Laura Mulvey

Laura Mulvey is a British feminist film theorist who was educated at st Hilda's College in Oxford. At this moment in time she is currently a professor of film and media studies at Birkbeck University of London. Mulvey worked at the British Film Institute for many years before taking up her current position.  

Laura Mulvey and the Male Gaze

The concept of a gaze is were you address how an audience views people and the way that they are being presented. In 1975 Laura Mulvey created the term "Male Gaze" for feminists it represented..

• How men look at woman
• How women look at themselves
• How women look at other women 

Laura Mulvey believed that film audiences always view characters from the general perspective of Heterosexual male.

Features of the Male Gaze

The main features of a male gaze are the way that the camera lingers on the curves of the female body, and the way in which events that occur to women are presented largely in the context of a man's reaction to the event that has occurred.

Laura Mulvey believed that this was degrading to women and it relegated women to the status of an object and made them seem like a they were not human beings and their role was to simply to be seen attractive in not only the male eye by the female eye too. It posed many confidence issues in the way in which women look at themselves and other women simply because of their appearance.

Below is a magazine cover of vogue which shows a women with a tiny figure that has a curvy waist line and her cleavage is on show this could be used as a perfect example of the male gaze because it shows how the magazine has used a attractive female to feature on their front cover

 

The Kings Speech

The Kings speech 

About the film 

The Kings Speech is a 2010 British historical drama that was directed by Tom Hooper, and written David Seildler. The film was produced by the UK Film council, See- Saw films and Bedlam productions and distributed by Monumentum Pictures and The Weinstein Company. The main character in the Kings Speech is Colin Firth who plays the part of King George VI. King George VI had a stutter in which he sees an speech therapist where they become great friends. The new King relies on his speech therapist to help him make his first wartime radio broadcast as George VI's brother has recently taken over the throne.

The Kings speech was Released in the United Kingdom on 7 January 2011, The King's Speech was a major box office and critical success. On a budget of £8 million, the kings speech earned over 400 million ($414,211,549) internationally (£250 million). It was widely praised by film critics for its visual style, art direction, and acting. Other Critics praised it's representation of historic detail. 

The Kings speech many awards and nominations, particularly for Colin Firth's performance where he received the golden globe award for best actor. The King's Speech won seven British Academy Film Awards, including Best Picture, and Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Supporting Actress. The film also won four Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Original Screenplay. 

Case Study the Kings speech 

Tom Hooper’s “The King’s Speech” offers a case study in how the indie film sector can harness opportunity in the global film biz and move quickly, even in times of economic hardship and without the help of a major Hollywood studio

The wide amount of UK mainstream media doesn't normally pay much attention to cinema box office but the kings speech was an exception the distributor Monumentum pictures had their expectations exceeded as it made an incredible £3.52 million in the opening weekend of its release. comparing the King's speech to other British films on there opening weekend is evidence that the Kings speech managed to find a niche in the market as slum dog millionaire made £1.83 million, calendar girls made £1.88 million and Atonement made £1.63million. When The Kings speech was released it lost some screening time to the New York Met opera's production. 

One of the main reasons why The Kings speech was praised by many critics was because of the realism of the way in which the film fits in with the historical events that happened in genre (1930-1940)

the kings speech includes 4 major events that happened during the period that the film is set in these are  The death of George V in 1936, the first monarch to address his subjects via the radio, the accession to the throne of Edward VIII and lastly the outbreak of war in 1939. The only fault of the film is were King George VI during the build up to the Second World War, uses a type font which was not designed until 20 years later. Cinemagoers see a BBC control room with the names of broadcast stations around the world but the signs are in Helvetica, which was not available until the late 1950s.Other faults picked by the public include women wearing hosiery without seams when seamless stockings did not arrive until later; a frustrated king throwing down his speech only for it to reappear in his hand the next second; and the use of a plastic model biplane when the ones of the time were wooden.The film also features a Tiger Moth plane with a registration which did not exist until 1941 and refers to the now Queen's younger sister as "Princess Margaret" when she was known throughout her childhood as "Princess Margaret Rose".The Kings speech was praised by both Americans and People from the UK because it shows the way in which the UK acted in a time of war which both America and Britain are involved in it appeals to a wide variety of people throughout a generation.

