Use the handbrake. Your head’s doing 100mph.

What factors have contributed to the success in the UK/ and or abroad of British films since 1990?

There are several attributes to consider when categorizing a film as British, or a British success. Some particular aspects that contribute to British cinema may be more important than others. Various things to consider would be the institution, the message and the film itself, whether or not it was actually financially successful. The argument itself is really whether or not British films can be successful without the help of any American organizations to back it. Can it still be considered British when all of the funding in it’s success comes from an American institute?
The institutional context is very different when looking at the three films I have chosen. It is also very important in contributing to the success of the film, which can clearly bee seen with these three. The difference between these films is that one film had American funding and was one of the most successful British films of it’s time, making [add price here] in the UK and the other two that were backed by arthouse productions have rarely been recognized in the same light.
Full monty was filmed in 1997 and was very lucky to be picked up by Fox Searchlight, which meant that they had a large amount of funding for their advertising campaign, whereas the other two films did not. With the right name behind it the film did not have to struggle to make itself known amongst the cinema world. Whether or not the director was well known or not was irrelevant. The film itself was directed by Peter Cattaneo who had only really filmed TV series‘, this being his first mainstream and only mainstream movie to date. Without the aid of Fox searchlight to help them I suspect that the Full Monty would not have been merely as successful as it was, which shows how important the company was in contributing to it’s success, and when comparing it to the other two films it’s clear to see that a name such as Fox Searchlight is needed for British films to be “Hollywood” in terms of success.
The other two films, Bullet boy and Sweet Sixteen were only ever recognized within either the target audience they were aiming at or a small population across Europe, however never ventured into America. There is also a difference between these two films in terms of their popularity, as sweet 16 seemed to reach a wider audience whereas Bullet boy did not.
Bullet boy was ensured a small amount of success within it’s country because it’s producer was the BBC, so they didn’t need to go through any companies to be able to show their film, because they simply screened it on BBC2. However this limited the amount of people who saw it and it has failed to reach an audience beyond the black gang society that it was aimed at. There were no recognizable qualities in the film that made people want to go see it. The director Saul Dibbs was an unknown new face and the film itself was funded by the UK film council, which meant that it didn’t have a chance to reach anyone beyond the British audience. The producer of the film was Marc Boothe, who has a non profit agency B3 media and is known to be a leading specialist in urban film exhibition, distribution and marketing. He has worked with companies such as Universal International Pictures and 20th century fox however when comparing the success of Full Monty to Bullet boy it is clear to see that having the help of companies such as these would have been beneficial to the film, showing that no matter how influential Marc boothe was in his industry, bullet boy had no hope of success without America behind it.
Sweet sixteen had a wider audience, all around Europe, places such as France, Germany and Italy. It was more popular in places where Ken Loach had made a name for himself, as well as Scottish screen in attempt to celebrate it’s own national identity. It still had an art house market, however and even though it won a film award for best independent film it still didn’t branch out into the same market success as the Full Monty.

[ TO BE FINISHED ]

I love how we’ve watched both Keira and Orlando’s career take off at the same time and they both appear to have begun to be typecast. The fact that they both starred in the same film probably didn’t help, but it seems that Bloom has been cast in too many sandle movies lately, and Keira in sandle/corset movies such as Pride and Prejudice and Pirates of the Carrabean.

At least Knightly tries to break free from being type cast, though. It can have positive and negative results, I suppose. It depends which genre you are being placed within. People like Jim Carey do not mind starring in stupid comedies all the time because they will always be popular. These sandle/epic movies often become popular for about a month, then get boring especially seeing as each one tends to be about four hours long. It seems Knightly stars in these films such as Bend it like Beckham and Domino in order to release the restraints being place on her to perform in corset movies, where as I think this is the role she is most suited in.

I couldn’t stand Knightly in most of the films that I had seen her in because she was too much of an English rose. Why else would they put a load of common cockney people in most old films? Because a posh british accent never sounds right in most genres, whether action, comedy or romance. Whenever she speaks her accent is so eloquent that her acting is just crap.

When I saw Pride and Prejudice I thought it was the only role that really suited her, because she could be an english, posh rose. She is expected to have the high and mightly accent and pretty face. These sorts of people only really belong in period drama’s/drama’s hence why Dame Judi Dench mostly stars in those types of films: Mrs Henderson presents, Ladies in Lavender, The importance of being Ernest, all period, corset drama’s, which is where Knightly belongs, I think.

Being type cast would probably be the best thing for her, really.