Analysing films and their budget

According to box office mojo, the budget for Bridget Jones Diary, was $25m. In the UK, this would be considered as a very high budget for a film. However, in the US this would be considered a mid-budget.
Films that have a budget of $100m or more, are known as tentpole films. The companies that are known as the Big 6 are the ones that are mostly known as the tentpole films.

All the Big 6 companies have used the vertical integration strategy. Meaning that they create the three steps themselves:

• Distribution
• Exhibition
• Production

For most Warp movies the age rate is at either 15 or 18. A recent Warp Film called "17" was given an age rate of 15, which is considered to be low, since the most common on is 18.
For nearly every single one of their movies, Working Title uses big american stars such as Renee Zellweger in Bridget Jones Diary (BJD). This is why they have such a large budget. For example the worldwide box office for Bridget Jones Diary was $281m. For a long time, the US revenue for UK films has been around 50%. However, for this movie, the US share of it's revenue was 25%.

The markets in every single country keep changing. The chinese market is likely to become the largest market because of the increase in the population. All the ROM-COMS, that are often produced by Working Title, are romantic so that they can appeal to a large, international female market. However they are also a comedy, so that they can appeal to a large male audience.

For Bridget Jones Diary, the UK owned $60m. There is a rule, called the Gant rule, that argues if a film would be a hit in Britain, it will make 10 times the money then it would in America. Bridget Jones Diary is an example of a movie that was a hit in Britain due to the fact that it is a British production.

The movie, Everest, was distributed in 65 different companies worldwide, because it is owned by such a large company. It totally owned $200m globally, but will probably increase as it is still screened in the cinema.

The movie called Mickybo and me was a film set in Belfast, which is in Northern Ireland. This film, produced by WT2, had a budget of £5m. However, Warp got their highest budget ever when they produced 71' with a budget of £5m. There other movies such as This is England was produced with a budget of £1.5m.
In the movie '71, the social realist genre was established by the hand-held and shacky camera footage.  There are also a lot of political aspects to it, but also a lot of violence. The movie was distributed in 10 different countries, including the UK and won many awards. However, according to Box Office Mojo, it only owned $1.6m.
The film from Warp that owned the most was This is England, which grossed $8m worldwide.  

Tyrannosir Swede

Here below you can see the screenplay, which I created for this Swede: 

Screenplay - Tyrannosir from Sophie2401

Below is the edited version of the funeral scene of our Tyrannosir Swede, which was edited by me and Bronwen Vaughan:



Here is our final cut of our Tyrannosir Swede:

British Cinema

There are 3 types of production company's:

1. Indie
2. Subsidiary 
3. Conglomerate

An independent film or indie film is a film production resulting in a feature film that is produced mostly or completely outside of the major film studio system. It is not owned by anyone.

A subsidiary production company is a company who is more than 50% controlled and owned by another company, usually referred to as the parent company or conglomerate. This conglomerate holds a controlling interest in the subsidiary company. 

A conglomerate is a company that owns companies, which are called subsidiaries. 

Analysing:

You would think that Working Title is a conglomerate however it is a subsidiary, which again owns it own subsidiaries such as Working Title Australia and WT 2. A producer can be both subsidiary and conglomerate. 

Some production companies are on a very big scale and are known globally. These are known as the Big 6 and are all conglomerates. 

• Disney
• Columbia
• 20th Century Fox
• Paramount
• Warner Bros
• Universal Pictures

All of these 5 conglomerates dominate the worldwide film industry and a company such as Working Title is for example a subsidiary of NBC Universal. Some people think that it should be called the Big 7 and that Lionsgate should be part of it, due to the bis success that it has had lately.

Working title is for example a subsidiary of NBC Universal who are owned by Comcast. Besides Working Title, NBC Universal also owns Universal Pictures.
Studio Canal are originally a French company, who also have a subsidiary called Studio Canal UK also known as optimum releasing.   These 2 companies have worked on distribution and production for several Warp films.


