Star
Wars The Force Awakens
Star Wars The Force Awakens is the seventh installment of the hugely successful Star Wars franchise. Starting in 1977 with Star Wars
this sci-fi fantasy action adventure franchise has gripped worldwide audiences
in particular gaining a lot of British and American fans. Star Wars The Force
Awakened carried on the success story leading for the eighth and ninth films.
Star Wars The Force Awakens was produced by Lucasfilm
which is owned and a subsidiary of Disney. Founded by George Lucas in 1971,
Lucasfilm was brought by Disney in 2012, and then released plans to create
a new Star Wars trilogy. Disney owning Lucasfilm has allowed there to be a lot
more success for this new Star Wars in the box office. Disney is an
internationally well-known company, famous for producing some of the best
films. This already gives Star Wars a good yet high expectation as people trust
that the film will be the best, so would pay and go to see it. Disney also
reaches a wide audience of children, teenagers and adults alike which enables
Star Wars to be the success it is. Disney is also a very wealthy company
so can afford to spare no expenses. They can easily use the best technology as
Disney are leading experts and have a lot of the contacts to be able to get the
most advanced. Disney are in a great position to be able to team up with other
media companies to get the best of the business. There will be a great cast as
not only can Disney afford to hire the best but actors will also want to work
for them for their great reputation.
In this case a big company made a big film. Star Wars
was already very famous, well known and well-loved before Disney became
involved. Disney owning Lucasfilm opens up Star Wars for even more success and
their budget and profit shows this. The budget was $306 million and the film
made a box office of $2.068 billion which is a massive profit and amount of
money to make. Disney enabled Star Wars The Force Awakens to have one of the
biggest budgets of the film industry to be able to pay for the best technology,
cast and crew. However, Star Wars also benefitted from smaller companies
such as Bad Robot which is owned by J.J. Abrams so automatically has a link to
Star Wars The Force Awakens as J.J. is very involved in the film, being the
director, part of the screenwriting and producer teams. Bad Robot Productions
often team up with other bigger media companies like Disney and Paramount to
still be able to produce some of the most successful films like Star Trek
Beyond.
As both Disney and Lucasfilm are massively involved in
Star Wars The Forces it means they can not only pool together aspects like
money to create an impressive budget also other resources like locations such
as using Pinewood Studios. This was particularly useful for Star Wars as they
wanted The Force Awakens to be more similar to the original trilogy. As
Lucasfilm produced the first trilogy they can use their original drawings,
plans and models and even in some cases the same people who worked on the first
films. By pooling all these resources, it has allowed Star Wars to be the
successful and box office record smashing film that it is. This helps to
attract but mainly please and impress audiences to help with the overall
success and profit of the film.
Star Wars The Force Awakens was distributed by Walt
Disney Studios Motion Pictures and publicised by Walt Disney Studios Motion
Pictures and Lucasfilm. Walt Disney Disney Studios Motion Pictures is an
American Motion Picture Distribution company that is a division of the Walt
Disney Company. This essentially means that Disney distributed the film. Here
Disney has worked with Lucasfilm to distribute the film they both produced
together. Lucasfilm as it is now owned by Disney means that the rights to Star
Wars are owned by Disney, however Lucasfilm is still a subsidiary of Disney and
played a massive role in production. Lucasfilm was at least equal if not more
responsible for the production of the Force Awakens as they have the expertise
and knowledge to create the best film for Star Wars in particular. Disney also
publicized the film using their vast amounts of money and influence to create a
lot of great merchandise such as action figures ect.. all which are sold either
directly from Disney (like in Disney stores) or under Disney’s name. Lucasfilm
also publicized the film as they released the trailers however as Lucasfilm is
a subsidiary of Disney it is still Disney publicizing the film.
Disney used their massive influence to promote and
publicised the film as simply everyone knows Disney. Once fans and the public
see that Disney are running and advertising a new film they immediately have
high expectations and be prepared to pay money to see the film. Disney is
internationally known and as it is a multi-billion-dollar company no expenses
will be spared to promote and publicised the film. The best advertising
campaigns will be used to ensure that audiences all over the world know about
the film and are interested in seeing it.
Bad Robot Productions the smaller production company
involved with Star Wars The Force Awakens would work together with Disney and
Lucasfilm to promote and publicise the film as they can use the impressive
amount of Disney resources and contacts. They will be able to offer their
skills such as practice and ease in advertising and producing Sci-Fi fantasy
adventure films like their past success of the Star Trek Franchise. They can
also benefit from the Disney aid such as the amount of money they can spend on
producing and promoting the film and the amount of contacts Disney has to
achieve the best for the film. Bad Robot Productions will also benefit from
being linked with Disney as this will automatically improve their reputation in
the film industry and help them become known to much wider audiences that
Disney access and broadcast too.
First of all, the many different ways that we can now
view and exchange films have sometimes impacted negatively for the way we “buy”
them as it is now very easy to view films online at no cost. Although this may
be illegal many people do it as there is little chance of being caught and it
saves money. This is no different for Star Wars The Force Awakens as Disney
would have lost money due to people not paying and going to cinema but watching
at home online instead. However, many people did still go to the cinema and buy
the DVD for the film which still allowed the film to generate a massive profit.