Representations of media

The clip that I have chosen which I believe represents me and other young men around the world is the inbetweeners movie trailer. For the first time this year me and my closest friends will be going on a lads holiday to Zante. The whole of the film represents the journey of 4 young men going on a Lads holiday together before they all go their separate ways. The film revolves around one key theme this is the opposite sex, all four of the Lads Simon, Neil, Jay, will. The film is trying to show the stereotypical late teenager on what they get up to on a 'lads' holiday away from their parents. the film also indicates the true friendship between the boys, as during one scene Jay and Simon have a row, and began to rebel towards each other, true friendship and love is shown throughout the film as the two boys work through their problems together, this represents the late teenage male gender as spending a lot of time with each other in small environments can cause conflicts between the group/friends. the film shows a true understanding of a night out or in this case a holiday, as over excessive amount of alcohol is consumed, and this can also lead to other things such as drugs, the film shows the effects of alcohol and how late male teens are unable to cope with excessive drinking, this is due to many males not knowing their limits to alcohol, resulting them not making it through the night, (passing out) and also performing stupid stunts. The film also represents the importance of appearance in a late male teens life, as males like to look and smell unique and  smart to try and attract the opposite sex. The films represents the 4 boys to start growing up and taking control of their own lives, this is shown by them being away from their parents in a foreign country, and trying to control their own money and not to overspend. This shows the typical independence that late teenage male needs before becoming a fully grown man, as many late teens still rely on their parents for money, and such things in life. 

Mr Smith Audience and Institutions

“Media production is dominated by global institutions, which sell their products and services to national audiences”.To what extent do you agree with this statement?

TOPIC - The BIG area of study

ASPECT - The small focus within that area

VIEWPOINT - The belief about that area

INSTRUCTION - What your answer must do.

Topic  US + UK film 

Aspect How US and UK films are made 

View Point The Big Six and how they are control of the filming industry 

Instruction Your own opinion 

identifying what information i will need to know in order to answer the question

A But the sad thing is that what hasn’t changed is the cost of marketing a film to the public. I’ll give you an example of the King’s Speech is being released in the US. The budget of our film was about 15 million dollars – at the very least they’ll probably spend 25 to 30 million marketing it America so they are going to spend almost double the cost of production on the cost of selling it and that is just in one country. So the sad thing about it is that there is still a kind of lock down on who gets to make films that reach everyone because even if you do effectively make your film for nothing, for a distributor they’ve still got to look at a huge amount of money to get the film out to everyone. So the revolution that I expected when the digital age came when I thought film making would be very democratic hasn’t quite taken off. And the other thing that stopped that happening is unfortunately the star system, which still hasn’t gone away. In the end one of the ways to get the bandwidth to get people to pay attention to your films is to get a big star and that remains expensive.

It’s certainly true that you can make a film cheaply; I keep finding films that my nine-year old made on my flip phone. He’s at it, he’s doing it and he’s developing something that while is certainly entertaining for him could also be a skill, a story telling skill. I was thinking while Tom was talking about how now anyone can make a film for almost nothing but its not happening because you also have to be rather good at it, there has to be a skill in place for it to work. But you achieve that by doing exactly what Tom has just said and what you now have which is a gift that my generation didn’t have quite so much access to is stuff that you can do it on. We’ve always had pencil and paper but now we have film making materials at our fingertips.

The other thing that is extraordinary is that you can make a film and you have the right to post it on You Tube.

You can put it out in public and get some people seeing it and that’s an unbelievable revolution. Again, in the old days I made my films but no one saw them apart from my family them because how would anyone see them.                                   

you could argue that media production is dominated by global institutions because the big 6 such as paramount productions own a lot of filming equipment and cameras that are simply to expensive for filmmakers with a small budget to buy for example the Sony HDC F950 which was used to film avatar each camera costs $115,800.00. 

British Film Industry - Taken From BBC

The British film industry should back more mainstream movies, a report is expected to recommend next week.
Ahead of a visit to Pinewood Studios on Wednesday, Prime Minister David Cameron said the film industry should support "commercially successful pictures".
His comments come before the publication of Lord Smith's review into the government's film policy on Monday.
The review was commissioned to find out how the industry could offer better support to UK film-making.
Mr Cameron praised the UK film industry but said "we should aim even higher, building on the incredible success of recent years".
He acknowledged the British film industry had made "a £4bn contribution to the UK economy and an incalculable contribution to our culture".
Lord Smith, the former Labour culture secretary, is also expected to recommend developing an export strategy to increase the profits of British films.
Speaking to the BBC, director Ken Loach said it was important to have a diverse film industry with a wide range of films to choose from.

