Evaluation: What Kind of Media Insitiution Might Distribute Your Media Product and Why?

QUESTION 3

Evaluating the final cut of 'The Next One' I think it is more a film to be released by an independent company rather than a major Hollywood studio. This is because although the narrative follows 'Urban Legend' and 'Final Destination', which were both released by Hollywood studios, the style of film, which is similar to 'Blair Witch Project' would be better suited to be released by an independent company such as 'Haxan Films' who released 'Blair Witch Project'. The budget for a film like ours would also be similar to a independent film, because most of it would be filmed in handy cam so therefore wouldn't need any special camera software or devices. A typical budget i think would vary from 100,000-300,000 in comparison to a major Hollywood film like 'Final Destination' which had a budget of 23 million.

The choice of actors also supports the idea that this film would be an independent film as it features unknown actors, which is very typical of a independent film. Also, by having unknown actors it makes the audience unknown to anything they have featured in before and makes them fully focus on the film rather than thinking about the actors as they were in a previous film.

 

Some of the themes in our film opening (a terrifying note that states the doomed future) are often used in big Hollywood movies such as 'Final Destination' which was distributed by New Line Cinema

These type of themes have gone onto feature in other Hollywood films such as 'Knowing' which was distributed by Summit Entertainment

 Although this theme could mean our film has the potential to be produced by a major Hollywood studio, the film would need a further narrative and back story which makes the plot and story more interesting. This is something that we haven't yet thought about and if we wanted it to be produced by a Hollywood studio we would need to look into deeper storyline for the characters. For example in 'Knowing' there is a love story which gets highlighted at the end. In Hollywood, in order to be sure that a movie will make a large profit, it is best not to take a risk with something more experimental and rather use a pattern that has been tried and tested time and time again. This is the main reason why major studios,such as Universal and Warner Bros often turn to remakes or chose to make stories that already have a fan base (eg Twilight) into feature films and why similar story lines seem to reoccur. This could also be a reason why our film has some potential to be produced by Hollywood, because it could have a narrative of being the student/youth version of Final Destination/Urban Legend.

As was said, our opening sequence shows great similarities to existing products. For example, the plot shows links to Urban Legend and Final Destination in finding something that will predict deaths. Also the choice of handy cam in scene 2 and 3 relates back to the filming style of Blair Witch Project.

Although I mentioned that 'The Next One' would probably be an independent film, I don't think it would be an art house, indie or small British film, despite the use of British actors and the unique style of digital (this new media technology allows independent and low budget filmmakers to create good quality pictures due to its low cost) cinematography.

The story offers nothing thought provoking or mentally challenging as a typical art house film would. Instead, 'The Next One' is made to appeal to young adults which although may not turn into a mass audience, would still attend their local cinema to watch it. Furthermore, our film doesn't focus on any social/political issues but simply contains a fictional narrative.

Due to the idea that our film would be an independent film, marketing it would be a difficult task as there would be less money put towards marketing it. In order to make our film known, we might need to send it to a film festival, to be distributed by a bigger media conglomerate which could help create marketing products such as franchises and merchandising.

If the film was to be picked up by a big studio such as Summit Entertainment, as part of the marketing, a film trailer would be created to play before other films in cinema chains, directing potential audiences to the films official website prior to release (Thenextone.com) having a website is vital for marketing as most people now have access to the internet. Viral marketing would be one of the main ways we would market our film, though social media and also through our own website.

Similarly, although it is possible to distinguish the film industry, media convergence meas we no longer live in a world where films, games and music exist separately. This creates the perfect opportunity for marketing.

Aside from the profit that exhibition would provide, 'The Next One' could show potential of a good opportunity for merchandising. Although there isn't any key elements such as jewellery which could appeal highly to our target market, there is other opportunities too. For example because the story is filmed in college, and the main character is wearing the college lanyard, an accessories company such as Claires could create their own lanyard using the same colours but have the name 'The Last One' on it instead.

In order to increase money made from this film, we could incorporate a key piece of jewelery or clothing that could be sold at a company like Topshop where our target audience like to shop. This could create more interest and create a bigger audience for  our film.

As well as merchandising, our film could also draw revenue from ancillary products eg DVD and Blu-ray release. This could include a directors cut and added extras such as a behind the scenes video (which we'd have to make) and directors commentary. An extended edition of our film could perhaps be released after the initial DVD release in order to draw in extra profit.

I think that the main way we can create profit is from a soundtrack (we would have to make sure the music was original)

I think if our film was to become successful after appearing at a film festival, it could be released by one of the Hollywood 'big six' studios (Columbia, Warner Bros, Universal, 20th Century Fox, Paramount and Walt Disney)