Disney released the film on DVD on 5th April
2016 on both Blu-ray and DVD. Prior to this on the 1st April
2016 Disney also released the film via download and Disney Movies Anywhere
which shows the different ways that people buy and get access to the film. This
allows the film to be viewed on many different devices at any time such as by
iTunes, Google Play, Microsoft and Amazon Video. The film can now be viewed on tablets,
phones, iPods and game stations which shows how technology has had a massive
influence on how audiences view the film. This has a had a positive impact for
Disney as some people are more prepared to buy the film as they can view it how
and where they want.
Star Wars has also benefitted from the new technology
that has been introduced in the production area. While trying to keep The Force
Awakens as similar to the originals as possible by using more real techniques,
The Force Awakens has massively benefitted from the new technology in the
production area too. They used the very best of ILM effects, used the very
latest technology of a motion-capture suite which is extremely advanced and
used digital work throughout the film. As Disney produced this film it enables
The Force Awakens to be able to pay for and have access to prestigious
technologies. They also used IMAX cameras and a 65mm film IMAX format to film
some of the film which shows how they are using some of the latest camera
technology to produce the film.
The marketing was another area to benefit from the new
technologies to be able to market effectively to a mass audience. The very
simple and easy way of posting a photo to Instagram helped create a massive
buzz and hype around the film; an simple modern day advertising technique. On
May 4th 2014 (Star
Wars Day) Pinewood Studios posted a selfie of Bob Iger (Disney’s chairman) with
an unidentified Chewbacca actor. This massively helped increase the hype and
shows how valuable social media is to advertising which is a technological
advance. Trailers were released which hooked audiences while leading up to the
film. Not only did they release these trailer the typical ways in cinemas but
they also released them on YouTube and the iTunes Store to engage audiences,
throughout different methods of viewing the trailers. At the Star Wars
Celebration, the second trailer was released and all of this was broadcasted
live by Verizon on YouTube, starwars.com and in cinemas. This shows how
technology has influenced where and how the trailers are released and more
people would view them online. As well as using the latest technology to
broadcast the trailers, Star Wars also teamed up with Google to be able to allow the Google users to pick either the “Dark” or
“Light” side. This is a very new way of advertising and is solely technology
based as Google is search engine, and they also teamed up with Snapchat to help increase the social media
hype. This really shows how the new technological advantages of social media
have made a massive impact on the way films advertise. They still use the
traditional methods of posters but have expanded to much wider advertising
techniques using technology.
Film companies have had to alter, change and add to
the way they advertise and exchange the films. They have had to make everything
a lot more digital, so everyone is able to get the content on everything from
smart phones to game consoles using the internet. This means they had to make
both the trailer and the actual film accessible this way. They did this by
releasing trailers on iTunes and YouTube and the film on Disney Movies
Anywhere. The trailer particularly benefitted by being released online as with
fans being able to watch from a variety of devices in any places; the third
trailer was viewed 128 million times in 24 hours which was new record for a
trailer for the amount of views in 24 hours. This really shows the
effectiveness of adapting and releasing the trailer online. Star Wars again use their massive fan base to their
advantage by having the “Force Friday” on the 4th September 2015 a
huge global marketing event. This event featured and 18 hour long live stream
on YouTube of fans opening and seeing the new merchandise. Not only does this
advertise the film but also the merchandise which will help Disney create an
even bigger profit. This shows now new technology has really influenced
marketing as using an 18 hour live stream on YouTube is one of the most recent
ways of marketing using the internet and the idea of access from anywhere.
As well as being able to view the film illegally (as
mentioned above) there are also many ways that people can view the film
illegally online. People can use Netflix, Amazon Prime, Sky Movies ect.... This
allows people to download the film how they want, onto whatever they want so
they can watch it whenever they want. This will encourage people to watch the
film at home more rather than go out to the cinema to see it. People nowadays
are mare more inclined to stay at home and watch the film. This will still make
Disney less money as it is cheaper for audiences than going to the cinema
however it will still allow them to make money unlike the illegal ways of
watching.
To encourage people to buy the DVD the DVD contains
exclusive extra footage which would have really helped to gain sales from the
bigger fans. There are also plans to release a Star Wars: The Force Awakens 3D
Collectors Edition” in autumn 2016. This is promised to have extra, very
exclusive and special footage which will help increase the hype of the film not
only at the time of films release but almost a year later too. This can only
really be done with massively successful franchises like Star Wars who have an
incredible amount of very dedicated fans. This shows how the home media has
adapted to having extra, exclusive features to encourage sales.
Star Wars also offered bonus cinema packages to help
increase the box office. On 17th December
2016 in North America there was Star Wars film marathon finishing with The
Force Awakens shown in 3D in selected cinemas. The people who went also got a
special lanyard that has exclusive marathon art; this shows how a franchise
like Star Wars can use their unique position of having lifelong fans, many that
have grown up the films to increase their box office sales.
Disney teamed up with a lot of different companies to
advertise the film to be able to market the film in lots of different formats.
