FMP Jim Taylor Screenwriting 101 - "The Character Tree" - Pre Production

The Character Tree

This is a character tree for my Protagonist for my FMP Jim Taylor.

FEET

What does this person look like?
Casual Dirty needs a good night sleep
Where do they live?
Lives alone now in his parents house
Where did they go to school?
Locally short distance from his house
Do they have any tattoos? why?
He hates the idea of something irreversible such as tattoos
Who is their best friend?
He doesn't like to brand people as best friends
What is their occupation?
he's currently studying at College

 GROIN AND GUTS

What does this person WANT?
He wants life to return to normal and for everyone to come back returning the status quo also for all this to all be a bad dream.
How does their sexuality manifest itself?
Its not a big deal to him as he's only ever had one main crush which is one of his close friends and he's never acted on these feelings
How do they feel about the classic sins (greed, Lust, Envy ect) ? What about them is really childish?
He has a lot of greed as he always had what he wanted before everyone disappeared and he took everything for granted he had. He's secretly still a kid at heart wants his Mum and Dad to come home and look after him.

HEART

What does this person NEED?
He needs to find answers and maintain his humanity.
What will make them a more functional person?
He would be more functional if he was less outgoing as he is constantly pushing himself to the psychical and mental limit.
Do they need to find self-confidence? Humility?
He's confident around friends but when he's alone he begins to be filled with self doubt.
Do they need to provide for their family?
No he's family is quite well of and he has never had to worry about money.

THROAT

How does this person sound?
Smart and abnormally calm considering the situation.
How do they project themselves? 
He speaks clearly but doesn't shout.
How do they try to come off to others?
He try's to come off confident and strong has a habit of putting on a deeper voice when nervous.
How do they actually come off to others?
He comes of as confident but sometimes a bit weird with a deeper voice that doesn't suit him.

LEFT CHEEK

What is their Intelligence?
Although initially he's more of a brawn then brains kind of guy he learns to use his brain more
How does this manifest itself?
As time goes on he begins to hallucinate and not realise whats real and fake.
How practical are they?
Hes very practical and likes to attempt to think things out before rushing into things
How do they solve problems?
He thinks everything through and makes sure he's ready for all possible scenarios

RIGHT CHEEK

What is their artistic/creative capacity?
He's not very creative and enjoys sticking to a same routine day in day out.
What elements are NOT practical? 
He's not used to fending for himself.
What is their Spirituality?
He dosent ofter think about it but he's open to others views.

CROWN

Review your answers do they represent a consistent Character Psychology?

Yes there are a few moments where they contradict as he is secretly shy but to everyone else he seems confident.

What are their defining memories?

His first drink with his friends which was his first taste of freedom without his mother smothering him.

How in a nutshell do they behave?

He has good and bad moments he's either very spoilt and over confident almost cocky or he's extremely shy and quiet.

Blake Snyder Beat Sheet

Blake Snyder's Beat Sheet

We looked at Blake Snyder's Beat Sheet which is used to create the structure of a film through key points "Beats" and to the right of each point is the amount of minutes into the feature that you should roughly see them.

1.Opening Image (1)
2.Theme Stated (5)
3.Set up (1-10)
4.Catalyst (12)
5.Debate (12-25)
6.Break into two (25)
7.B-Story (30)
8.Fun and Games (30-55)
9.Midpoint (55)
10.Bad guys close in (55-75)
11.All is lost (75)
12.Dark Night of the soul (75-85)
13.Break into Three (85)
14.Finale (85 - 110)
15.Final Image (110)

Lord of The Rings - The Fellowship of The Ring 

1.At exactly 1 Minute The first image appears which is just after the title

2.The theme is stated between 1-5 minutes into the feature.

3.

