Ownership of the Movie Industry

History of the Movie Industry

The 1920’s - 1940’s were known as the ‘Golden Age of Hollywood’ and was dominated by big 5 major conglomerates

These were: 20th Century Fox/Metro-Goldwyn Mayer

(MGM)/Paramount/Warner Bros./RKO Radio

These are characterised by the large amounts of funding that these corporations

have that allow them to produce large budget, high context films that received

large box office takings

The Current IndustryThe current Movie industry is still dominated by Hollywood, now

the big 6;

Walt Disney/Buena Vista (control 24.5% of the industry) -

released Finding Dory this year grossing $484,761,750 from

4,305 theatres

Warner Bros. (17.4%) - Batman v Superman:Dawn of Justice

($330,360,194 from 4,256 theatres)

20th Century Fox (13.6%) - Deadpool ($363,070,709 from 3,856

theatres)

Universal (12.5%) - The Secret Life of Pets ($365,389,630 from

4,381 theatres)

Sony/Columbia (9.1%) - Ghostbusters ($127,960,612 from

3,963 theatres)

Paramount (6.9%) - Star Trek Beyond ($158,658,428 from 3,928

theatres)

Surprising Statistics

Disney made 4 out of top 10 box office films this year (e.g. Finding Dory)

5 are based on comic books (e.g. Captain America: Civil War)4 are targeted at young children (e.g. Zootopia)

Evaluation of Major Studios

Pros:

Large marketing and distribution budget

High quality production and visual effects

Cons:

Small writers and independent companies have little say over their film once it is

sold to a major studio

This means less attention may be paid to the film as it is one of many that the

studio will be working on at any given time making negotiations even more

difficult

Independent Film CompaniesIn contrast, independent companies produce films at a much lower budget, however, these tend to have a strong focus on

good plots and often gritty or controversial concepts

The British film industry consists of a lot of independent companies but is yet to rival the dominance of Hollywood

An example of an independent film company is Working Title;

A British company founded in 1983

Working Title has made over 100 films that made over $6 billion each and have won 11 academy awards

The company heavily focus on British values and regularly work with high profile British actors such as Hugh Grant, Colin

Firth and Keira Knightley to make quintessentially British films such as Notting Hill and Hot Fuzz

Surprising Statistics

Only 7% of Independent British films between 2003 and 2010 were profitable

Independent films made 9% of total box office takings (2013)47% of people working in the industry are freelance

Evaluation of Independent StudiosPros:

The producers have a greater say on the direction of their film, it is their idea after all

Independent companies tend to work in close partnership with writers and distributors allowing for

easier negotiation and more time spent targeting the niche markets of the indie film culture

Cons:

Less funding means independent companies may need another company to distribute and market the

film such asIndependent films tend to be untested and may not appeal to a large audience meaning some may not

make a profit

Therefore showing that film producers are constantly having to compromise between the integrity of the film and the budget they are able to work with

My Project

The genre of film I am looking to make for my ancillary task is

Psychological Thriller, these tend to be dark and gritty

Similar examples are ‘Before I go to Sleep’, which was an

independent film produced by Scott Free Productions, in partnership

with Millennium Films

However, other examples like ‘Gone Girl’ are made on a large budget

by a major conglomerate, in this case 20th century Fox

Therefore the ancillary task could be produced by a major studio,

however, in order to maintain a its dark values, typical of a British

thriller, an independant studio may be better