Dredd
Budget: $45 million
Box Office Gross: $36.5 million

Distributer: Entertainment Film and Lionsgate

Running time: 95 minutes

Genre: Sci-Fi, Action

Produced by: DNA Films, IM Global and Reliance Entertainment

Actors:

Dredd - Karl Urban

Judge Cassandra Anderson - Olivia Thurlby

Kay - Wood Harris

MaMa - Lena Heady

Location it was filmed in was mainly South Africa, the rest was produced in CGI, the costumes tend to be of a science fiction genre.

This film took $6,278,491 (USA) (21 September 2012) on the opening weekend.

Star Trek: Into Darkness 

Budget: £190 million
Box Office Gross: $470 million
Distributer: Paramount Pictures (Big Six)
Running time: 133 minutes
Genre: Sci-Fi
Produced by: Bad Robot Productions, K/O Paper Productions and SkyDance Productions

Actors:
Chris Pine - Captain Kirk
Benedict Cumberbatch - Khaan
Simon Pegg - Scotty
Zoe Saldana - Uhura
Alice Eve - Dr Marcus
Zachary Quinto - Spock
Karl Urban - Doctor

Star Trek were originally going to CGI everything in the film but they decided to build it all because they wanted it to be more realistic and they could afford it, unlike the film 'Dredd' because they didn't have the money so they had to CGI everything.  Star Trek was predominantly filmed with in warehouses, however spaceships are filmed on real life huge dustbins and edited away to look Sci-Fi like. They also used an element of CGI, however JJ Abrams (director) wanted to produce as much props as possible and edit them to make it look more life like and real.
Star Trek used IMAX camera for 30 minutes of the film
This film took $70,165,559 (USA) (17 May 2013) on the opening weekend at the cinema.

20 miles to go see it cannot have had a saturated release whereas star trek was released widely 

In what ways have the improvements in hardware and content affected institutions and audiences?
There are many ways that improvements in hardware and content have affected institutions and audience’s one of these being the re-introduction of 3D which stands for three dimensional viewing. 3D is a motion picture that enhances the illusion of depth perception. Some forms of 3D films have been produced from as early as 1915, but 3D never really took off as the hardware was costly and the process required to produce a 3D film was considered to be to time consuming. 3D film was incredibly reintroduced by James Cameron who directed the Film Avatar which was released in 2009 this was really one of the first 3D films to be featured in a wide release, and it sent people all around the world into a 3D craze The avatar made a staggering £2,782,275,172 from box office and suddenly 3D television was reincarnated in the world once again and better than ever before. Three dimensional viewing had a huge impact at first with institutions and audiences as Television company's introduced The 3D home television this gave viewers the chance to watch sport, television shows, documentaries and films in 3D all from the comfort of their own home. But sadly as an owner of a 3D television the improvements of a 3D television owner were short lived. I would personally not class the 3D television as an improvement in hardware or content but it definitely did effect institutions and audiences, television channels on sky were created exclusively for 3D and for a while it was an international sensation but after a while the novelty wears off as the owner of a 3D television I would personally not want to sit at home and watch a 3D movie straight through to the end as personally there is to many distractions and as you are wearing the built in 3D glasses you cannot go on your phone it is hard to eat and adding to this the room has to be completely dark, these problems arose to many 3D television owners and now currently only 6% of the population of Great Britain own a 3D television. After the avatar was released many audiences were attracted to the cinema all of the 4 quadrants in fact and the Avatar promoted many other films to be screened and filmed in 3D but after a while many people of the UK realised it wasn't worth watching films in 3D and it was just a gimmick that is why sales in 3D televisions and The amount of people that visit the cinema has decreased since 2010.

 An improvement in hardware and content has dramatically affected institutions and audiences. People throughout the world have replaced buying DVDs with subscriptions to online movie sites such as love film and Netflix these sites require a monthly subscription fee but offer viewers 1000's of movies to watch every single week for as little as £5.99 a month. Not only this But some of the latest game consoles provide a feature where gamers can also watch movies online, Xbox have teamed up with love film so console users can use love film on their Xbox's. The surging increase in online movie viewing has contributed to the death of the Blockbuster DVD rental chain and the death of the old fashion movie stores. Online websites provide much more of a variety for very little cost without the inconvenience of renting films and having to return your DVDs back to the shop. This improvement in hardware and content regarding the way we view films has changed the way institutions release films big institutions sell their films to online movie viewing companies. For example love film brought the rights to the new Star trek into the darkness film so they could show it to their online audiences. The figures for how much love film brought the rights to show the new star trek is kept disclosed though as its private information between love film and paramount productions.

