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.

Representation of females in Horror

         In this essay I will be discussing the representation of the female gender in the horror genre and whether the views of the horror genre tend to be more conservative or more progressive.

The visibility of females within horrors is a major part of how females are represented in horror. Commonly the ratio of the males to females in horror is two to one. But due to more movies being more conservative in which they have less females compared to men, for example in the film Eden Lake (2008) there are nine males and only 3 females, as the main characters and few minor characters. Although in conservative horror films men out number women at two to one, in more progressive horror films they challenge the amount of women in the films compared to men, for example the film Halloween (1978) there are five female characters and only four male characters, this is making the film have the same amount of women in it compared to me and challenging the conservative films. Overall more and more films are being produced with a more progressive view on the amount of females in the films.

The majority of horror films show the roles of females in a negative way, the roles are: Domestic, Sexual, Consumer and Familial. These are the roles that most films make there female characters fit into. The roles are showing that the females are just going to stick to conservative stereotypes that are out-dated within modern society, for instance in the film Halloween the characters Lynda and Annie are depicted as sex objects and as nothing apart from a sex object, the character Annie is also shown to enforce the conservative stereotype of the domestic women as she is shown to be staying at home and doing the house work, in the film she is doing the laundry, “the stereotypical house wife”, she also at home looking after her sister while her parents are out, again backing up the stereotype. Also in the film The Shining (1980) the character Wendy is shown to be a housewife, very passive, weak and submissive, in the beginning of the films most of the shots that you see of Wendy as being domestic, looking after Danny, but she isn’t objectified in the film, we do however identify with Wendy. Morally the roles that females are shown as in horror films are wrong, horror films tend to be more conservative in the roles that the female characters are shown in compared to more progressive views on these roles.

In The Shining the audience is made to identify with Wendy and the position that she has been put in because of Jack, the work that he is meant to do and yet here is making Wendy do it because he feels that he can over power her, due to his feelings on the stereotype of women e.g. he feels that the women should do the “house” work. By the use of the male gaze later on within the film, the audience objectifies the woman in the bath, making all eyes on her, the male gaze is then hugely undermined within a few cuts where you see that the alluring woman has turned into a rotting and decaying woman, this makes Jack feel repulsed and the audience is repulsed, this was a clever way of attracting the audience towards how females are represented in horrors. In the film Eden Lake in the film there is a point in which Brett’s Gang are “eyeing up” Jenny, in this the gang encircle the couple and the use of a tracking shot makes the audience feel like the part of the gang, but this is also making the audience understand what Jenny is going through and how the character has been objectified as just a sexual object for the gang to “perv” on. In many horrors the gaze tends to be progressive and doesn’t objectify women as conservative films.

In Halloween it shows that any of the characters that have sex will eventually die, this is also backed up by the fact that Laurie is the final girl and is shown to be androgynous and not really in with the “popular” girls, due to the fact that her name is boyish, in no way sexualised and wear masculine clothes. The film basically punishes the teenagers for having sex.  In both Halloween and The Shining more of the female characters die compared to the amount of male characters that die within the films.

Overall the way that females are represented in horrors is pretty equal but with some more overpowering qualities in the films and making them swing more towards conservative views of females in horror, although these might be swing more towards conservative views more and more films are tending to have a more progressive view on the way they are shown in horror. 

Difference between theatrical trailers and teaser trailers?

TEASER

THEATRICAL

     VS

















The main difference between theatrical trailers and teaser trailers has to be down to the length of it, a teaser trailers length is from 30 seconds to 90 seconds, whereas a theatrical trailer can be anywhere up to 2 and a half minutes. Both theatrical and teaser may included scenes from the movie that may have been delete or not used in production of the finished film, but this is mainly in teaser trailers. A theatrical trailer is usual shown in cinemas before a film that is the same genre as the film in production or on the internet, whereas a teaser trailer is shown on the TV, internet and before films and these are generally shown months before the actually release of the film. A teaser trailer is only made on a small budget whereas theatrical are made using a huge budget to gather the wide possible audience they can, teaser trailers can easily be pulled from production because the theatrical trailer has bigger hints into the story line and the teaser trailer only shows clips to wet the audiences appetite, for example the teaser trailer for Spiderman was pulled out of advertising due the events that happened during the period it was being made.

Audeince Research Questionaire Results

Audience research

View more presentations from jconnolly2010.

Here are some examples of the results that we got from the open quesitions:


Answer set One:


...."3) Trailers, as they are eye catching and are easy to access through different types of media, such as t. v. and internet. The trailer for me is the main part of the advertising that makes me want to go and watch an up and coming film.


4)I prefer Gore, as it is more appealing to me, I find it entertaining to watch and is a good topic of conversation when talking with friends about the latest horrors.


7)Jumpy scenes, as they cause suspension, and make you feel scared.


8)The Saw films".....

Answer Set Two:

....."3) Trailers. Seeing the best bits of the film gives me an idea of how good it is.