4.The discovery of the ring

5.Gandalf realises what kind of ring it is and convinces Frodo to leave the Shire

6.Frodo meets merry and pippin

7.Gandalfs of to see Saruman

8.Frodos chased by ring wraiths

9.Frodo meets strider

10.Strider vs ringWraiths

11.Frodo is stabbed and begins to fade

12.Arwen trys to get Frodo to Rivendell as hes fading

13.Frodo wakes up in Rivendell

14.council meeting forming the fellowship

Vlog

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvB41XGBSvc

Spiderman Theories - Notes/ Research

Psychoanalytical Theory 1
- Spiderman (Super Ego) decides what he wants which is to be a hero and save people Peter (Ego) then deals with the consequences of the Super Egos commands like Mary Jane falling in love with spider man because he saved her from the thugs/villains (Id)

Psychoanalytical Theory 2
-Peter Parker is the Super ego who wants something for example he want Mary Jane to notice him to do this he use's the Spiderman (Ego) who achieves his goal of capturing Mary Jane's attention by saving her on two separate occasions from Villains (Id)

Auteur Theory
-Sam Raimi is the Auteur of Spiderman and puts his own original stamp on the work which includes:
-Recurring Cameo Appearances  (Ted Raimi, Bruce Campbell)

http://blogs.indiewire.com/criticwire/sam-raimi-the-classic-theme

http://www.deadites.net/features/the-classic-delta-88/

Genre Theory

We have been studying the Genre Theory in our lesson first we talked about Iconography, Iconography is association a icon with something else in this case a film genre so a Gun would be associated with a action Genre and as a class we looked at the Western genre and had to list things you would expect to see in a Western Gene film this is what the class came up with.

We then had to find a clip that had some of these present i found this clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0BrdMi-oyc
Which is from The Good The Bad The Ugly which is a personal favourite of mine and contain quite a few of the points listed which define it as a Western Genre.


We next had to try to make a Genre-less poster a poster that you would look at and not be able to define into a genre this is the poster i made this poster.

I found it hard to create a genre-less poster as even after I gave it my best shot people still thought it was a Romance genre but I learned that its very hard to take films/film posters and make them genre-less

In the next task we were then given two quotes and told to agree with one of them and give a brief explanation why

"Genre is an endlessly flexible tool for artists and audiences to understand and define films. It allows filmmakers to connect with the audience most likely to enjoy there work"

"Genre is a barrier to creativity and a strait jacket to prevent experimentation. it is the enemy of interesting cinema"

I would agree with the the first statement given because i fully support genre i do believe that it allows film makers to connect with the audience and Genre helps define the film and allows audiences to know what they are viewing before hand.

Cat in the Hat Psychoanalytical Theories

Dr. Seuss' The Cat in the Hat 

My chosen Film is Dr. Seuss' The Cat in the Hat i will now look at this film and try to apply 3 different theories The Auteur, Feminist and Psychoanalytical Theory.

Psychoanalytical Theory

I mainly chose this film because I think that it has a direct link to a Psychoanalytical Theory which is called the Ego Theory the idea is simple in basic terms a chain of command The idea is that you have a Super Ego who is in charge and relays a message down to the Ego much like the brain talking to the  body the Ego is the one that has to find a way of achieving the goal set. Incomes the Id which is the subconscious which generates quick ideas which can either be used or subsided as unimportant For example if the brain (The Super Ego) told the body (The Ego) we need money the subconscious (Id) might suggest to rob a bank but after generating the idea it is dismissed. In Dr. Seuss' The Cat in the Hat The Cat Played by Mike Myers is the Super Ego because he is the one coming up with activities to do Conrad and Susie are the Ego the ones that have to deal with the commands and consequences and The Things are the Id as they generate problems (such as destroying the house) and also generates solutions (cures the boredom of the children and helping them fix the house) or From a different side of The psychoanalytical theory you could swap the roles and say that The children are the super ego wanting to have fun the Cat is the Ego trying to achieve the goal.

Psychoanalytical Theory's

The Ego Theory

Today we learned about some of the Psychoanalytical Theory's that exist the one that stood out most to me was about Sigmund Freud's theory about The Ego, The Super Ego and The ID are the three parts that make up your brain The Super Ego is the part of your brain that gives out commands and sends a message down the Chain of command The Super Ego sends a Message to the Ego which deciders how to achieve the command given and the ID is the subconscious thats provides ideas which may be good ideas or they may be bad ideas which once considered are realised to be bad. For example we watched an episode of The Trapdoor an old stop animation in which an elusive "master" (The Super Ego) gives commands to Berk (The Ego) who is attempting to complete the task given he then opens a trapdoor which reveals 2 monsters (The ID) One of the monsters is a ugly evil monster which Berk shows a mirror to (revealing its a bad idea) which sends him running back into the trapdoor and the other monster helps Berk achieve his goal.