Another aspect which you could say has resulted in the improvements of hardware and content regarding how it effects institutions and audiences is the improvement in the quality of cameras and the quality of the way audiences view this better quality footage. Many Hollywood productions such as Batman the Dark Knight rises directed by Christopher Nolan have started to predominately use IMAX cameras for the vast majority of the filming the reason why is because it captures a better quality. IMAX movie theatres are becoming the most popular movie theatres in the world by September 2012 there was 697 IMAX theatres in 52 countries. Due to various upgrades in hardware and content (upgrade in American cinema) the British film industry and cinema had no choice but to try and keep up with The way Hollywood were making and producing films and as the majority of films made in Hollywood were big budget films, this meant British producers were forced to use digital films instead of the old format film and cinemas had to be changed from film format to digital format. This posed as a great disadvantage to British film makers as digital cameras cost more to buy than cameras that use film, this posed as a major problem because the vast majority of British films were made by using a relatively small budget and big production companies such as Warner brothers and paramount pictures own the majority of the best quality film cameras, an example of this would be the Sony HDC F950 this camera cost $115,800.00 and was used in the making of Avatar in 2009. This leaves many British film directors unable to get funding for their film so their films end up being produced by various different companies from the UK and from outside of the UK. An example of this would be the 2012 version of Dredd that by right was a British film but had many South African aspects to it. Dredd was filmed in South Africa because it was cheaper to record there and although they had a budget of 45 million the director Peter Travis did not want to use equipment from big film production companies as it was too costly.

 In conclusion there are many different aspects of hardware and content that effect institutes and audiences and the ones that are mentioned above are what I believe to be the main changes that have most certainly affected the audiences and institutions British film companies such as Film four and monumental pictures are finding it harder and harder to compete with American Film companies simply because of the continuing advancing in content and hardware, This question very much shows the Influence that The American film industry has on content and software because of the Money it has not only this but because of their capabilities. Although British film companies do have low budget films that haven’t used the best content and hardware but have still pleased millions of people around the world an example of this would be slum dog millionaire but some film critics argue that the only reason why that made money was because it fit in all four sections of the 4 quadrants and appealed to many people like a film produced in Hollywood would do the majority of the time. There are currently different aspects of film though that are changing and innovating so you cannot be sure what the viewing of the audiences will be like and how exactly this will affect institutes.   

Screen Yorkshire, Film 4 , Warp, studio canal.

Information for cross media convergence and synergy.

Screen Yorkshire: - For over ten years, Screen Yorkshire has been at the forefront of championing the film, TV, games and digital industries in Yorkshire and the Humber. Its aim has always been to secure and support the very best projects, companies and individuals, helping to make Yorkshire and the Humber one of the most sought after destinations for production in the UK. Screen Yorkshire is a specialist business which invests first and foremost in content, but also in developing talent. As an investor in content it runs the largest investment fund of its kind in the UK - the £15m, ERDF-supported Yorkshire Content Fund. Screen Yorkshire also runs bespoke and highly regarded talent development schemes, aimed at encouraging both national and regional talent to progress and excel within the film and TV industries.

Screen Yorkshire has invested in TV and film production for the past decade. Some of our most high profile investments in content production include:Red Riding, Tyrannosaur, Wuthering Heights, Kill List, This is England '86, A Passionate Woman, The Damned United, Unforgiven, Lost in Austen, The Cottage, Brideshead Revisited, Hush, This is England, The Bad Mother's Handbook, Bunny and the Bull, Exhibit A, Yasmin and Mrs Ratcliffe's Revolution.

Film 4 :- is a digital television channel available in the United Kingdom and Ireland, owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation, that screens films. It offers films in standard definition free of charge. Film 4 is a British film production company owned by Channel Four Television Corporation. The company has been responsible for backing a large number of films made in the United Kingdom. In 2011 Film4 launched its ground-breaking new role in exploring innovation in filmmaking with the appointment of Anna Higgs as Commissioning Executive for Film4.0. Film4's reputation for nurturing new talent and building on its family of returning talent in the UK is well-established, and it is now extending its vision to advance thinking and practice and develop more direct relationships with audiences in a fast-changing environment.

