KEY REVISION NOTES

Attack the Block

Director: Joe Cornish
Starring: Jodie Whittaker, John Boyega
Studio: Big talk productions, film 4, studio canal, UK film council
Distributed by: Optimum releasing
Budget: £8M
Box office: £4M
Production: Shot in london, night shoots over six weeks, only 100 FX shots were used
Other Info: Play.com sells a BluRay glow in the dark sleeve edition. Distributors were worried about the American audience not understanding the British slang/accent
Soundtrack: Basement Jaxx

Kick Ass


Director: Matthew Vaughn
Starring: Aaron Johnson, Chloe Grace Moretz, Nicholas Cage
Studio: Plan B entertainment, Marv entertainment 
Distributed by: Lionsgate, Universal
Budget: $30M
Box office: $90M
Production: Shot in Canada and various UK locations, adapted from the comic book that was written parallel to the films production
Other Info: Screened at the San Diego comic-con, controversy over young actors and explicit language, Rated 15 by BBFC, won awards for best actors etc
Soundtrack: The prodigy, Ellie Goulding etc

The Hunger Games


Director: Gary Ross
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Donald Sutherland, Woody Harrelson
Studio: Lionsgate, Color force
Distributed by: Lionsgate
Budget: $88M only $78M was used 
Box office: $690M
Production: Shot in USA, film not digital, used less CGI to make it more realistic, propane blasts etc
Other Info: Racist comments, sold over 3.8 million DVD/BluRay copies in the first weekend of sales, DVD contains bonus features making it more appealing to buyer
Soundtrack: Score by James Newton Howard, Soundtrack has artists on such as Maroon 5 and Taylor Swift

St Trinians


Director: Oliver Parker
Starring: Rupert Everett, Gemma Arterton, Colin Firth
Studio: Ealing studios, UK film council, Fragile films
Distributed by: Entertainment film distributors
Budget: £7M
Box office: $30M
Production: VooDooDog made the cartoon pieces in the film (synergy), Filmed around the UK and London, Girls Aloud feature in the film as the school's band.
Other Info: Sequel didn't do as well, third film is scheduled to come out next year, Third most successful independent British film at the time
Soundtrack: Girls aloud, Lady Sovereign, Lily Allen etc

Prometheus


Director: Ridley Scott
Starring: Noomi Repace, Michael Fassbender, Idris Elba
Studio: Scott free productions
Distributed by: 20th Century Fox
Budget: $130M
Box office: $400M
Production: Shot in Allacante, prequel to the Alien series, filmed in 3D with the help of 3ality technica (synergy)
Other Info: people wanted less 3D in the cinema's though and more 2D showings, number one in the DVD sales charts in the first week of sale
Soundtrack: Score was played backwards and then digitally flipped to create an eerie atmosphere, written by Marc Steitenfeld

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"Big things have small beginnings"

"Prometheus, are you seeing this?" on Prezi

PROJECT PROMETHEUS

http://www.projectprometheus.com/

This website was created especially for the film as it built up the anticipation for the release and contained exclusive content such as videos, pictures and character information, that the fans enjoy and read to gain more information on the film and it's background. 
Fans would have kept going back to the website to check for any new trailers or content on the site, and this ensured they would not lose interest in the film and go and see it when it was released. 

Prometheus Trailers

Viral Clips

Prometheus Twitter Campaign

Prometheus ad campaign reaches 15m Twitter users, but was it worth it?

20th Century Fox tried to tap into the viral power of Twitter on Sunday night to promote the impending release of Ridley Scott’s sci-fi movie Prometheus.
In what was heralded as a world first, a new three-minute trailer for the film was screened simultaneously online, on Channel 4 and on social TV app Zeebox.

Viewers were then encouraged to tweet about the film using the hashtag #areyouseeingthis.

During the next ad break, Channel 4 screened a 40 second spot which included viewer’s tweets.

Channel 4 said it fitted with its strategy to pioneer innovative and impactful marketing solutions, but it did it actually meet either of these criteria?

Word-of-mouth agency 1000 Heads monitored activity on Twitter around the hashtag during the past week.

The results show that there was a spike in activity on Sunday night, peaking at more than 4,000 tweets, and the hashtag was trending for a brief period.
The tweets shown on screen were all positive, but this wasn't the case on Twitter.

The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games on Prezi

KICK-ASS

Idea:

The idea for the Kick-Ass movie came from the comic book series written by Mark Millar. It was published by Marvel Comics and illustrated by John Romita Jr. The comic-book series is about Dave Lizewski, a teenager who sets out to become a real-life superhero and ends up by being internet famous.

