The Film Industry
Hammer Horror and British Cinema (1930s to 1970)
I intend to look at several key areas which are: How Hammer started to make commercial products to make profit over critical praise or artistic merit; how Hammer managed to keep production costs low, something that meant many other production companies couldn’t make profit because the cost of making their films was so high; how Hammer was able to introduce a new genre into British film industry as well as British culture – a genre that had already become very popular in the USA; and finally, how Hammer was able to make films for the international market, branching out British cinema to new countries especially the USA. (MORE)
Love Film: Saving space for the DVD Collector
Recently, my DVD collection passed 700 discs and I found what started out as a novelty - sharing a bed with the hundred or so overspill from my last Ikea do-it-yourself bookshelf - was becoming dangerously unsociable. Some might think I should have figured this out a lot sooner, but ever since I bumped my head as a five-year-old I’ve been rather slow. MORE
The Effect on the British Film Industry of American investment since 1945
According to the Film Council’s own statistics film production in Britain fell by 30 per cent to 800 million as the number of indigenous films that started shooting in the country dropped from 45 the previous year, to 27.’ (Hopkins, 2005) Hopkins sees the problem as Labour’s move to stop tax breaks that encourage foreign investment in British films. Britain’s film industry last night gave warning that it will suffer a severe fall in income this year because of confusion over lucrative tax breaks that persuaded Hollywood studios to spend almost 500 million in the UK last year.’ (ibid.)
Britain will become a no go area for filmmakers’ said executive producer Russ Smith (BBC Online, 2004) The issue is not the government’s initiatives to support indigenous films through Lottery Funds and the Film Council, indeed contrary to popular opinion, ploughing money into the production side of British cinema ‘is not and never has been the main problem’ (Wayne, 2002. pg 9) but largely the need for American investment, meaning such measures that discourage such investment are largely unhelpful to the industry.
British film as the British Film Institute (BFI) define it deriving its cultural and financial impetus from Britain’ (Beckett, 2001) is one that simply does not guarantee success on a financial level seen in such examples as Stephen Poliakoff’s Food of Love’ making only 1507 at the box office having cost 2.1 million. (imdb.com, 2005) The government’s initiatives via the Lottery fund only recouped 20% of its funding between 2001 and 2004 (BBC Online, 2004) because as Working Title’s co-chairman Tim Bevan sees it The contemporary British condition is just boring for a mainstream audience’ (Beckett, 2001) However, as this suggests that Britons simply do not want to see films about their country it is interesting that such successful British films as The Full Monty’ and East Is East’ have exampled the possibility of breaking this trend. The key to their success it seems lies in their distribution, as The Full Monty’ received full backing from 20th Century Fox, and Film Four used a very expensive advertising campaign to promote East Is East’. (Wayne, 2002. Pg 10) Comparatively, Brassed Off’, a film similar in plot and aesthetic to The Full Monty’ did not receive strong U.S backing or well-funded British promotion and was financially unsuccessful. The quality of the three films is largely subjective but all are regarded as good British films (all received critical praise at the time of release), so it appears their success was down to other factors - largely U.S backing and strong advertising. As the Film Council claim that part of British cinema’s problem is a lack of quality scripts, talent, and too many poor films (Beckett, 2001), it appears that their portfolio for success is rather short-sighted, in that quality’ is an ambiguous area of any art form, and that based on financial figures, it is distribution and exhibition that are the vital areas for them to improve. However, American hegemony of both exhibition and distribution in Britain proves this is a difficult task. (Read full article)
They decide what we buy: Consumer demand and the American media
Ron Kaufman writes, only the extremely nave believe they are not affected by television advertising.’ (Kaufman, 2004) It’s a bold statement but considering U.S broadcast media began out of a necessity to sell a product, it is one that deserves attention.
According to Herman and McChesney, U.S broadcasting arose first as a derivative of radio equipment manufacture, the producers needing regular broadcasts to stimulate radio sales.’ (Herman, McChesney, 1997. pg, 138) They go on to say the idea that it would be a vehicle for advertising was considered outrageous’ in the 1920s, but as early as 1946, commercial radio networks had achieved dominance and the FCC (the newly appointed regulator whose duty’, according to the National Association of Broadcasters was to assure adequate public service’), was being defensive. They spoke of sustaining programmes’ where commercial decisions concerning programme structure, can be redressed.’ (ibid. pg. 139) In addition, the FCC’s regulatory system was poorly managed. McChesney implies that it was corrupt as he explains that Charles Denny pushed for a plan that basically gave [commercial broadcasters] NBC and CBS near monopoly control’ only to quit and triple his salary as a NBC executive. (McChesney, 2004. pg. 42) Regulations such as the Fairness Doctrine’ were never enforced to require commercial broadcasters to do ample public affairs programming.’ (ibid. pg. 44) In effect, what began as a medium to sell products, (but was hailed for its potential contributions to education, religion, children’s enlightenment and high culture’, or what Herman and McChesney would consider its use for a well-developed public sphere’) became an industry that needed to sell itself in order to survive. As public service broadcasting was moderately rated’, commercial television and radio networks realized the higher the rating for a programme, the higher the price of advertising would become and thus as time became saleable and its price rose, the pressure for higher ratings and good demographics increased.’ (ibid. pg 139)) (Read full article)
The (in)significance of Blu-Ray and HD DVD technology
Perhaps we’re forgetting why DVD eventually took off? Yes, it offered better picture and sound quality than VHS videos but only technophiles, cinema projectionists and die-hard movie buffs really cared about that in the first place. The average consumer bought their DVDs because of convenience. DVDs were small, they didn’t need rewinding back, and by 2005 the players and the DVDs themselves were cheap. Blu-Ray and HD DVD producers now have to convince the public they need even better video and audio quality even though these were minor factors in the average consumer’s conversion from VHS to DVD. So in effect, the Blu-Ray and HD DVD makers have to convince us to spend more money on the same things we already have the ability to skip to any part of a disc, additional features like making-of documentaries and blooper reels, easy storage and ease-of-use. It has to be asked does the average consumer who wants to watch a good movie on a Friday night really care that Blu-Ray discs have five times as much storage space than the average DVD? Does the average consumer care that high-definition DVDs improve upon normal DVD flaws such as edge-enhancement and artefacts? There’s a simple answer to all this no. (Read full article)
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