4) Psychological. I like having to think to understand a story like and a twist at the end.


7) Soundtrack. It’s usually building up to something scary and you know it’s coming.


8) Silent hill. I like the fact it’s gore, supernatural and psychological mixed together".....

Answer Set Three:

....."3)Trailer because it gives you a teaser as to what is gonna happen


4) I prefer psychological because it keeps you interested throughout the movie.


7)The setting and the jumpy scenes scare me the most cause you don’t know what’s gonna happen.


8)Nightmare on Elm Street, it terrified me when I was young and haven’t watched it since.".....


Answer Set Four:


....."3) Word of mouth, this is down to the fact that the trailer for the movie could be awesome, but then the film could turn out to be shit. So word of mouth would be the best, because it would matter what your social group thought of the film and in turn would make you go see it or not.


4) Psychological.


7) Setting.


8) I don’t really care about fucking horror films.".....

Analysis of results

From my questionnaire I have found out that the majority of people that watch horror films at the moment are females and the majority of the horror audience are between 16-20 years old, this could be down to the fact that the majority of horror films are rated 18 and audiences are most likely to go with their peer groups. Another thing that I found out was that the most influential type of advertising is the trailer due to the fact that they "are eye catching" and easy to get on many types of media. I also found out that many people go to see horror films down to the Gore that is provided in the film, although many people go to watch horrors down to the story line. Within this research I found out that nearly 3/4 of the people we ask in this questionnaire only go to see horror films in the cinema once a year and nearly all of the people bar a few that were asked found that horror wasn't their favourite genre.

Audience Research Questionaire

Questionnaire – audience research into horror

1. Are you male or female?

Male      Female

2. How old are you?

10-15 yrs              16-20 yrs              21-25 yrs              26-30 yrs              31+ yrs

3. What type of advertising influences you the most?

Poster        Trailer              Reviews               Internet               Billboards            Words of mouth

And Why?..............................................................................................................................

4. Which type of horror do you prefer?

Slasher        Monster        Gore      Undead         Sci-Fi      Psychological

And Why?...............................................................................................................................

5. What would encourage you to go and watch a horror film?

Director                Actor/Actress    Setting/Location               Storyline              Sequel

6. How often do you go and watch horror at the cinema?

Weekly        Fortnightly        Monthly          Yearly        Never

7. What scares you the most?

Soundtrack         Tension         Gore        Setting         Jumpy Scenes

And Why?...............................................................................................................................

8. Favourite horror film?

...............................................................................................................................

9. Is horror your favourite genre?

Yes         No

These film trailer have been analysed by me and Dale, a class mate.

Psych:9

The genre of Psych:9 is horror/thiller, the trailer hints at the film being a horror by using inter titles and the use of voice overs, the use of the CCTV cameras to make you jump and when the main protaganist is straped to a chair, suggests a torture scene maybe? And also the trailer hints at it being a thiller by not releaving that much to you in the trailer.

The name of the film is shown twice towards the end of the movie in two different fonts, one appears to be a title card with the release date of the film and the other seems to be more involed within the film.

There are no real production values shown in this trailer, no characters actors are releaved and when looking into this film on IMDb.com there are no real stars in this film, the cast are unknowns, the director of the film is also never meantion in the trailer.

The trailer itself introduces the audience to the central characters of which one is a female and the other two are male, although it shows the central characters it only shows one of there relantionships on the trailer being the women getting a job off one of the male characters to stay in the abandoned hospital.

The use of a mixture of the voice overs and the dialogue within the film hints at the narrative, but doesn't give that much away,thus making the audience want to know what happens in the film, with the dialogue at the start of the trailer it says that the killer attacks his victims from behind, this is giving the audience the lust for more and wanting to know what the killer looks like.

The Crazies

The genre of this movie is shown in the trailer as horror due to the use of zombies, although the film shows these zombie it doesnt say how they got there? Whats happening to them? It doesn't answer any of the questions that you ask you self while watching the trailer, making you want to know more about the film.

The name of the movie is only shown once at the end just before the final two shots that support the genre of the film and showign that the film is a horror.

In this trailer it shows the two companies that maded this film,Overture Films and Participant media, these are both fairly unknown companies. The trailer doesn't state any of the actors names in the trailer and none of them are recoginizable to the audience.

The trailer introduces the central characters one called Devon and the other two characters, one male and one female, remain un-named in the trailer. The character Devon's relantionship with the woman is that she is his wife/partner, and the Devon's relantionship with the male character is that he is work partner, both of them being police.

In the trailer it shows an outline of the film, it shows the location, being a small town in America, it shows who the killers are, Zombies, it hints at the ending but doesn't reveal it all to the audience.

There is no use of voice overs in the trailer it only uses dialogue from the film two pieces of music one being Gary Jules' "Mad World", which is used at the end of the clip.

