Evaluation Question 3

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product

and why?

DNA Films

The independent film production company DNA films was set up in 1997 by owners Andrew MacDonald and Duncan Kenworthy. DNA films have produced a small amount of films that has been successful with critics as well as the target audience. Some of the films they have produced are:

• 28 Weeks Later (2007)

• Sunshine (2007)

• The Last King of Scotland (2006)

• 28 Days Later (2002)

Bullet Boy

As a group we looked at bullet boy’s film distribution. We saw that it was a low budget film similar to ours and was looking to be distributed around the UK. For ours, we were low budget so we can relate to this easily as both of our films our amateur.

Film Distribution

The distributors job in the UK is to identify the target audience and deliver it to the most amount of people as possible for every film. For the distributors this isn't a small task to do especially when there audiences have many other ways of watching the films inside and outside of their home. Also that’s including the 500 or more films being released in cinemas in the UK.

A film distributor is a company that works on its own independently as a team or even sometimes just as an individual which acts as a final stage between the film production company and the film exhibitor. The film distributor is securing the placement of the film and is making sure it gets to the exhibitors screens. Within the film industry the word ‘distribution’ refers as a marketing technique as well as circulating movies around theatres and home viewing such as TV and DVD.

In our film, we decided to use DNA films as our film distributor the reason for this was because DNA films distribute lot of low end and low budget films, this would suit ours because we wouldn’t be spending a lot of money on distribution.

For our film we had to show and advertise DNA films as that was our chosen distributor. To do this we had to add a credit to the start of our opening sequence “Production of DNA Films” from this the audience would know who distributed the film, the production team. After choosing our distributor we had a look into how they would distribute our film and this is what we got:• Someone has an idea for a movie.• They create an outline and use it to promote interest in the idea.• A studio or independent investor decides to purchase rights to the film.• People are brought together to make the film (screenwriter, producer, director, cast, crew).• The film is completed and sent to the studio.• The studio makes a licensing agreement with a distribution company.• The distribution company determines how many copies (prints) of the film to make.• The distribution company shows the movie (screening) to prospective buyers representing the

theaters.• The buyers negotiate with the distribution company on which movies they wish to lease and the

terms of the lease agreement.• The prints are sent to the theaters a few days before the opening day.• The theatre shows the movie for a specified number of weeks (engagement).• You buy a ticket and watch the movie.• At the end of the engagement, the theatres send the print back to the distribution company and

makes payment on the lease agreement.

This gives us an idea of how our film will be distributed.

The reason we chose DNA films to distribute our opening sequence was because they offered low cost fees to release the film but also because they are getting a bigger reputation our film could be more successful at the same time. As our film is a genre of action/thriller we saw that DNA films also distributed a large amount of these. This could make our film more successful as DNA films subscribers would probably be our target audience as they will be action/thriller fans.