Practise Exam Question

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

As stated by the BBC on their article ‘The History of British Cinema’ (BBC, 2010): ‘The British film industry has been through some amazing highs and 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’.

However, from looking at contemporary cinema – as I am going to do through comparing and contrasting my British and Hollywood case studies – I will understand how this statement is still applied. I will be exploring Skyfall (2012) and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) to understand how the balance is still in favour of the massive Hollywood conglomerates, which take up a large percentage of the market place. Despite this however, over the past ten years there has been substantial growth for British films due to a range of different aspects. These aspects include, technological advances, government, lottery and European funding, the Hollywood writers’ strike and British talent such as J.K Rowling refusing to let Hollywood take over the Potter franchise. All of these aspects amount to the British film industry taking larger steps forward in the global film industry.

As stated by McDougall (2008), Britain still cannot compete on a completely level playing field as Hollywood because of the millions of pounds difference in production, distribution and exhibition. This brings with it funding issues for higher budget British films. For example a higher budget British film may need funding from other places – so even though it’s classified as a British film, they still have some outside help meaning that in turn they loose a certain percentage of their profit, from production and distribution to other countries.

Outlined by McDougal (2008), my British case study (Skyfall) is a category D film. Category D films are usually films that are made in the UK with (usually) British cultural content, but financed fully or partly by US companies.

In terms of production, my British case study had a production budget of $150-200 million, while my Hollywood case study had a budget of $220 million. Ideally the British film industry would be self sufficient, as the Hollywood system is, however our film industry hasn’t developed to that extent as of yet. Despite this, it doesn’t mean that we are not making progress in the film industry. This is because the British film industry still grosses a profit from D and E category films – as seen in my case study. Producing films like this does however not take a profit away from Hollywood films. One advantage of D and E category films, like my case study, is that bigger production budgets mean higher quality films and that there are bigger star names and talented crew.

After having compared the production information on my two film case studies you can see a visible difference was made for my British film. My British film starred Daniel Craig, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes  while my Hollywood film stared Harrison Ford, Cate Blanchett, Ray Winstone. In terms of crew, the Hollywood film was able to employ Producer: Frank Marshall, Director: Steven Spielberg, Cinematographer: Janusz Kamiński Editor: Michael Kahn, Screen Writer: David Keopp, Music Provider: John Williams, while my British film had Producers: Michael G. Wilson, Barbara Broccoli, Cinematographer: Roger Deakins, Editors: Stuart Baird, Kate Baird, Screen writers: Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and John Logan, Music: Thomas Newman.  In terms of locations and settings, my British film was filmed in Scotland, England, Japan, Turkey and China, while my Hollywood film was filmed in the USA and Argentina. This shows that due to the Hollywood funding my British case study was on an equal footing to my Hollywood case study.

In terms of content and target audience, the genre of my British film is action, thriller crime, the age rating is 12A, and the primary target audience is mainly male, however based around a family audience in the social brackets of C1 – E. My Hollywood film is also of the action genre, it is rated 12A, and the primary target audience is social grade C1 – E and a main family audience.

The fact that both films were two similar genres meant they were competing for two similar target audiences. My British case study attracted this audience more successfully because of the franchise associated with the Bond movies as well as the diverse nature of the audience that it appeals to around the world.

In terms of age rating (developed due to hypodermic 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 year olds. This is because they have a disposable income and time to socialise. My British film would appeal to this group because it is an action thriller and this age group is stereotypically associated with a film genre of this nature. This could perhaps be shown through Stanley Hall’s theory of rebellion in youths. My Hollywood film would also appeal to this age group – it is the same genre of film and it has the same connotation, which link it to youth and rebellion.