The Uncanny Theory

uncanny Theory = something from childhood changed also familiar/unfamiliar

Feminist Theory - Naomi Wolf/ The Male Gaze

Naomi Wolf - "The Beauty Myth"

In lesson we were talking about the Feminist Theory and after researching i found a woman called Naomi Wolf who published a book in 1991 called The Beauty Myth which is all about the idea of Feminism and societies view on the female gender.

She talks about how society and the Male gender have forced them to want to change the way they look at themselves and make them want to go through extreme measures to appeal to the males image of what women should look like.

“Cosmetic surgery processes the bodies of woman-made women, who make up the vast majority of its patient pool, into man-made women.” 
― Naomi Wolf, The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty are Used Against Women

The Male Gaze

In lesson we also spoke about the Idea that in hollywood cameras are used to film "through the male gaze" for example in Who Framed Roger Rabbit - In the scene where Jessica Rabbit (A Female Cartoon) is singing on a stage she is wearing a revealing tight fitting dress and the camera focusses on her legs and chest which is were you'd imagine the males would be looking hence "The Male Gaze"

“What are other women really thinking, feeling, experiencing, when they slip away from the gaze and culture of men?” 
― Naomi Wolf, The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty are Used Against Women

Lord of The Rings Theory

Lord of The Rings Theory

For the Purpose of my work I chose Lord of the Rings and focused on what could be seen as a underlined meaning for the film.

Lord of the rings is a film Following the relationship of two hobbits who travel on a life threatening journey and find comfort in each others arms slowly developing there friendship into much more.

Frodo and Sam two hobbits, two friends or two lovers it may appear that Frodo and Sam are just friends to begin with but as there journey progresses they find themselves unable to hide there feelings.

Sam throws himself into the water an able to swim at risk of dying because he couldn't live without Frodo this is were there love first blooms after Frodo pulls him out of the water he holds him close.

Sam now comforts Frodo on there journey trying to reassure him that he is strong enough to do it and if he can't continue then Sam with carry him the rest of the way and refuses to leave him behind.

The final moment of there relationship Frodo decides to leave on a boat but comforts Sam first by holding him and giving Sam and only Sam a kiss on his forehead.

Auteur Theory

Auteur Theory - James Cameron

We began looking at the Auteur Theory in lesson which is the Theory of a Director being the main creative force like an author of the film I decided to look at James Cameron's work to see if he could be a Auteur and Auteur usually has Recurring Themes, A unique Visual Style or Recurring Cast. 

Recurring Themes

Cameron's work has Recurring Themes and subtexts this usually includes one or more of the following:

Conflicts Between Humanity and Technology for example the Terminator Films and Avatar which is arguable considering its not between humanity and technology but instead an alien race and technology. Strong Female Characters for example Rose from Titanic and Ellen Ripley from Aliens finally some form of Romance subplot like Titanic and True Lies

Visual Styles

James Cameron doesn't have a Visual style per say but his work usually has the following:

Lots of special effects in most films Terminator, True Lies, Titanic, Aliens and Avatar all use lots of special effects. Massive build up to a dramatic scene's for example Titanic building up to the inevitable ship sinking scene and plays on your emotions using recurring sounds and songs including sad sounding violins. Avatar has the massive build up to the destruction of the home tree which has a massive period of silence as the tree falls building suspense.

Recurring Cast

The most Recurring Actor in James Cameron's work is Bill Paxton Who appears in The Terminator, Aliens, True Lies, Titanic and Ghosts of the Abyss. Arnold Schwarzenegger also appears in a Terminator and True Lies

Significant Body of Work

There is 16 Films currently released by Cameron which will all share a theme or cast member with at least one of his other films.


Auteur?

