Low Budget VS High Budget Films

For this task I had to compare Low Budget Films against High Budget Films.


El Mariachi:

This film is a small, low budget film that had a budget cost of only $7000 USD to make in 1993 (Around $12000 USD now) and surprisingly gained a large amount of publicity and fame as well as an outstanding $2 Million USD in the Box Office.
The production company for this film was Columbia Pictures, a well known production company affiliated with Sony, many instantly recognise the company when they see their logo.


This film aimed to do what large budget films also tend to do, most action/adventure ones by delivering a simple, action packed story line with a lot of energy to entice their audience. Columbia Pictures have also produced and distributed many other popular films, such as the original Spider-Man series in association with Marvel Studios as well as Skyfall and many other popular films. Columbia Pictures do not have a specific genre type in which they choose to produce, however it is clear that they tend to be story driven and usually contain some form of action, however there is no specific genre as they have produced many different films.



Star Wars (The Force Awakens):
This film is a high budget film that had a budget cost of $300 Million and gained an enormous amount of popularity and fame and over $2 Billion profit in the Box Office. The production company for this film was Lucasfilm and Bad Robot. Lucasfilm is a very popular production company well known and familiarised as the company that produced the original Star Wars films. Bad Robot is a smaller production company owned by J.J. Abrams, the director of this film.

The film's clear intention is to bring back a popular series that everyone loves and appeals to a young and old audience due to the action, great use of CGI and storytelling, as well as the nostalgia that is brought with it back to the 1980 films. Lucasfilms have produced many other films along with the Star Wars films, such as Indiana Jones. Bad Robot has also produced other large films such as Star Trek, this is mainly because J.J. Abrams also directed Star Trek.


Cinemas:
Despite popular belief, Cinema's do not actually yield much profit from selling tickets, only around 20-25% of the ticket price actually goes to the Cinema/Theatre company, the remaining majority goes back to the film studio who made the film. For a £10 ticket, only around £2-£2.50 goes towards the Cinema, meaning little money is made. Hence why popcorn, drinks and snacks are sold at extortionate prices, because this is the cinema's main profit margin. Apart from beverages and tickets, advertisements are the only other way they can make money.

Audience Analysis

I had to analyse information about the media and what effect they have on it's consumers.

Who creates the content the media or the audience?
The media has a large influence on its audience. The audience creates news worthy (and sometimes not) stories and the media takes these stories and either twists them or exaggerates them to attract more attention with "click-bait titles" or misleading titles. The use of these misleading titles can just be for grabbing people's attention to maximise profits, although some media companies are more genuine than others and care more about the truth, their accuracy and professionalism compared to other media companies. The media is also generally associated with news companies, however, film, TV and radio are also in this group.


Can the media exist/function without an audience? 
The Media can exist without an audience, however without an audience there may be less media companies producing news or films. As for Film, TV and Radio, without an audience watching/viewing their works, they would gain little to no yield in terms of profit, meaning that creating works for them would not be worth it.


Can an audience (public) exist/function without media? 
An audience cannot exist without media, as there is nothing for them to consume. Without News, radio, TV or film the audience is practically worthless, the same applies if there is no audience for the media.


Who is more powerful: the media or the audience why/how? Can the media control an audience?
Both the media and the audience have a large amount of power in the modern world. The media have the power to control an audience with certain views and propaganda. However, without an audience the media cannot produce any media to control the audience. Therefore, the audience is more important, if an audience stopped viewing the media or ignored it in certain areas, then the media would not exist or would be restricted into producing certain views.

Film Pitch Presentation

For our recent task we had to create a Film Pitch Presentation for our film idea. We worked in allocated groups and were given an allocated genre as well as a target audience. Our challenge was to come up with a story line, along with casting actors, creating a film poster as well as mentioning our influences and how the first scene will start.


 

Film Pitch Presentation from Josh Yates

Our genre was a Comedy for Teen Girls and was called "The Wedding". The plot essentially follows a group of girls who have to attend a wedding in Australia but get off in the wrong country by accident, a whole lot of chaos ensues.