They also worked with many, many different companies to produce the film. This
ranged from 12 different special effects companies that included ILM and many
other companies like: Oh So Small Productions for dwarf, short and tall actors,
SISS Ltd for security for Harrison Ford, Flying Pictures for aerial filming and
many more. This shows the many different expertise companies to create a film
of the quality of Star Wars. Disney wanted to get the best they could and used
as many companies as needed to do this; this show how the film industry is one
massive network that come together to pool the best technologies to create the
best films. 12 different special effect companies show how many different
technologies all work together by slightly editing, improving and combining
each other.
They teamed up with iTunes to enable audiences to buy
the film on any Apple product for £13.99. As
well as the film Apple users can also buy on iTunes the soundtrack
for the movie for £11.99. Another way that the film was marketed was by the
merchandise released; Disney released lots of different merchandise such as
tee-shirts, figurines and toys and as well as Disney releasing merchandise many
other companies have joined in like thinkgeek.com and other similar websites. Disney
also teamed up with Hasbro for them to be the main toy manufacture for a deal
of $225 million, as well as allowing Lego and Topps to have the right to
produce merchandise. This shows how Disney teamed up with some of the biggest
and best companies that are very well known to increase the buzz around the
film. Disney also teamed up serval major global partners like Max Factor and
Subway to help advertise the film; Max Factor created a collection of makeup
looks inspired by the film and Subway gave out an exclusive bag and glow stick
lightsaber with every children’s meal, that people could collect. This shows
how by teaming up with other companies Disney is advertising the film across a
wide range of audiences to engage not just the typical male viewers but other
audience demographics too like women and children.
Film companies have massive advertising campaigns to
attract audiences that they have differed slightly for different countries,
continents and audiences in the world. The Subway campaign was exclusive to the
UK and other companies joined in with localised British marketing campaigns
such O2.O2 through their Priority, loyal scheme that involved giving away
tickets to the UK Premier and various merchandise. On “Force Friday” which
began at midnight for the UK the #MidnightMadness trended and the Disney
flagship store on Oxford Street in London opened at midnight to allow fans and
exclusive, first see look at the products. In the UK Toys R Us, Smyths and
Forbidden Planet also let fans in a midnight to get the first chance to see
some of the merchandise. Tesco also got involved in the many different ways the
film was marketed in the UK, with a Star Wars Weekend discount at Extra stores.
This shows how along with standard trailers, posters and social media hype Disney
engaged and attracted UK audiences by working with brands that they know and
love. This shows how each different country has a different twist to the advertising
to engage most audience demographics of that culture. As all these brands are
often shown and their advertising is featured a lot on TV, Radio ect.. the
British public are familiar to them and will begin to link Star Wars to them as
well as becoming more familiar to the film as they will get used to seeing it
advertised.
In the USA Star Wars was also advertised by using US
brand and releasing products exclusive to the US. This was the case of the Fiat
Chrysler Automobiles company who released a special adapted Star Wars The Force
Awakens car along with an impressive advertising campaign featuring Star Wars
characters. Other American brands that got involved were Cover Girl, Hot Wheels
and McDonalds to name but a few. America also got to see all the trailers
before the rest of the world, Vanity Fair and American magazine got to have the
first exclusive cover issue for The Force Awakens and the third, final, most
impressive trailer was released during a break in the American TV show Monday
Night Football. This shows how priority for American audiences was for them to
see the content before the rest of the world; this can be due to an earlier
release date of 4 day and that Disney is an American company. This dose show
however that American audiences are valued slightly more than the rest of the world
and how the fans there may be some of the most dedicated in the world. The film
clearly wanted to impress American audiences and this is shown by advertising campaigns.
It shows how the American audiences differ from the rest of world as they want
to be able to have access to everything first.
Due to the political climate in China and its political
history, typical all American Hollywood blockbuster movies were never really a
hit or even shown. Though the situation has changed slightly and Western films
are more of a hit, this still impacted on Star Wars. As viewers has not grown
up with the franchise so there is far less hype around it. To increase the excitement
for the film an Chinese trailer and posters were specially released to engage audiences.
Famous Chinese actors and musicians like Luhan were used to introduced the
trailers, saying about how much they liked the franchise and this helped attract
the audiences as they would (like anywhere) find it far more believable if it
was highly rated by someone many people looked up to and respected. LuHan also
created a created a music video. More Chinese subs were sued in the trailer to
help relate it to the audiences more and attract them to the film. The film was
advertised on subways and city streets ensuring that audiences simply could not
miss it. Disney spent a lot of money doing huge publicity stunts such as having
500 Stormtroopers on the Great Wall and lighting up buildings like lightsabers.
They also tried to find the Chinese equivalents such as allowing The Force
Awakens on Tencent a streaming service very much like Netflix. All these great
and extensive lengths in the Chinese marketing were taken so that The Force
Awakens could build and create a bond with audiences. While it will never have
the nostalgia that Star Wars holds in the USA and UK it did massively increase
the hype and buzz for the film. This advertising campaign massively excited audiences
and was very effective.
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