Independent case study: Peer assessment

Name of student whose blog you are assessing:

Sophia.K

Name of film they have researched:

Skyfall

Have they covered all three platforms? 

Yes she has

Examples they have provided from print platform: Analysis of print cover

The use of the 007 acts as brand recognition due to the fact that all bond films use this logo and is recognised worldwide by the audience. 

Examples they have provided from broadcast platform:

 The same music is used throughtout the whole trailer to create parallel sound which is also non- digetic.

Examples they have provided from e-media platform:

The website sticks to a black and white film which creates synergy with all the products this brand produces such as the film poster and DVD packaging.

What institutional information did they find out about the film?

It uses all these website to promote the film through various interviews with cast, trailers and introduction competitions to it's followers.

What issues did they find in terms of representation in the film they studied?

What links or comparisons can you find between this case study and Ill Manors?

• Skyfall and Ill Manors are much more modern films set in today's socitey
• Appeals to a wide audience

Is there anything you can learn from this case study? What could you add to your own case study after looking at someone else's work?

MEST1 section B: Independent case study

Case study research tasks

The basics

1) What is the name of the film, the director and notable stars?
Paddington.
Director: Paul King
Main stars: Hugh Bonneville, Sally Hawkins, Julie Walters

2) When was it released?

23rd November 2014

3) What genre is the film? What are the generic conventions that tell you the film belongs to this genre?
Comedy and family, This is because the trailer instantly makes the audience at the protagonist acting dopey.  

4) What was the critical reception? What is the film rated on IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes?
The movie was rated 7.7/10 on IMDb

Broadcast

1) Write a close-textual analysis of the trailer using the MIGRAIN key concepts of Media Studies.

2) Find examples of television promotion on YouTube (adverts, chat shows, ‘red carpet’ interviews etc.) and post them to your blog along with an explanation of how these promote the film.


The trailer helps to promote the film as it allows its 
target audience to gain an insight of what the movie is about. It also allows them to see short dramatic clips of scenes within the movie and some leave a cliff hanger which intrigues the audience into it more persuading them to watch the whole film.


















This poster helps to promote the film as it shows a still image of a scene within the movie, which is of Paddington himself in a bath tub sliding down the slide, with great amounts of water surrounding him, almost like a water slide. This is very effective as it shows how dopey and ridiculous the bear is which adds to the humour of it. The fact that that he's managed to create a huge mess on his owns shows how dumb there bear is making people want to watch more of it. It also, shows the release date of the film which allows the audience to watch as soon as it comes out.

3) Does the broadcast promotion use stars to create interest in the film?
The broadcast uses a couple of famous stars in the film to create interest. The fact that they've only used a couple is to make the film seem more realistic.

Print

1) Read at least THREE reviews of the film and provide a quote from each one.

• 'A total delight'
• Paddngton is absolutely, positively delightful
• Sweet. charming, amusing and classy. The sort of movie kids will still love when they're old and cynicial.

2) Find examples of print promotion (e.g. film poster, billboard adverts etc.) on Google images and post them to your blog along with an explanation of how these promote the film.

 

3) Choose ONE print advert and write a textual analysis of what it communicates to the audience.
The first thing the audience realise is that it is a comedy.

The colour scheme used is bright, which adds to the family and comedy genre of it. It also makes it seem friendly and approachable to all ages. In addition, the central image is a picture of Paddington himself in a bath tub floating at the top of the bathroom with large amounts of water underneath him. Also, the colour of the water has been exaggerated a lot, making it seem artificial and fake. This could have been done to tell the audience that it cannot happen in real-life, but in Paddington's little world it can. This attracts the target audience as it shows them how clumsy Paddington is, as he caused the mess surrounding him. In addition, the title of publication is effective as it stands out amongst the blue water. This also attracts the audience as they instantly realise that he is the bear from London, making them want to watch the whole movie. Also, the paw print on the title, is effective as it links with Paddington bear. Finally, the Release date is also  effective as it allows the audience to know when the movie is coming out so they can watch it as soon as it comes out.

4) How is the film’s brand constructed? What does the brand connote? Does it remind you of any other brands or similar films?
The brand is of an English bear, with several other merchandises with it. The brand connotes an English society.

E-media

1) Research the film’s presence on social media: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram etc. How does the film’s social media presence help promote the film
The films social media helps to promote the film as on twitter, it shows hilarious scenes and still images of the bear, which intrigue the audience into watching the whole film.
Instagram helps promote the movie as it also shows a wide range of pictures from the film as well as having short dramatic clips of scenes within the movie. 

2) Analyse the official website for the film. How does it use the film’s brand? What examples of synergy can you find with the other platforms?
As soon as people The official website includes the trailer of the film which allows a wide range of people to view it.

