30 Questions

What % of global box office was the British film industry responsible for?
15.3%

What was this % in 2009?
6.8%

What might this change indicate about British film?

This indicates that the percentage almost doubled

What films have been responsible for this change?

Slumdog millionaire, Dark Knight Rises, James Bond

What % of the British film industry makes a profit?
7%

What % of Hollywood films make a profit?
17%

How does that % differ between £2m and £10m budget British films?
4%

What might we infer from this difference?
This indicates that film production at box office dropped

Which age group makes up the largest % of UK cinema goers?
18-24 year olds are the most likely to go to the cinema and make up the largest percentage

Why do you think this might be?
As people at this age will be wanting to go and have a good time with friends or as they have free time they want to socialize with friends

Which 'type' of film has seen an 18% drop in attendance?
3D films have made a 18% drop in the media

Within that 'type' which genre has seen the biggest fall?
The family films that don’t involve a lot of action/horror have also seen a fall

What did Charles Grant put this decline down to?
Charles Grant say's that 3D films are too expensive

Who is Paul Greengrass?
An English film director

How did he describe the British film industry?

Greengrass told the BBC on Sunday night the 17% figure for higher budget films was approximately the same rate of profitability as Hollywood.

What did a BFI spokesperson say was the point of less profitable low budget British films?
"tiny budget films that, while commercial success is always hoped for, are successful and beneficial to the industry for other reasons like skills and training development and for artistic and cultural importance"

What was the budget for Filth and how much money did it take?

BUDGET: $5,000,000 (estimated)

BOX OFFICE: £247,860 (UK) (29 September 2013) (38 Screens)

What advantage did James McAvoy feel £100m films have over low budget films?

"An independent film managed to get people to come and see it without a studio and without hundreds of millions of dollars of advertising money. That's remarkable - it means British film can do it on its own." "He said $100m (£61m) movies that "sometimes aren't very good" had an advantage over smaller films because they had a massive budget to sell the film."

What is VOD?

Video on Demand

What % increase did VOD see last year?

50% Increase

What impact might VOD have on distributors and Studios?

"Maybe VOD [video-on-demand] is going to change everything because the distributor and the studio might become less important."

What impact has it had on Blockbuster rental stores?

It has forced the company to go bust because everybody nowadays uses VOD which means that nobody uses the video shops anymore.

What was unique about Ben Wheatleys 'A Field In England'?

In July this year, Ben Wheatley's film A Field in England was the first UK film to be released simultaneously in cinemas, on DVD, on TV and through video-on-demand. Wheatley's "psychedelic trip", set during the English Civil War, took more than £21,000 at the box office on the same weekend it was available free of charge on Film 4. It also sold more then 2,000 copies on DVD over the same period. The film was made on a modest budget of £300,000.

What does director of The Machine Caradog James think is the toughest part of film making?

"The toughest thing is you make a good film but can you get it to reach an audience? It's events like this and individuals who champion independent cinema that give us a profile and any chance of a mass audience."

Why have rules been relaxed on what makes a film 'British'?

Anna Mansi (the BFI's head of certification) told the BBC "This puts us on a level playing field with our creative content tests and other European culture tests, the increase in visual effects points will also be very beneficial to the effects industry."

How has the use of visual effects in films been encouraged?

Alex Hope of visual effects company Double Negative said he was "delighted" with the tax changes, hoping foreign productions filming in the UK would hire British effects companies rather than taking the work back overseas. "Today's measures target productions that would not otherwise qualify for tax relief and incentive them to bring VFX or production business to the UK," he said.

Name five of these rules and link them to The Kings Speech, Kill List, The World's End

Film set in the UK - all threes films are set in different parts of the UK.

Lead characters British citizens or residents - the main characters are all of British descent (Colin Firth - The King's Speech, Simon Pegg - The World's End, Neil Maskell -  Kill List)

Film based on British subject matter or underlying material - The King's Speech is about our English monarchy, The World's End is about traditional English pubs in a traditional English town (with a twist), and Kill List is about two hitmen in the North, traditionally this can be seen as quite an American subject matter however the strong dialect and British twist to the film makes it qualify as this. 

Original dialogue recorded mainly in English language - all the films were filmed in English.

Represents/reflects diverse British culture, heritage or creativity - The King's Speech is more upper class society, The World's End is more middle class and Kill List is working class.

What rules has chancellor George Osbourne announced for tax on British films?

"George Osborne also announced tax relief would be increased from 20% to 25% on the first £20m of qualifying production expenditure. Productions will also only have to spend 10% of their budgets on UK expenditure to qualify - down from 25% - to help more independent production companies and make the UK a more attractive co-production partner. Mr Osborne will also announced a £5m investment in the National Film and Television School's Digital Village, to create a training centre for the UK's digital and creative industries."

What is the highest grossing film in UK box office history?

Skyfall (To date, the 23rd Bond adventure has earned £94.3m in the UK, beating the previous record holder, Avatar, which grossed £94m in 11 months.)

How much has it taken and how many screens was it available on?