Finance:

Budget: $30 million

Total income: $96,188,903

Matthew Vaughn went around, securing independent financing. But now that it’s received a positive response at Comic Con; Lionsgate, Paramount, and Universal are all making bids for distribution. The rights to a film version of the comic book were sold before the first issue of the comic book was published.

Script Development:

Vaughn: "We wrote the script and the comic at the same time so it was a very sort of collaborative, organic process. I met [Millar] at the premiere of Stardust. We got on really well. I knew who he was and what he had done but I didn't know him. He pitched me the idea. I said, 'That's great!' He then wrote a synopsis. I went, 'That's great, let's go do it now! You write the comic, I'll write the script.'" 

  Jane Goldman one of the screenwriters, said that when she works with Vaughn she does the "construction work" and the "interior designing" while Vaughn acts as the "architect."

Seven American film studios turned down the script before Vaughn released it through his own production company. Vaughn initially went to Sony, but he rejected calls to tone down the violence.

Other studios expressed interest but wanted to make the characters - in particular studios Hit-Girl's character - into adults. Whilst studio executives said that it would be less offensive to portray Hit-Girl as a teenager, Goldman argued that it would have been more offensive since, as a teenager, Hit-Girl would have been sexualized. Goldman said that Hit-Girl was not supposed to be sexualized.

Aaron Johnson and Chloë Grace Moretz were cast as Kick-ass and Hit-Girl and a cameo from Nicholas Cage was included as the character Big Daddy.

Production:

The big studios doubted the success of an adaptation as a violent superhero, which made the film be independently financed, but this gave him the freedom to make the film the way he imagined, without having to worry about high-censorship. Vaughn believed enough in the project to raise the money himself, with the help of co-producer Brad Pitt. Christopher Mintz-Plasse, (Red Mist), said that the creators of the film were wondering whether a distributor would pick up the movie. On the set Vaughn jokingly referred to Kick-Ass as something that was going to be "the most expensive home movie I ever made."

Filming locations include Hamilton, Ontario, Canada; Dip 'N' Sip Donuts on Kingston Road in Toronto, Sir Winston Churchill Secondary Schooland "many Toronto landmarks that play cameos"; and various locations in the UK, including Elstree Studios. The opening sequence with Nicolas Cage was filmed in a sewage plant in East London.

The 2D/3D animated comic book sequence in the film took almost two years to finish. Romita created the pencils, Tom Palmer did the inks, and Dean White did the colours.

In an interview with Total Film, Aaron Johnson confirmed that the film stays true to the adult nature of the comic book series by featuring a large amount of profanity and graphic violence. It received a 15 rating from the BBFC. Director Matthew Vaughn felt the 15 certificate was about right and expressed some surprise at the film having received a "PG rating" in France.

Production companies involved in making the film were Marv films and Plan B entertainment. Distributors then included institutes such as Universal pictures, Paramount and Warner pictures. 

A full company involvement list can be found here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1250777/companycredits

Sales:

A teaser trailer was shown and this caused some controversy because of the explicit language used by Chloe (Hit-girl). An international trailer was then released and shown around the world.

Marketing:

Posters were put up in bus stations, magazines and and trailers were shown on TV. Empire and Total Film magazine covered the film and it's journey from page to screen and film reviews are on their websites also. The film was also pitched at San Diego Comic-con and the Empire magazine Movie-Con.

Exhibition:

A premier was held in London for the film and the cast plus other guests - including Brad Pitt- arrived to promote the movie.

Kick-Ass made £3,881,704 (UK) on the opening weekend (4 April 2010)  and it was shown on 402 Screens across the country.  

It was shown on 5778 screens across the world on the opening weekend alone.

	All Critics	Top Critics	Audience
	76% (235 reviews)	67% (39 reviews)	83% (211,361 reviews)

(Taken from Rotten Tomatoes/ wikipedia)

Chris Hewitt of Empire magazine gave the film 5/5 and declared it, "A ridiculously entertaining, perfectly paced, ultra-violent cinematic rush that kicks the places other movies struggle to reach.The film's violence is clearly fantastical and cartoonish and not to be taken seriously."

In an interview, Matthew Vaughn said, "There is about 18 minutes of deleted footage, which is really good stuff." The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 3 August 2010 in North America, selling 1.4 million copies within its first week, one-third of these in Blu-ray format. Kick-Ass debuted at number one on the DVD sales chart and the discs were released in the United Kingdom on 6 September 2010.

Other Windows:

A video game produced by WHA Entertainment and Frozen Codebase was released through the App Store on 15 April 2010. The game was released on PlayStation Network on 29 April 2010.