I would say that in some ways James Cameron is an Auteur but when watching a film there is nothing truly defining that would make you say "this is a James Cameron Film"

1960's and 2000's

We were given a task to look at two separate decades and finding out what events were going on in the world and how Hollywood used these events in there films. I was given the 1960s and the 2000s I started with the 60s there was a lot of different things going on at the time like in 1961 the first man went into space this prompted lots of panic and curiosity of what could be out there which ultimately created opportunity for film makers to create space films that would really react with the audience such as The 2001 Space Odyssey http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062622/.Also in the later 1960's a massive string of radioactive monster films came along with the attacks on  Hiroshima and Nagasaki which happened prior to 1960's such as Godzilla and the rest of the Shōwa Franchise.


2000s

911's - world trade centre (film) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0469641/

natural disasters- day after tomorrow http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0319262/?ref_=nv_sr_1

diseases(mad cow,swine flu) - resident evil http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120804/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000s_(decade)

Vlog Plan

Clash of the Titans Plan

-What country and era were they made and the impact on how they were made?

-clash of the titans (1981) was made in USA

-clash of the titans (2010) was made in USA

-These two films were made in completely different times and both were amazing for the time they were produced for example the 1981version technology was limited but they used what they had at the time like lots of stop animation fighting scenes and whereas the 2010 version had much more technology available including using 3D cameras

-What were the films budgets and how did the budgets impact on the production?

-Clash of the titans (2010) Estimated budget $125 million

-Clash of the titans (1981) Estimated budget $15 million

-Both films had considerably high budgets for there time 1981 had around $15 million and the 2010 version had $125 million so a massive $110 million difference which would heavily influence the quality difference between the films. for example 2010 had enough money to create around 1600 weapons for the film including swords, daggers, darts and a blowpipe. there high budget also allowed them to create the 40,000 square foot city of Argos and finally they had the money to spend 5 months designing the

Kraken.

-Are the intended audiences the same for each version

-Clash of the titans (2010) Pg-13

-Clash of the titans (1981) Pg

-There are slight differences to the target audience the original Clash of the Titans film aimed for a U classification because the director Desmond Davis wanted to reach all ages but instead attained a pg. rating whereas the 2010 version got a pg-13.

-Other successful productions at the time that could of impacted this remake 

-Before clash of the titans remake was released in april earlier in the year Percy Jackson and the Lighting Thief was released which features lots of the greek gods and has a similar theme to clash of the titans and due to getting mixed reviews on sites like rotten tomatoes the director of clash of the titans  probably thought that this was the time to release the film.

-What Social or Polictical issues were going on at the time of this version?

-Clash of the Titans (1981)

Around the time of this film there were massive conflicts arising in Rome which amassed to a bombing in one of there airports

-Clash of the Titans (2010)

-Were the Reasons for remake artistic or financial?

-Artistic Louis Leterrier decided to remake the film in his image he also believed the story needed to be retold and modernised originally he didn't want to remake the  film as he loved he actually said to Warner Brothers "I understand why you’re remaking it: It makes sense, it’s exciting. But you shouldn’t. It’s bad. Don’t do this." then after thinking it over and reading the screenplay he decided to go alone with it.

-How was each version Marketed?

-Clash of the Titans (1981) 

there was very limited resources available at the time for marketing and so the biggest marketing technique was putting the film poster everywhere for people to see before the actually film was released

-Clash of the Titans (2010)

2 months before the release of the film they released movie posters and banners and a sneaky campaign was launched to steal peoples attention away from kickass by placing an add on the side of google every time someone searched kickass a side add came up for clash of the titans saying to go watch it but kick ass respond by placing a add beneath clash of the titans saying "Don’t Be Conned. Heroes Don’t Clash, Real Heroes Kick-Ass. Join Up Now"

-How did production and distribution technology impact on each version?

-Clash of the titans (1981)

Clash of the titans technology was very limited and resulted in stop animation fight sequences and low budget sets that had to be reused. 

-Clash of the titans (2010)

In the 2010 remake of the film there was very little limitation on distribution and technology allowing them to achieve outstanding visuals and very few limitations on worldwide distribution allowing them to bring in a bigger audience.