There are 3 steps in a film cycle:

1. Production
2. Distribution
3. Exhibition 

When a conglomerate owns many small subsidiaries, which do different things such as distribution, production or exhibition, it is known as vertical integration.

Comparing Warp Films - Working Title Films

In the beginning of the film, there is a voice-over, where it says: "Once again, I found myself on my own and going to my mother's annual turkey curry buffet".

When this movie was tested on an American audience, it was very confusing, since for the Americans, turkey connotes Thanksgiving and for a British person it connotes Christmas.
However later on in the movie, there was a visual intentional humor created and the american test audience laughed at the sight of Mark's jumper and the silly, little, magical sound effect.

This laugh was necessary because American audiences had been very confused after the "turkey curry buffet".

The mise-en-scene of this small, little, stereotypical village with cottages, snow falling down and a very British dialogue immediately connotes the typical image of England. 

Moreover, there are a lot of signifiers to show that it such as the Red Phone Booth (in the background of the shot below) and the Poppy on the monument from 11th of November that is dedicated to fallen soldiers of World War One and World War Two. 

When looking at a Warp Film such as "This is England", which is a social realist genre movie and you compare it to the Working Title Bridget Jones film, you can tell that there are enormous differences between the two companies. 

Warp doesn't use this posh aspect of England, but shows a lot of the urban areas and working class, whereas Working Title enjoys to portray the typical English stereotype. These stereotypes are useful to win an audience.

The first few shots you see in "This is England" is of a small room with pinned wallpaper and an alarm clock on a chair, which indicates that there are no real furniture.

Whereas in "Bridget Jones", we see a big detached country house with a huge garden and a sculpted hedge. Through this mise-en-scene, Working Title are emphasising on the stereotypical English house.
When Bridget enters her mother's house, we see a dutch angle. This angle was chosen, because it was the only shot you could use in order for the audience to see the entire entrance of the house. The director wanted the audience to be able to see the entrance to emphasise the old fashioned and stereotypical English house.

The entire mise-en-scene of the antiques, wallpaper, decor and even the mother's flower dress, is used to underline the stereotypical English house and character, which is considered to be very posh.

Moreover, comparing Warp to Working Title, Warp movies use non-diegetic music, however there is never any singing on the soundtracks. BUT in Working Title films such as Bridget Jones, there is non-diegetic music with singing such as the song "Magic Moments" by Perry Como.

In addition to this, the voice and the accent in Working Title films such as Bridget Jones and Notting Hill is very different from the voice and characters from "Tyrannosaur" or "This is England".
In Warp films, the characters use swear words and have a lot of different accents, whereas in Working Title films, the actors all have a posh British accent and say "jolly gosh".
When Bridget is introduced to Mark, she says "Ding-Dong", which is invented film language, that fits into the stereotypical creation.

Also, when Bridget Jones was filmed, Renee Zellweger had to put on a lot of weight to look as if she was slightly overweight. In the entire film, she wants to lose weight and it is about how women should look slimmer. A film company such as Warp who uses the social realist genre in a lot of their movies such as "This is England", would never ask someone to put on weight, or make a movie about it. They would consider it to be a horrible message to send out to women.

Another significant difference between Warp and Working Title, is that every Working Title film, have never used anyone who is black in their film. If they had used an actor who was black, it would have been to create the racist stereotype of a black dumb man. However, in a movie such as "This is England", there are a lot of black people and one of the main characters Milky, is very intelligent. This is why many people like the social realist genre, since it is very realistic and doesn't try to hide anything.

In terms of Warp and Working Title on the market, there are a lot of differences in for example advertising as well. For Bridget Jones, Working Title decided to put only Renee Zellweger on all the posters that went out internationally, because everyone knows her since she is a big American actress and in the British market Hugh Grant, Colin Firth and Renee Zellweger were on the posters because the 2 men were well known to the English audience back then in 2001. Although Working Title films are known internationally, they don't win any awards. However a company like Warp has big success at film festivals such as Cannes Festivals and Venice. They also win awards, despite the fact that they don't even closely have the same budget as Working Title.