3) Did the film run any kind of e-media based campaign to generate interest in the film?
Their campaign was about inviting people to the sets of Paddington and trying out the things the brea himself did in the movie e.g at the train station. 
The campaign is underpinned by the aim to:

• Highlight film locations in Britain 
• Data capture
• Increase visitor spend in Britain

Another campaign is that they had a 'colour me in' picture on their website for children to complete. After they did this their parents could upload it on twitter and uses the hashtag #Paddinton which went viral

4) Can you find any examples of the two-step flow theory online – did celebrities or journalists tweet or post about the film in order to promote it to their followers?

Audience

1) Who is the target audience for this film? Demographics and psychographics.
The target audience is aimed at families in the psychographic group of mainstreamer and explorers and in the demographic group it is aimed at people of C1 and C2.

2) How does the cross-media promotional campaign target this audience?
They did this by embedding trailers, posters, adverts etc. onto their sites to help promote their film. This allowed a variety of people to access the information about the movie which will eventually interest them.

3) What audience pleasures does the film provide? Think about the BFI lecture on audience pleasures in British film.

4) What similar films would the target audience enjoy? Justify your suggestions.
In my opinion, the audience will like Mr Beans holiday as firstly its also aimed at families and secondly its a comedy. Mr bean and Paddington are both dopey characters and do hilarious dumb things, meaning they get into stressful situations which interests the audience into it more.

Institution

1) Which film studio produced the film? What other films have they produced? Do they have a track record with this kind of film and this target audience?
Studio Canals.
Studio Canals produced the films : Million Dollar baby, Mr Beans holiday, Johnny english: reborn and loads more.2) Which company distributed the film in the UK? What other films have they distributed? 
Heyday films. This company produced all the Harry Potter films, i am legend , the boy in the striped pyjamas and loads more.

3) Do they have a track record with this kind of film and this target audience?

4)What was the budget for the film?
38.5 million euros

5) How successful was the film financially? Why do you think this was?
I think that the film was very successful financially. This is because it had millions of people watching it all over the world in cinemas and so meaning it had gained a lot of money from them. Also, it had a small budget compared to other big films and to think it came out very successful like the big budget movies. Furthermore, it has passed $200m 

6) Was this film more successful in the UK or worldwide/USA? Why do you think this is?
Paddington was no.2 on the 2014 list in the UK for films and was more successful in UK hitting $53.5 dollors, whereas it hit $8.7m in the USA

7) What certificate was the film given (12A, 18 etc.)? What was the reason for this certificate? Is the certification important for this film in terms of targeting its audience? Why?
The British Form of Film Classification gave the film a PG


Representation

1) What representations of people, places or groups can be found in this film?
I think that the bear portrays a dominant representation as it reinforces the stereotype that bears are clumsy and dopey and just fall over whenever, which exactly how Paddington acts within the movie. 

2) What representation of ‘Britishness’ does the film contain?
The whole theme of the film is British. This is firstly due to the accents. The characters accents are British which had to the Britishness of it. Also, the fact that the colours used in the trialer symbolises the England flag also adding to the Britishness of it. Finally, the words on screen says from the producer of Harry Potter, suggesting that a British person had produced this film.

3) How does the representation of Britain differ to Ill Manors? #
The representations are both different because it firstly they are both completely opposite genres. Ill Manors is a crime/thriller and Paddington is a family/comedy. Also, the storyline's are different as ill Manors is about someone trying to track a phone down but comes along many obstacles and Paddington is about a bear who needs to find a home in the UK.

4) What values and ideologies can you find in your chosen film? (E.g. The King’s Speech is extremely patriotic, pro-monarchy etc.) 
There are not many ideologies in the trailer as there are no purposes to the film, its just about having a bit of a laugh, whereas The kings speech is based on a true story, telling the audience about England's past. However, the only main ideology Paddington  has is it being based around the England culture.

Case study comparison

1) What similarities and differences can you find between Ill Manors, A Field In England and your chosen case study film? List all that apply. 
Similarities:

• All 3 films are set in England 
• They all entertain their target audience

Differences:

• Ill Manors is based around violence and crime, whereas Paddington is based around enjoyment and laughter and A field in England is based around real events in the past.
• Paddington uses a bright colour scheme like yellow, blue and red, whereas the other two uses a dull colour scheme such as grey and white.

Updated double page spread

Updates magazine cover

A field in England - case study

Summary of the article
The article on 'A field in England' is about how the makers of them film distributed the film to get a million viewers. They became one of the first films in the UK to launch simultaneously across all platforms such as VOD, free broadcast TV, DVD, BluRay and cinema. In addition, the distributors challenge for a film thus be summarised as, identifying the films audience, persuading the audeicne to watch and more. Furhtermore, the film made mad £21,399 over its opening weekend. It drew a combined audience of 288,000 viewers and those who recorded the film on Saturday and sunday were also added to the total, it was 357,000. In addtion, it was the number one trending topic on Twitter in the UK and sales of DVD's from amazon and HMV amounted to 1462.

