target audience
Usually the audience is mainly female based but due to the comedy aspect it also appeals to men. The age target varies from teen rom-coms' to adult rom-coms', but the romcoms' usually range from 12-44. E.g 10 things I hate about you (directed by Gil Junger) is a teen rom-com' and the main audience age will be teens and adult rom-coms' like About a boy (directed by Chris Weitz and Paul Weitz) a larger older audience. 
Most rom-com ratings are 12 or 15, due to swearing or sexual content which will appeal to the 14-44 ratingand that is a commonly used in rom-coms' due to the key love theme.  

Rom-com audience

• Rom-coms have an excellent record of delivering box office success with many years featuring some global $250m smashes.

• Richard Curtis / Hugh Grant rom-coms built the success of Working Title tossing over $2bn worldwide although more recent releases have not lived up to the large grossing Four Weddings, Notting Hill, Bridget Jones or Love Actually.

• Rom-coms split across many audience types. 1. Sophisticated (arthouse) Woody Allen directed films. 2. Mainstream adult films such as About a Boy that still appeal to younger audiences. and 3. the teen rom-com, often set in high school environments such as Ten Things I Hate About You, Submarine or Wild Child.

• Most hit rom-coms attract a 12/15 UK and PG/PG-13 US audience, though there are often exceptions such as There’s Something About Mary that was 18R.

• Working Titles technique of employing major US stars tend to be the biggest hits on both sides of the atlantic.

• Although mainly a female centred genre a key lead male can deliver a smash hit. The lead must have sex-appeal for the female viewer and an on screen persona that the male audience can empathise with. Great examples of this are Mel Gibson, Hugh Grant and and John Cusack in What Every Woman Wants, About A Boy and High Fidelity respectively.

• Recent hits such as My Big Fat Greek Wedding and Bridesmaids however prove that the male lead is not always required.

• Although the cast is key and budgets vary an important consideration is the intellectual property cost of the novel.  Prime examples being the already smash hit novels Bridget Jones Diary and High Fidelity.

• The decline of the rom-com has seen them reinvent themselves by mixing in another genre such as the zoom-rom-coms Shaun of the Dead and Warm Bodies or the social realist rom com Submarine.

• Indie rom-coms prove that it is not always about a stellar cast. Alternative classics such as Napoleon Dynamite, Submarine and Rushmore prove this by simply being odd, dark or simply great stories.

• Shifting budgets of the big 6 studios to CGI sic-fi / fantasy and action movies have led to the rom-com struggling to get the support and therefore the audiences of their hay day.

• AS the US and UK industry moves in to different areas, the domestic emerging markets are taking advantage. Finding Mr Right, a Chinese production kept other US blockbuster off the top spot in 2013.

• Unlike the Sci-fi / fantasy trilogies and sequels the rom-com has little opportunity to reinvent its own sequel. The ending usually being happy where boy gets girl has little else to offer. As always there are exceptions with the third Bridget Jones instalment due 2017.

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What the different BBFC ratings would mean to our film

12: Having the BBFC rating as a 12 would narrow the audience and also due to 

bad language it wouldn't be appropriate. 

E.g Working Titles Wild Child was a 12 

The film was passed '12' for moderate language and sex references. The film contains infrequent moderate language, when a girl is asked 'How many boys have you shagged?' and when the head girl later spits out an aggressive use of 'bitch' to the lead character. The moderate language was not felt to meet 'PG' Guidelines which allow 'mild bad language only', but was considered to be covered by the '12' guidelines which allow infrequent strong language.
The film also contains some moderate sex references, notably a passing reference to 'the missionary position and Lebanese fulcrum' as teen girls wonder if the lead character has had sex, and sight of a mock phone box escort card/ flier featuring the head girl in her school uniform and caption 'Naughty Schoolgirl Harriet'. The level of detail and the tone of the sex references were felt to fall in line with the BBFC guidelines at '12' which state that 'sex references may reflect what is likely to be familiar to most adolescents but should not go beyond what is suitable for them'.
In addition, the film includes frequent mild language (e.g. shit, arsehole/ A-hole, crap, slut, frigging, bloody, 'biatch') and uses of Jesus and Christ, implied teen drinking and a teen playing with a cigarette lighter which accidentally causes a fire. (BBFC)

15: This is our primary audience but we would want this as our BBFC rating at it 

would attract a larger audience it will also allow us to use mild infrequent language and sexual references which would appeal to our youthful audience. e.g  Warps Submarine was a 15

The quantity of strong language in the film went beyond what is permitted by the BBFC's Guidelines at '12A'/'12' which state that 'The use of strong language (for example, 'fuck') must be infrequent, but 'frequent use of strong language' is allowed at '15'. (BBFC)

18: Having it as an 18 would not be appropriate as there is no severe bloody 

violence or sex involved this would go beyond what we would want to include. e.g Warps The is England

The key factors which therefore placed This is England at 18, rather than 15 are:

• The violence is directed against a vulnerable character – Milky is easily the most gentle of all the characters, vulnerable throughout because of his race and lulled into a false sense of security in the scene leading up to the attack

• The violence and language are unexpected and shocking – the scene starts very calmly; the other characters don't realise what's about to happen

• The scene is distressing – we see most of the film through Shaun's eyes and he is especially upset and confused by what is happening

• Repeated aggressive use of the word 'c**t' along with racist terms within the scene. (BBFC)

 Considering the whole 90 minutes
Taking into account that we have only composed the first 2 minutes of the opening we have left out a lot of content that would effect our BBFC rating and audience. We would probably incorporate swearing and scenes of a sexual nature as this would keep our film within the limitations of a 15 rating as well as appealing to our primary audience. 
This fits with our love triangle as their will be a disequilibrium which will most likely be the wrap between to competing love rivals and scenes of a sexual nature will most likely be the cause of this. An example of this would be the fight scene between Mark Darcy and Daniel Cleaver as they fight over Bridget. These are the two male characters in the love triangle and this will mostly likely be what happens in ours. 



Audience testing
Audience testing is very important when producing a film, as it is key to see whether it appeals to the films target audience and is well accepted. For example Harvey Weinstein who was a big part of the production of Bridget Jones nearly stopped further production and distribution of the film when in audience testing people didn't respond to the first part however the scene where Mark Darcy reveals his reindeer jumper saved the film as it received a laugh. The film went on to be very successful making $281,929,795 and then ended up in an equally successful sequel.