£20,180,369 (UK) (28 October 2012) (587 Screens)

The Seven Areas Of Representation (ETHNICITY)

DEFINITION OF ETHNICITY- Relating to or characteristic of a human group having racial, religious, linguistic, and certain other traitsin common

STEREOTYPES ASSOCIATED WITH ETHNICITY- An ethnic stereotype is a simplified and often misleading representation of an ethnic group, composed of what are thought to be typical characteristics of members of a given ethnic group. These images of a particular group are used to communicate underlying messages about status, society and cultural norms.

A SELECTION OF TV DRAMAS THAT INCLUDE THE STEREOTYPE, ETHNICITY- There are many different kinds of shows on television today and these are able to present different kinds of images. Some shows present news and current affairs stories, trying to report on actual events in a realistic way. Other shows will create fictional drama or comedy situations that are designed to reflect real life. Commercials are made to sell products to specific groups or target audiences in society.

All of these types of television can use stereotypes as part of their presentation. Some of the main kinds of stereotypes used on television include:

• Gender 
• Age 
• Ethnicity 
• Disability

Stereotypes can be used in positive or constructive ways, however there has been research that shows many people base real life opinions on how different groups are shown on television.

ANALYSIS OF HOW THE STEREOTYPE'S ARE REPRESENTED- Many sociologists believe that media representations of ethnic minority groups are problematic because they contribute to the reinforcement of negative racist stereotypes. Media representations of ethnic minorities may be undermining the concept of a tolerant multicultural society and perpetuating social divisions based on colour, ethnicity and religion.

Evidence suggests that, despite some progress, ethnic minorities are generally under-represented or are represented in stereotyped and negative ways across a range of media content. In particular, newspapers and television news have a tendency to present ethnic minorities as a problem or to associate Black people with physical rather than intellectual activities and to neglect, and even ignore, racism and the inequalities that result from it.

IMAGES FROM THE TV DRAMAS YOU USE TO ILLUSTRATE YOUR POINTS-

ISSUES OR PROBLEMS THAT ARISE FROM THE REPRESENTATION OR THE STEREOTYPE INVOLVED- The reading and study of ethnic minority writing repeatedly confront the problem of representation, and raise many questions in the debate between essentialism and social construction and implications for the issues of appropriation of voice and agency. Using examples from Italian-Canadian writers and other minority groups in Canada this paper explores these questions and implications referring to the critical work of Sneja Gunew, Edward Said, Francesco Loriggio, Linda Hutcheon and Frank Lentricchia.

The King's Speech Case Study

The kings speech is a very  British film, the film tells the story of a man who became King George VI, the father of Queen Elizabeth II. After his brother abdicates, George ('Bertie') reluctantly assumes the throne. Plagued by a dreaded stammer and considered unfit to be king, Bertie engages the help of an unorthodox speech therapist named Lionel Logue. Through a set of unexpected techniques, and as a result of an unlikely friendship, Bertie is able to find his voice and boldly lead the country through war.

Britishness...  
The director of the film was Tom Hooper, he was born and brought up in London. Most people to the modern day would define a British film to be a ‘British’ film with reference to obvious cultural elements such as a setting in the UK or a focus on British people abroad. A predominantly British cast, a story-line about some aspect of British life. However, there's are two ways that a film is able to qualify, either under Schedule 1 to the films Act 1985, examples include the Bond and Harry Potter films, or by satisfying the terms of an international co-production agreement to which the UK is a party.2 Under the Films Act, for a film to be certified as ‘British’ by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, a number of tests must be met:3

• The maker test: the film must be made by a company that is registered and centrally managed and controlled in the UK, in another state of the European Union/European Economic Area or in a country with which the European Community has signed an Association Agreement;4
• The production cost test: 70% of the production cost of the film must be spent on film making activity in the UK.

Exhibition...

The box office in the UK doesn't really pay attention to mainstream medias cinema box office. However, The King's Speech made £3.52 million on the films opening weekend. The films reception of the film was a range of different views.

 "The King's Speech takes a rather different view of Britain and the 1930's, though it's not entirely inconsistent with Auden's judgment and isn't in any sense what is sneeringly called heritage cinema. It is the work of a highly talented group of artists who might be regarded as British realists – Tom Hooper directed the soccer epic The Damned United; Eve Stewart was production designer on Mike Leigh's Topsy-Turvy and Vera Drake; Jenny Beavan was responsible for the costumes worn in Gosford Park and The Remains of the Day; the cinematographer Danny Cohen lit Shane Meadows's This is England and Dead Man's Shoes; Tariq Anwar's editing credits range from The Madness of King George to American Beauty; and the screenplay is by the British writer David Seidler, who co-wrote Coppola's Tucker: The Man and His Dream."

 The kings speech is a very British film as its about the royal family at the begging of the second world war. 

Production Issues...
The film had a budget of 15 million. it was marketed extremely well due to the fact that the marketing campaign was spread by word of mouth that had been generated by the press, A few other techniques were used to keep the conversation going. The three production companies were:

• UK Film Council
• See-Saw Films
• Bedlam Productions
• Momentum pictures
• The UK film council was an income of money from the national lottery which was shortly closed down after a few weeks of it's release date.