Media studies

Isabel Denney-foster

Mr Ford

Successful media products depend as much upon marketing and distribution to a

specific audience as they do upon good production practices.
To what extent would you agree with this statement, within the media area you have
studied?
On the face of this statement we can see that many points about the marketing
process and values are being made and even challenged. The idea of the
marketing process is to help encourage profits to be made from the film, therefore
the idea of who you are aiming the products, film and storyline are big contenders
to consider during the processes of making a film. The distribution and production
factors are what condemns the films overall success because it helps to bring
about knowledge and presence of the film to the public, therefore, marketing and
distribution is an important element to making the film a big hit. The production
practice is what leads to the representation of the film and the way you market
the film helps to determine which audience you want to see the film. You also
wouldnt want to represent and market the film in such a way that it was nothing
like the genuine film itself, that would only lead to disappointment and bad
reviews, thus, defeating the object of making the film successful.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens was a huge accomplishment because the
distribution, marketing and production helped to lead to a ground breaking global
box office figure of $206 billion. The DVD/ Blu-Ray release earned in the DVD
charts $156.5 million which only added to the success, interest and income. The
film was also available to be streamed on demand on sites such as Amazon Prime,
Now TV and iTunes, the deals of which were made meant that some of the money
from purchasing and licensing would go back the production company and studio.
The merchandising profits remain unattainable due to the fact that the numbers
are growing each and every day.
Distribution played an important part of Star Wars success, like it does is in many
films. Overall the film was shown on well over 5,000 screens globally and this
supports the idea that distribution aided the film to become such a huge success.
The idea that Disney aided the films distribution is incredible; the company is so
well known and if Disney distributed a brand this big this would only increase its
presence- instead of it being a film that is spoken about in passing, it was
something you could not really have escaped and probably became sick of after a
time. Disney is known by cinemas and is trusted amongst making deals, the
connections that they have also managed to attain during their existence has
managed to make their ideas of distribution much more achievable. The ideas of
the film being distributed digitally managed to save the companies money
because the process is in fact cheaper and easier. The film was aimed at
audiences at all ages and also ultimately was trying to encourage a younger
audience to become engrossed in the franchise. The film was four quadrant,
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Media studies

Isabel Denney-foster

Mr Ford

mainstream and rated 12A which allowed young viewers to see the film. Because
the age of audience for the film had been expanded this allows the film to make
more profit and this ties nicely with the idea of how marketing helps immensely
with profiting.
Marketing is a crucial stage of achieving publicity. Star Wars is an already well
known brand and franchise by people who are older due to the original star wars
film prior to Force Awakens. The first star wars film, A New Hope, was one of the
most influential because of its ground breaking use of special effects. Because of
this standard it was important for the team on Force Awakens to help maintain
this image. Charles Lippincott was in charge of the marketing of A New Hope
which consisted of T-shirts, posters, toys, trailers and billboards which ties into
very much Above The Line marketing and that was simply because of the
technology available at the time. The original films were also aimed at wide
audience frames like The Force Awakens is today. Since the original films, the deal
for Disney to own the original production company Lucas Film has taken place.
Obviously this result changes all different kinds of elements to the film however it
does allow the marketing process to become so much more versatile- it also gives
the opportunity for the marketing to be Below The Line.
The film received attention on social media all the way through the stages of
production. Because of Star Wars and Disneys huge focal and publicity group it
was allowed a lot of attention and this allowed people to become gripped with the
potential storyline, ideas and film before any footage- the major teaser trailer, for
example- was actually released. Teaser images helped boost interest in the public
and this helped to make the production of the film notable. The first major trailer
was released 28th November 2014 creating a huge ricochet in social networking as
the interest of fans and more was being touched. With another, strategically
planed, trailer released just over 5 months after, in April 2015, the interest was
maintained by the public. The release of the trailers helped with the huge
marketing campaign and it was shortly followed by the release of the
merchandise.
The idea that cast and crew were invited onto talk shows- such as The Graham
Norton show and others- to reveal secrets or keep the targeted audiences
interested helped boost the want of more information. The idea of targeting the
prospects of there being new lead roles in this star wars film was something that
was wanted and needed to be targeted in a positive way so that audiences
wouldnt find this change negative. This helps explain why the franchise went
about marketing and exposing their cast in a positive and appealing way, this
helped to maintain the idea that people would still enjoy the film.
Posters, Toys, mugs, pyjamas- The list goes on! With all these items released to
the general public with the produce from Disney its no wonder that so much
profit was being made from items. Disney is company which works considerably
with its visuals and merchandising and this is what helps the items to appeal to all
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Mr Ford

ages. With the classically designed posters following the original art work of the
previous films helping to appeal to the original audiences as well as the teddies
and childrens clothes appealing to younger, more influential audiences.
Yet another key to the films success lay to the films production. Star Wars The
Force Awakens received the 2nd biggest budget in film history ( $306 million). With
the director JJ Abrams this allowed the production team to team up with Abrams
company Bad Robot. The fact that Lucas films and Bad Robot were the production
companies and that Disney was the main, respected Distributor these big names
were going to be able to afford the best of the best production devices as well as
crew, publicity and trust. The cast was set up with both A-list (Harrison Ford,
Carrie Fisher, Andy Serkis, Mar Hamill and Domhall Gleeson- some of whom are
original cast members) and upcoming stars (Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver and John
Boyega) this allowed the public to see what new talent would be offered to help
influence the franchise as it develops. With writers like Lawrence Kasdan and
Micheal Arndt accompanying JJ Abrams to create this gripping story was
subsequent because these writers are previous workers for the franchise- This
allows the fans to be excited because they know some originality will be included
in this film. Because the original films received so much success because of their
visual effects, it was important to keep this as one of the main selling points of the
film. A lot of the effects included on screen visuals- such as explosions, makeup
and costumes- and this allowed the film to stand out because of the realistic
qualities, thus, making sure the film did not rely too much on CGI. These
production values are what are sought after in films and these are the reasons
why Star wars: The Force Awakens achieved so much success.
In conclusion I agree that this statement is correct because of there is an equal
balance and importance between each of the processes. I also feel that when it
comes to evaluating whether marketing and distribution are more important than
production I think that you need to consider which age ranges and audiences the
actually film is being aimed at. I dont think that production would specifically
matter if you aimed this film at children aged 10 and under; they dont have the
correct comprehension of how the production values would make the film
appealing- all they really want is colours, action and fiction. The film Star Wars :
The Force Awakens does appeal to children in this way, however the production
companies have also added these realistic and impressive production features
because they want the film to also appeal to people of an older age range. This
theory also helps to explain why the intense and tentative marketing campaign
has also been aimed at people of all ages. In effect this plan has managed to gain
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Mr Ford

a lot of profit as well as more interest in younger viewers and it is obvious that
each of these processes have an absolute effect on the success of the film.

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