[●REC]²

The Genre of the movie is shown by the the dark apartments and the its residents. The name of the movie comes up at the end but no voice over. the trailers main sounds are the fast paced talking and screams. it relies on the presumption that the audience has seen the first one and realises they are sending in a clean up crew to kill the infected. The film doesnt mention any actors or directors. The trailer shows the begining of the film of special forces well armed going in it then shows how everything is going wrong. This makes the audience want to know how things went wrong, this can then be lead back to the first film that was made. The trailer shows the three main characters at the start of he trailer, these three are shown throughout the trailer, then at the end you are shown another three minor characters, these three main characters get into sticky positions within the trailer and the footage is shown in the POV of the actors and the main characters, again with the three minor characters this can be linked back to the previous film that was produce with the main characters in that film being a TV crew recording the day and life of the firemen in their local town.

Narrative Theory applied to "The Shining"

Propp:


Vladimir Yakovlevich Propp was a Russian and Soviet formalist scholar who analysed the basic plot components of Russian folk tales to show there simplest narrative structor. His book Morphology of the Folktale was published in Russian in 1928, it was through to be a breakthrough in both folkloristics and morphology and influenced Levi-Strauss and Barthes


This is Propp's theory that I have applied to The Shining

Character Roles:

·      The Villain: Jack, The Hotel and Grady.

·      The Donor: Halloran – donates the shining and the snow cat.

·      The Helper: Wendy, Danny and Tony.

·      The Princess: Wendy and Danny

·      The Princess Father: Jack (at the start of the film).

·      The Hero/Victim: Wendy and Danny (not very clear in most of the film).

·      The False Hero: Jack.

·      Despatcher: Unclear.

Successful Bits:

           

            Some of his theory seems to fit in to the narrative of the film and it also makes you think about which character fulfils which role within the film.

Unsuccessful Bits:

            Not all of it applies to the film.

Usefulness:

            Makes you think about the narrative in better detail and helps us understand the film and allows us to dig deeper into the story of the film.

Todorov:

Tzvetan Todorov  is a Franco-Bulgarian philosopher. He has lived in France since 1963 writing books and essays about literary theory, thought history and culture theory

Successful Bits

           
His theory of having an equilibrium, disequilibrium and new equilibrium.

·      Equilibrium – normal home life and Jack applying for the job at the hotel.

·      Disequilibrium – Jack going mental.

·      New equilibrium – Danny and Wendy escaping to safety.

Unsuccessful bits:

            This isn’t a straightforward narrative, unlike Todorov’s narrative theory of having a beginning, middle and end. With this film its more like Beginning, middle, false end, new middle and then the real end. This is due to Wendy thinking that she has escaped from jack by locking him in the storeroom.

Usefulness:

            Makes you think about the films narrative in minor detail but not in much depth.

Levi-Strauss

Claude Lévi-Strauss was a French anthropologist and ethnologist, and has been called the "father of modern anthropology"

Successful Bits:

            His idea of having binary opposites in films fits in with this film. Such as Good vs Evil, Sane vs Insane, Real vs Unreal, Innocents vs Evil?

Usefulness:

            Makes you think about the film in greater detail and more about what’s going on within the film.

The Return Of The Repressed

Sigmund Freud was an Austrain neurologist who founded the psychoanalytic (a body of ideas that Freud developed and continued to be used by others) school of psychiatry. Freud is best known for his theories of the unconscious mind and the defense mechanism of repression. From this Freud hoped that his research would help bring repressed thoughts and feelings into consciousness in order to free the patient from suffering repetitive distorted emotions. The bringing of the unconscious thoughts and feelings to consciousness is brought about by encouraging patients to talk in free association (the patients are asked to relate whatever comes into their minds during the sessions and not to censor their thoughts) and to talk about dreams, through this process, transference, the patient can discover and resolve repressed conflicts, especially childhood conflicts involving parents.For example in the film Black Christmas, Billie the young boy is abused by his mum, but then later on his feelings on this mater return, which cause Billie to go to the house where he grew up and murder the people in it.

Therefore the return of the repressed is the process where repressed elements are kept in the unconsciousness and tend to reappear through consciousness or in behaviour.

Rec Teaser Trailer

This is the film trailer for [●REC]I have chosen this movie trailer because the movie trailer itself isn't that long and it doesn't really relieve much to the audience about the film and doesn't show off the best bits of the film, unlike the majority of other films in the market. Although the movie trailer isn't that long it does set the location of the film : A blocked off building in Barcelona in Spain. The location aslo adds the language of the film which is spanish. The trailer also shows that it has been all done on a handheld camera or steadicam and looks like it is done to record the firemen, maybe for a training video for future references, you dont actually know. The reason why i have chosen this trailer is just down to its simplicity of it and how it hasn't shown off all the best bits of the movie, it hasn't shown the story line off that, it hasn't even really shown off the zombies in the film and the only one they did show was at the end. Overall this is a good trailer because it is leading a bigger audience in to watch it because they want to know what happens in the film.