Film 4 productions have produced many famous films such as Shaun of the dead, Slumdog millionaire, buffalo solider, east is east, four lions, the lovely bones, Attack of the block.

Warp : - warp films is an independent film production company based in Sheffield & London, UK, with a further affiliated company Warp Films Australia based in Melbourne, Australia. Warp Films was established by Warp Records founding partners Rob Mitchell and Steve Beckett. originally Warp films was created with financial support from NESTA and had a remit to produce a number of short films. In 2010, Warp Films produced Chris Morris’ debut feature Four Lions, a satirical comedy drama following a group of home-grown Islamic terrorists from Sheffield, England. The film was a critical and box office success, achieving impressive numbers at the box office on its opening weekend, generating the highest site average of all the new releases (£5,292) and making a total of £609,000. As of 8 August 2010, Four Lions grossed £2,932,366 at the UK box office. The film was nominated for two BAFTA awards; it won the ‘Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director, or Producer’ BAFTA award for Chris Morris. Warp films do not tend to produce a film on their own they tend to synergise with other film companies  such as screen Yorkshire and film 4.

Warp produced This is England four lions dead mans shoes, the midnight beast, the snipist. Warp also produced dvds/ short films of famous bands playing gigs or a series of gigs on their tour for example warp produced
The stone roses made of stone, Arctic monkeys at the Apollo.

Studio Canal : - is a French-based production and distribution company that owns the third-largest film library in the world. The company was founded in 1988 by Pierre Lescure as a spin-off of the Canal pay-TV network. The original function was to focus on French and European productions, but later made strategic deals with American production companies. StudioCanal's most notable productions from its early years include Terminator 2: Judgment Day, JFK, Basic Instinct, Cliffhanger, Under Siege, Free Willy, Bridget jones diary, and the original Stargate movie. It has strong links to Universal Studios (Studiocanal and Universal Studios were owned by the same company between 2000 and 2004, hence StudioCanal co-produced a fair number of Universal's films.


examples of synergy and cross media convergence between production companies

Kill List (co-production with UK Film Council, Warp X, Screen Yorkshire and Rook Films)
Berberian Sound Studio (co-production with Warp X Productions  Screen Yorkshire and UK Film. Council)

Shaun of the Dead (co-production with Big Talk Productions, Working Title Films  StudioCanal Universal Studios and Rogue.

Attack the Block (co-production with Big Talk Pictures, StudioCanal and UK Film Council.

Why was Dredd a box office failure ?

Dredd was originally a fictional character that appeared in a graphic novel by the name of Judge Joseph Dredd in 1977. In these graphic novels Dredd is an American law enforcement officer in a violent city of the future. Judge Dredd is one the UK's best known comics published by DC comics. In 1995 the first Dredd film was released. It was an American film that stared Sylvester Stallone this film proved to be a complete failure because Dredd was virtually unheard of in the States as the comic books was only released in the UK and the people of America had very little attraction in going to watch Dredd at the cinema. The 1995 version of Dredd was slated by critics throughout the whole of America. In 2012 the latest version of Dredd was produced by  British - South African producers at DNA film studios in synergy with IM global and reliance entertainment.

The 2012 version of Dredd was seen to be a huge box office failure as the budget spent was 45 million dollars but yet Dredd only made 36.5 million dollars so Dredd made a reported loss of 8.5 million dollars. Filming began for Dredd on the 12th November 2010 in cape Town the filming took place in South Africa because it was cheaper to film over there, the film was shot in 3D using RED MX and Phantom Flex high speed cameras. Some 2D elements were converted into 3D in the post production stage as it was also cheaper to do this too. One of the first reasons why I believe Dredd was a box office failure was purely because of the the fact that it was filmed in 3D. Dredd was primarily shown in the UK in 3D. 2D screenings were nortoriously limited as the distributor denied cinema's requests for 2D prints, by the distrubutor dening the majoirty of 2D screenings it limited the audience as many people do not like watching 3D films as the viewing quality is effected not only that many cinemas do not like showing 3D films as they are more expensive to run with less audience appeal.