How was A Field In England’s release different to typical film releases?

It is different to a typical film release as theses are released in countries across the world, whereas, A field in England was released in in England on film 4.
What are the advantages to releasing the film across all platforms on the same day?

It will cause  'word of mouth' to occur which is where someone for example would tweet something positive about it, which allows others to then see the film themselves and if they like it, the may also tweet or post something positive about it , which eventually keeps going on and on, causing more and more people to watch it. Also, a wide range of people will be able to access the link to watch it from al over the country if they do do have e.g a Facebook account, but have a twitter one they can see information about the movie on that.

What are the disadvantages to this approach?

The disadvantages of this approach is that 

What target audience would A Field In England be aimed at? Demographics and Psychographics.

The target audience in the demographics area would be for older people and intellectual people e.g University students, in the category of B. In the psychographic group, the audiences would be explorers and reformers. 

Do you think all films in future will be released across all platforms simultaneously in future?
In my opinion, i think films will be released in the same way in the future as this is a very effective way in promoting a film. This is due to the fact that a variety of people will be able to access it across different platforms. Allowing the movie to get more viewers and hopefully positive reviews.

Ill Manors: official website

Ill Manors: official website

How does the Ill Manors official website promote the film?

The website promotes the film as it seems to give complete access to everything relevant to the film, in an easy to use interface. It's purpose may be to have everything what fans need, in one place.
What examples can you find of the Ill Manors brand on the website homepage?

The styling of the web page is very similar to the atmosphere that the movie gives off. This would have been quite attractive to the aimed audience and helps them find self identification in the pictures used.

What links does the website offer?The website offers links to various different aspects, relevant to the film such as the trailer, synopsis, stills and where to buy the DVD and Official Soundtrack

What examples of synergy can you find between the website homepage and the print/broadcast platforms?
Examples of synergy used are the shops where the album can be bought such as HMV, iTunes and Amazon. Also, reactions from famous celebrities are displayed on the site to persuade the more people to watch the film as celebrities act as opinion leaders.

Ill Manors e-media: Tag London campaign

Summarise the Ill Manors Tag London campaign in 100 of your own words.

How does the Ill Manors Tag London campaign help to promote the film?

The contributors from the publics tweets onto established places around London, the Big Ben ironically being one of them, especially because it is right opposite to the houses of parliament  a place which is highly criticised amongst the tweets due to the hierarchical unjust taking place (talking about the lack of work and co-ordination from the MP's)

• ' #ILLMANORS JUST ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF CAMERON'S BROKEN BRITAIN '

• ' #ILLMANORS, SOCIETY REBELLING BACK AT BROKEN BRITAIN, @4PLANB '

What links are there between the Tag London campaign and other texts you have studied as

There are links between the the Tag London campaign and the TED x  lecture link together, as during TED x  lecture, PLAN B mentions society, and how society ignores people. It talks about the riots which links to 'Cameron's Broken Britain' and also mentions how society ignores individuals like him. 

Why might user-generated campaigns like this be more successful than traditional media campaigns?

Traditional media campaigns can become repetitive and outdated, hence different market approaches need to be considered and taken forward, Its only essential as time goes on to exploit advances in technology and E-media at this rate seems like the best way forward. More of the population are on social sites than ever, and its an efficient way of spreading news like fire, in order to get talk going about the campaign which heightens PR opportunities.

Choose five of the tweets above and for each one write what target audience the tweet could appeal to (demographics/psychographics) and then link the tweet to one other media text you have studied as part of the Ill Manors case study (TEDx lecture, music video etc.) Justify your link for each tweet using examples from the film/promotional materia

• #ILLMANORS JUST ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF CAMERON'S BROKEN BRITAIN

links to the London Riots, demographics, TED X lecture

• #ILLMANORS, SOCIETY REBELLING BACK AT BROKEN BRITAIN, @4PLANB

links to the London Riots, Music Video

• WHY ARE THE RICH GETTING RICHER AND THE POOR GETTING POORER. PFFT TO THE GOVERNMENT.THE OLYMPICS.WILL DESTROY LONDON #ILLMANORS

Links to the Olympics, Music Video

• #ILLMANORS INCLUSION NOT EXCLUSION.

Links to the London Riots, Music Video

• THE RECESSION IS A WORLD SCHEME TO KEEP THE POOR, POOR. THE RICH OF THIS WORD HAVE NEVER BEING RICHER. #ILLMANORS

Links to the London Riots and the Olympics, Music Video and the TED X Lecture