-How was the news of the remake received by audiences and there views after the release? 

-When the film was announced people generally thought it was a terrible idea fans of the original thought it was a disgraceful idea and really were not happy and once the film was released peoples views were proved right as the majority of people got together and shared there views.

VIdeo Podcast Notes

-For this podcast i had to pick a film or TV series that had been remade or rebooted i have decided to look at The Clash of The Titans (1981) film which was remade in 2010

-These two films were made in completely different times and both were amazing for the time they were produced for example the 1981version technology was limited but they used what they had at the time like lots of stop animation fighting scenes and whereas the 2010 version had much more technology avaliable

-Both films had considerably high budgets for there time 1981 had around $15 million and the 2010 version had $125 million so a massive $110 million diffrence which would heavily influence the quality difference between the films. for example 2010 had enough money to create around 1600 weapons for the film including swords, daggers, darts and a blowpipe. there high budget also allowed them to create the 40,000 square foot city of Argos and finally they had the money to spend 5 months designing the
Kraken.

-There are slight differences to the target audience the original Clash of the Titans film aimed for a U classification but instead attained a pg. rating because the director Desmond Davis wanted to reach all ages the 2010 version got a pg13.





-Film Stuff (2010) http://movies.about.com/od/clashofthetitans/a/clash-titans-budget.htm
-Visual Effects (1981) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Harryhausen
-Percy Jackson and The Lightning Thief Review http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/0814255/
-About Percy Jackson and The Lightning Thief http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0814255/
-Clash of the Titans http://www.vanityfair.com/online/oscars/2010/04/clash-of-the-titans-director-you-shouldnt-remake-clash-of-the-titans
2010 vs 1981 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5t-_t-fMWQ

Remaking Van Helsing

Van Helsing

The task

We were given a list of films that are currently being reviewed for a possible remake out of this list i chose the 2004 film Van Helsing with my choice made i then had to review the plot, characters and theme of the film and make it apply to a current day audience.

What i did

being a big fan of the original film i decided to make as few changes as possible the first and most important change was i planned to make the whole theme darker and aim for a 15 borderline 12A i would get Christopher Nolan to direct the film to try and give it a darker edge like the recent Batman Series. some verry important changes i would make is to cut the female character from the film eliminating all love interest as it could take the dark feel away i would also attempt to axe most of the monsters instead of having Frankenstien's Monster, Dracula, vampires, werewolves and Mr Hyde i would stick with just one enemy such as werewolves this could also lead to potential for a series of films each featuring different monsters as he tries to track down the killer of his family which would be the new plot of the film which ultimately ties in with modern day fears of losing family members in the first film i think a famous cast is needed i would keep Hugh Jackman as Van helsing but i would make the Antagonist for the first film Sean Bean as the head Werewolf.

The Big Relaunch

Relaunching Goosebumps

Viewers Beware Your in For a Scare!!!!!!!!

Goosebumps was a TV series that aired in 1992 and went on till 1998 it was based on the hit children's horror books by R.L Stine. The hit Series was cancelled  due to ratings beginning to drop in the late 1990's people began to simply loose interest in the series. its hard to avoid this if you were to relaunch the show maybe you could have some younger stars featuring in a few episodes the only problem is that the original series is based on R.L Stines books so the new series would be totally different but i think that there is a open market for children who like scary or gross things and could potentially like to watch these. Another reason i think its time for a relaunch is due to how tolerant the younger generation is now days they can manage to watch more horror based shows and still not be phased. I think the relaunch should be aimed at around 6-10 year olds possibly on Cartoon Network around 6pm any later and they might be asleep and any earlier and it might be targeting to young an audience. you would need a fair budget but not to pricey most of the budget would be on visual effects.

Log-line

After 15 years the Hit TV show is back time to dim the lights hold on tight viewers beware your in for a fright!