Every week a superhero movie is on CGI menus this is because we can now make superhero movies look more life like and realistic as the quality of film is much better than ever before, this could contribute to the fact that Dredd was a box office failure as what would distinguish Dredd between other superhero movies?. The 2012 film Dredd had a budget of 45 million and contained actor Karl Urban as the main star. Karl Urban is considered to be a famous actor but hes not a worldwide known figure, like the cast from Batman the Dark knight rises that had an estimated estimated budget of $250 million dollars and contained world wide famous actors such as Christian bale, Michael Cain, Morgan freeman, Anne Hathaway. When Christian Bale starred as batman his face was revealed numerous times as one of the reasons why people would go to watch the new Batman is becuase of the Cast. Yet in Dredd Karl Urban's face was not revealled once. Batman made $1,084,439 from box office compared to Dredd who lost $8.5million dollars, This is because Batman put the money on screen The Dark Knight rises contained a variety of different special effects with explosions and CGI was also used to add to the special effects. whereas Dredd contained very few special effects and the special effects used didn't really have the same effect as dredd was filmed in 3D and Director Christopher Nolan in Batman filmed with IMAX Cameras which are the highest quality cameras that the film industry currently has as they are a bigger camera with a bigger lense on a state of the ark frame These are all reasons why Batman Made money and Dredd was a box office failure because Dredd simply didnt provided enough intrest from the viewers on screen.

Another main reason why I believe Dredd was a box office failure is because it did not appeal to the four quadrants, the four quadrants are 4 categories relating to age and gender. Hollywood directors believe that in order to make a film profitable it needs to be relatable to each of the four quadrant Dredd did not do this. The majority of the modern day superhero movies that have made a considerable amount of profit have all been rated PG such as Spiderman, The Avengers movie, Batman this is because American film companies such as universal try to make films diverse to all ages so all different age groups of people can go see it from families to eager comic book fans. Not only this but if you release the film as a 12A or a PG13 then the amount of money that you can make in marketing is a considerable amount more as you can make children's toys , Lego figures, children's games it can be put onto happy meal boxes whereas Dredd was an 18 which meant that the audience it appealed to was more restricted, it would only appeal to adults and as the main character wasn't a good looking man which contained sex appeal as you couldn't see his face so it wouldn't attract a female audience so many couples wouldn't go and see it which left only men that would be mostly likely to go and see it and very few men go to the cinema together to watch 18 rated films which leaves only the comic book fans that had a genuine interest in going to see it.

Dredd was made to compete with the US comic book films but this proved to be a bad mood as Dredd already had a bad reputiation in the Us as the 1995 version of Dredd was slated for many reasons, not only this but The Amercian films that have been adapted from comic books such as Avengers and Spiderman and Batman are all produced by the biggest film companies in the world like Warner Brothers who have a strong reputation for making sucessful movies so this is really another reason amoung the many on why Dredd was a box office failure. To contribute to this big film companies always have well known expirenced film directors who have great sucess with producing films, for example Warner brother produced spiderman and the director of spiderman was a well known sucessful directorer who had already acheived sucess in the movie industry his name was Marc Webb. The Director of Dredd was fairly new to the film industry and hadn't really produced any sucessful films before, he was more comofortable with directing tv programmes such as the Bill which is possibly why Dredd was criticised by critics for lacking creativity This also contributed to the fact that Dredd was a box office failure.

Many Uk films struggle to be as sucessful as all time American films quite simply because of the budget and resources they have. America is the most sucessful country in the world that has produced some of the best films the world has ever watched. The production companies in the UK are alot smaller than the American production companies for example film 4 and pathe are tiny film companies compared to warner brothers. Although british film companies are small there are still british films that have managed to make a considerable amount of profit and have been praised by film critics an example of this is Slumgdog Millionare produced by pathe films slumdog millionare had a budget on £15 million pounds but made £377,910,544 at box office this is because the film was cleverly directed and produced and appelead to all 4 film quadrants although slumdog millionare made a lot of money they are bigger budget American films that have made over a billion pounds Batman the dark knight rises being a prime example of this. American films produced in holywood are likely to make money if they appeal to the the correct audience and the film is cleverly produced and directed with a high enough budget somewhere in the margin of $100million dollars. Whereas low budget british films are likely to make money if they also appeal to the right audience and are cleverly directed and produced but there will always be execptions in both British and American films.