Roles of the Distributor

Planing a Release

When planing a release of a film the distributor has to ask them selves the questions "Who is the film for? Who can be convinced to buy a cinema ticket to see it and why should they do so? What sort of audiences have similar films attracted recently?" Once they have asked them selves this questions they then have to estimate what they think the film might earn, so they can plan on a budget for the film.

When planning to release a film the biggest influence within this would be the audience itself, Who are they? They to do research into the target audience and the target age of the film, with the distributor job to attract the biggest possible audience that they can, including having niche interest groups, who are interested into a mainstream film. The most frequent cinema goers within the UK are more likely to be Teenagers, Students or Young Adults, with more that half of the UK 15-24 year olds going to the cinema at least once a week.

Market research within the film can help the distributor to be more confident of the expected audience of film, this is can be down to test screen which then follow a questionnaire which can help the distributor evaluate the current advertisement of a film.


Marketing Plan


Trailers, trailers play a big part in the advertisement of a film, with them being used to whet the audiences appetites before the film has been released, with the trailer the distributor has to decide based on the age range of the target audience, on where to show the trailer, for example a film targeted at the older generation is more likely to capture its biggest audiences with having the trailer shown on the television, whereas for the younger generation the trailer being shown online would be more appropriate.

Posters, posters can be shown everywhere and to any one, the posters can be shown within the foyer of the cinemas or on the side of buildings, they can be seen by people who are any age range. The poster usually includes an image of the main character, maybe adding to the star value of the film, and they usually have a tag line of some sort incorporated into them. Film posters are also one of the easiest things to buy with approximately 250,000 poster stores in the UK.

Online, the world wide web is one of the easiest ways for people to find out about films, this can be either from the film having its own website, and releasing teaser footage of the film onto it to create hype about the film, or by forums and online magazines, with them telling other people about the film. But this does come with its downfalls with as soon as a film is released there will be a review about it, good or bad, word of mouth can be damaging to a film that is about to be released as it spreads fast across the world wide web.