 

Essay: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Expectation

Expectation is what the audience expects to see in the following film or piece of media The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey had such high expectation from the audience because  it had to follow on from the legendary film trilogy The Lord of The Rings this expectation could bring in a massive audience but due to high expectation it could create tons of pressure to make sure that the film is as good as its predecessors people might go in the cinema with high expectations and have them fall short which may make you really dislike the film even though it was actually rather good. but after researching it i found a review about peoples expectations.

http://twitchfilm.com/2012/12/review-the-hobbit---an-unexpected-journey-exceeds-expectations.html

Representation

Representation is how a film is shown and represented Sadly i think that The Hobbit was misrepresented after i watched the trailer i assumed the Hobbit to be a dark fantasy film just like Lord of The Rings but i found that once watching it in the cinema it was more of a comedic family style film i wasn't to botherd but some people really thought the film was a massive misrepresentation of what The Hobbit was according to the books. i found quite a few sites that list differences between the book and the film but one i didn't know about was the scene at the start of the hobbit in which Frodo appears in a cameo roll and that whole scene shouldn't of been there which annoyed the fans and mis represented the books.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/12/14/the-hobbit-19-changes-from-j-r-r-tolkien-s-novel-to-peter-jackson-s-movie.html

Audience Marketing

How you market a film is key and most people market there films to there ideal Audience The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was marketed cleverly to separate audiences because of the diverse fan base for example these two posters are from the film and are clearly meant for two separate audiences.

 The poster on the left would clearly be for people that love action and that are already fans of Tolkien's work along with a generally older audience whereas the poster released on the right would be meant for younger audiences people who would look at the hobbits and think oh this looks funny ill go watch this which was a massive mistake marketing two separate audiences because it made some audiences so confused as to what type of film this would be. They also release some other posters for people who didn't know that the hobbit is actually a Prequel to the Lord of The Rings Trilogy they did this cleverly through the following posters.

As you can see the poster for the hobbit copied the Lord of the rings famous silhouette shot making it more identifiable.

Fan Culture

Fan culture can play a massive part in films especially ones based on books because there is already a fan base and therefore a massive audience before any kind of marketing The Hobbit has a massive fan base which consists of both children, adults and indeed fans. these fans may or may not enjoy getting together and dressing up which forms the base for a massive Fan based event. I'm talking of course about Hobbitcon/RingCon in which a massive group of fans get together at the Maritim Hotel in Bon, Germany once there they talk about the films, books, characters, anything and everything they also have a bunch of guests this year they had Ken Stott, James Nesbitt, Dean O'Gorman, John Callen and Mark Hadlow which are actors from the film. Most conventions can be used as a mass marketing technique to bring fans together and build hype for upcoming films or they could show off new merchandise to the fans.
http://www.hobbitcon.de/en/

How producer's get feedback

There are many ways for producers to get feedback including surveys and teaser trailer's one of the best ways is test Screenings which are used by producers to see what there audience thinks about there film and if anything needs changing for the release of The Hobbit Peter Jackson had one of these test screenings and Jim Vejvoda from IGN said "It looks like live television or hi-def video. And it didn't look particularly good" If there were an outstanding amount of people who didn't like the test screening then Peter Jackson may of considered making changes.

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2012/04/24/the-hobbit-didnt-look-so-good

Interactive Marketing

Interactive Marketing is a form of marketing that gets you involved in the form of games or even scavenger hunts that is intended to bring in the audience and interest more people in the upcoming or just release film for example The Hobbit Launched a massive Advertising campaign which included a fully worlds first interactive Trailer using your hands this was launched through Xbox Kinect which allowed the viewer to zoom-in/out or wave to interact with the video.
http://www.videoadnews.com/2012/09/25/advertising-meets-minority-report-brainient-launch-hand-gestured-ads/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=W4WnrbBPgwo
After the release of The Hobbit another Interactive campaign was released which allows the Facebook users to log on as "Dwarf's" and begin your quest and accompany the hobbit to "Erebor"you have to travel 1200 miles in game Via a number of challenges both online and off line these include creating your own images for a character/Avatar.
http://nicolasborreil.fr/warner-the-hobbit/#

