Mohini Bhatt Media Studies

Discuss the issues and patterns which enables your institution to thrive as a business with a focus
on the production process.

For a film institution to thrive as a business it has to be able to have funding provided to it so that
the institution can produce a movie that will hopefully become a blockbuster. This can’t just be done
though the production process has a large contribution to the making of a film and helping an
institution thrive as a business. In this essay I am going to go through the production process and
how it helps businesses thrive and also comment on how films succeed in Britain. Furthermore I will
look at and compare British film institutions such as as Working Title/Warp Films to see how they
use film financing to finance their movies and how they would use it in their process.

The main part of making a film is the funding provided and the production process you have to go
through. Firstly you need funding to make a movie the producer must secure funding before filming.
The problem with this is that it’s generally hard to predict weather the film will make a profit or not.
There are certain funding processes that the producer can be given and these fall under the
headings of Government Grants, Tax Schemes, Tax Shelters, and Pre-Sales. Each set of funding has
their own rules for example in Government Grants the UK film council offers subsidies and National
Lottery offers subsides to UK film councils, and others like Pre-Sales which is common helps the
producer sell the right to distribute. In the case of Working Title they fund their films through the
primary aspect of Pre-Sales this is because it’s easier and they are part of the conglomerate
Universal not only this but their movies are seen as ‘commercially sound’ because they use
mainstream genres such as rom-com, they use big name stars such as Hugh Grant, Keira Knightly,
Julia Roberts and Bill Knightly and they are also well known because of movies such as Atonement.
Whereas in the case of Warp Films they are a more independent company therefore secure funding
from Government Grants via the National Lottery and the UK Film Council. Because the funding is
low Warp Films concentrate more on films that are about social realism rather than a genre like sci-fi
which would require a large budget and they would also use pre-fabricated sets, however these
films on social realism can be seen as ‘artistically pure’ and would receive more critical views.
From when the funding is received the production process for the movie can then begin. The
main concept of the production process is that you start with an idea which then is turned into a
script made into a film and then finally released in cinema. The producer begins and he/she is in the
middle of everything. The producer starts to come up with an idea for a script so that investment can
begin, he/she then begins the search for the suitable cast and the location. The producer is always
asked to look at the ‘bigger picture’ because it’s his/her job to make the directors creative vision
appear on screen and make everything possible logistically. When the producer has an idea for the
script they then hire a script writer whose job it is to produce a script based on the idea given. This is
usually drafted around 12-15 times until a blueprint is made this is then sent on to a script developer
who checks the blueprint changes anything if necessary and re-writes the script. After the script is
written the process can carry on in search for ‘The Package’ which is basically the producer getting
together the cast which includes the actors, director making sure that he/she is keeping eye on the
budget all the time. The actors are required to be faithful to the script at all times as it’s been
developed to suit them and sometimes their style of acting. Then the producers attract investment
locally (BBC Investment) or even foreign investment. If they go for foreign investment it is extremely
Mohini Bhatt Media Studies

important to find a lot of funders although it is easier to deal with one, but many are required
because if any pull out there will be nothing to carry on with therefore it is important to have many
and also you can receive more creative input. After all the planning for the scenes, finance and
budgets in terms of how the script’s been working ect, above the line costs and below the line costs
have been checked by the producer he/she can carry on with the last two stages of the production
process. These are audience and marketing, the audience is basically has the producer when creating
the film defined the audience, thought about the location of release, if anyone will see it and
whether or not they believe they will break even with the audience after this has been thought
about they will finish on the note of marketing. Marketing is the process in which the movie will
begin to make profit; there are posters made, teasers, trailers, merchandise all of this will contribute
to the profit all depending on how well the movie does. The film costs up to £50 million to market it
and then the producers have to consider it becoming a DVD and then moving on to it being on TV.
Also certain genres will come out at certain times for example more horror movies will come out at
Halloween etc. Overall the production process needs to make sure that they keep one thing in mind,
the idea has to be definable, an original piece to the audience but something they can compare it to.

Working Title and Warp Films are both British institutions but as Working Title is a
conglomerate to Universal it receives a bigger budget so it can make movies that make more of a
profit whereas Warp Films are an independent company causing them to make lower budget movies
but they concentrate on social realism which really engages the audience.

To conclude, it depends on what funding the producers are given to make the film this then goes on
to how the production process will work for them and how it will help them thrive as a business. For
example with a low budget the institution Warp Films will not thrive but if they use genres to engage
the audience’s attention more like social realism then they will slowly thrive as a business it will take
time. This is different to Working Title with the conglomerate to Universal as it has such a well-
known name related to it, it will not take that long for the business to thrive.