The film has been nominated and has won several awards for Best British film, Best newcomer and more, with Chloe Moretz winning four of them for her performance.

Kick-Ass 2

It was reported that Universal will be distributing Kick-Ass 2.

"The costumed high-school hero Kick-Ass joins with a group of normal citizens who have been inspired to fight crime in costume. Meanwhile, the Red Mist plots an act of revenge that will affect everyone Kick-Ass knows." -Synopsis

The same cast will be returning, plus a few new faces. Matthew Vaughn had chosen Jeff Wadlow, who also co-wrote the script along with Vaughn, to direct the sequel with filming planned to begin in September 2012.

Good source of information: http://www.scribd.com/doc/42700167/Kick-Ass-Production-Notes

KICK-ASS on Prezi

Attack the Block

Director and writer: Joe Cornish
Rating: 15
Genres: Action/ Comedy/ Horror/ Sci-Fi
Release Date: 13th May 2011
Stars: Jodie Whittaker, John Boyega, Alex Esmail.
Budget: £9 million

How it was produced:

It was produced by Big Talk Productions who are known for filming, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim vs. The world and Shaun of the dead. They produced the film with the UK film council, Film4 and Studio Canal.
The 'block' was a mixture of council estates across London.

 "We wanted to stamp a clear layout on the audience's minds early, and since we couldn't afford to show an aerial shot of the estate as it doesn't exist, the way to show it was by showing this top shot of the map at the very beginning of the film." - Director Joe Cornish.

The film was shot across London from March to May 2010, with six weeks of night shoots on the Heygate Estate and various other places. Interior scene were filmed at Three Mills Studios in east London.

What it was based on:

Cornish was once mugged outside his home in South London and investigated the kind of kids that robbed him. He then took thay stereotype and turned it into an Alien/ Sci-Fi.

"Children make mistakes; they test the boundaries of the world."

 

Soundtrack:

The soundtrack for the film was an original score composed by Simon Ratcliffe and Felix Buxton of the popular electronic dance music group Basement Jaxx.

Promotion:

Posters were posted on bus stops, billboards etc. promoting the films release.
A premier was also held for the film in Leiceter Square London.

Attack the block has a website that promotes the trailer, screencaps from the film itself, and interviews with the cast and directors. http://attacktheblock.com/ 

The Film:

There wasn't any controversy surrounding the film as it is a comedy-horror and appealed to a "geek-friendly" crowd. It was the debut film of director Joe cornish and the cast said they enjoyed working with him.

My Review:

When i read the critic reviews of Attack The Block, i thought 'finally, another good comedy/horror to look forward to' but after watching the film i was disappointed. The reviews had told me it was 'genius' and i would 'regret not seeing it in the theater', however when i watched the film i wondered what all of the fuss was about. 
I usually love Sci-Fi/Comedy/Alien films - Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead are two of the best in my opinion - so i expected to really enjoy and love this film.

To begin with i felt that the film had a weak plot line as there wasn't much explanation of the events or characters. I found it hard to watch the actors on screen because i find the way they spoke to be quite cringey as i felt they were overdoing the "block" talk at times. 

Throughout the film the character of Brewis (played by Luke Treadaway) made me laugh as he was so out of place with his well spoken accent and the fact he sought approval from the "block" gang.
Another aspect that made me laugh was the cameo of Nick Frost as the drug dealer, Ron. His one liners like: "Well, 'ere lads, you've discovered a species hitherto unknown to science, quite possibly non-terrestrial in origin, and you kicked it's fuckin' head in!", made me laugh, as did others throughout the film.

I thought the second half of the film was better than the first as I found myself getting into it more and I found myself wanting to see how it turned out in the end.
The slow motion sequence, when Moses is being chased by the aliens was good as, we could everything that was happening without it being a blur and different camera angles allowed for an exciting way to view the events. I enjoyed the on-going battle between the aliens and the kids.

Overall I would rate this film  ★★★ as it is enjoyable enough but not as good as the critics had said. 

Industry Flow Chart

Industry Flow Chart

The Amazing Spiderman:

I went to see The Amazing Spiderman, to see how it compared to the original trilogy. Even though i enjoyed the original trilogy; i thought i'd enjoy this film too as it's newer and has a new cast - including Andrew Garfield. Also, i knew it would be good due to the fact it is produced by Marvel and based on the original comic books.

I really enjoyed the film, although i'm not sure i prefered it to the original trilogy and vice versa. I thought the use of CGI was good when it came to 'The Lizard' and i enjoyed the variation in characters and the plot. Although, i'm not sure this reboot was worth it because 'the untold story' wasn't that surprising.