Merchandising

Merchandising usually comes after a films release and like selling your film to the people through other items it could also be used as a way of marketing or as a money making technique for example there are hundreds of different pieces of merchandise for The Hobbit Including Toys, Games, Mugs, Clothes and film memorabilia these were created for the fans to spread the word about the Hobbit if people want to buy a shirt and then show it off spreading the word about the film then why not let them. But Merchandising can sometimes get crazy in the form of bootlegs, bootless are basically knock off pieces of merchandising fakes/copies of the originals i couldn't find any The Hobbit bootlegs but i managed to find some Lord of The Rings examples.

 http://bootlegactionfigures.com/blog/?p=2245

Film Reviews 

Before the internet became the phenomenon it is today most film makers depended on Word and Mouth the idea that one person could talk to another then talk to someone else and so on which would publicise your film but due to how long this would take it wasn't ideal which is why if a film was quite terrible it would take to long to get the word around and people would still go and see it but with the internet came massive sites that allowed people to review and rate films which you could check what other people and film critics think about the film your going to see. One of the most well known sites is Rotton Tomatoes which allows people to vote if they want to see the film or not and based on those satistics will rate the film.
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_hobbit_an_unexpected_journey/

As you can see above 82% of people enjoyed this film where as 65% didn't after you have cast your vote you may write a review of the film which people can read. This is a much faster way of spreading a review then Word and Mouth.

Distribution

Distribution is how and where a film is sold for example the Hobbit was distributed to Around 100 countries worldwide once distributed in some cases the name is also changed the main reasons for this could be to bring in different audiences for example they might change the name to something crazy which may actually apply to a foreign audience. For example when The Hobbit was released to Poland they actually changed the name i translated it and came up with The Hobbit: There and back again Which is really confusing because thats the name of the second film so I'm not sure what they will call the next one.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903624/releaseinfo

Assimilation to Culture

Assimilation to culture is how something fits in to culture how other programs show and welcome it and pay Homage to it one example is in the opening to the VGA's during this opening sequence a South Park clip was used which featured the Shire and the main character from the Hobbit but since it never mentioned a name or anything it wouldn't of needed permission 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxlY27d0v4g

Test Screenings and Interactive Marketing

Test Screenings and Interactive Marketing

Test Screenings are events where people producing films will ask members of the public who apply to there target audience to sit in for free and watch the film almost like a premier but the point of these Test Screenings is to see the public feedback and depending on what people say will determine if they should change the production in anyway usually the most important question they ask is "would you refer this film to a friend" if they find out that more then 30% wouldn't then they would consider making changes to the film. 

An example of a film that used a Test Screening is Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story the original ending for this film is White (played by Ben Stiller) wins the match witch shocked and annoyed the audience as White is the antagonist so after the audiences outrage the producer changed the ending to the film despite the Director Rawson Marshall Thurber saying he would keep the ending the same he was overruled and in the new ending Peter (Vince Vaughn) wins the match.

I remember doing something similar to this back in 2004 where i was asked of the streets to watch a trailer of the film Robots i was then asked questions about the film and what i thought of it including "would you show this film to a friend."

Interactive Marketing is a form of marketing that gets you involved for example the Batman Dark Knight film had massive hype build up as to what actor would be playing the Joker through Interactive Marketing they put up a pixilated image of the actor as the Joker then they told people to email through and for every person who emailed they would remove 1 pixel this was a genius idea as they had thousands of people emailing in creating awareness an people then got there friends involved aswell because they wanted to see this one picture of the Joker Warner Bros. also launched a mass scale scavanger hunt in which you had to go to diffrent locations and take pictures and things gettin people really involved once you completed the hunt you unlocked a few more pictures of the Joker this was practicly free marketing for Warner Bros. 

Misleading Film Poster

Evaluation

We were tasked with taking a existing film and creating our own poster for the film. The poster had to be misleading, for example the film I chose to make a poster for was The Godfather, I took the original idea for godfather which is about a crime boss. and is a gangster action style film. and then ended up with a family. comedy style of film I used Photoshop for all of my work. and only used basic techniques to create the poster.  I’m actually really proud of my poster considering it is one of my first attempts of using Photoshop, but I would of liked to use more advanced tools in Photoshop to make my end result look more professional.