Case study for British Film Attack the Block

Attack the Block is a British science fiction/ Monster movie released on the 11 of May 2011. 
It was written and directed by Joe Cornish. It comes from the same writing and production stable as other horror/comedies such as hot fuzz, shaun of the dead and scott piligrim vs the world. 
The film stars Jodie Whittaker, John Boyega, Nick Frost and Luke treadaway.

"Attack the Block is set on a council estate in South London on Guy Fawkes Night, and, with some coming of age themes, the plot centres on a teenage street gang who have to defend themselves from predatory alien invaders. Released on 11 May 2011, the film achieved significant popularity, favorable critical reviews, and accolades internationally. The film has been listed as a cult film in the making by a significant number of websites"
Source- Wikipedia

The target audience for this film will be teenagers from ages 13-16, 17-19 , older audiences in there early 20's and sci fi fans. Most teenagers would really be able to recognize with the characters in this movie because it is set in a place where most teenagers within London live, Council estates. Instantly we think that the class of the target audience are lower/middle class as they may be receiving welfare help, both parents may be in full time occupation or they may be living with a guardian. They refer to the location of the council estate as "the ends" which in fact is a slang term used across major part of London's council estates. This also reaches the target audience as teens from working/middle class council estates tend to be influenced by slang language because its such a huge part of urban society. The council estate is actually located in Brixton, which at a certain period was a very rough, the roughest place in London, notoriously known for its gang culture it is less talked about now because people are just so used to the typical idea of Brixton that only people who are involved in crime, have no education and live off welfare live there when in fact that isn't the case at all. 
This movie has many conventions of a typical conventions of boys who come from south London. However they break those conventions with the story line and the characters. 
The costumes used in this movie represent different characters and identity so the target audience know who to relate to as well as teaching a lesson to go with the story and the meaning.


This film used the studio:Canal films, Uk film council,Big talk pictures, Film4 Productions. All of the listed are well known institutes within Britain who have high repuations based on their films in the past. This will automatically attract attention from the public as UK films are not as recognized as Hollywood because of there high influence and there hard establishment within the world, especially Britain.

On its opening theatrical weekend in the UK in May 2011, Attack the Block garnered £1,133,859, putting it in third place only slightly behind American blockbusters Thor and Fast and Furious 5; also in the opening weekend Attack the Block had the highest cinema site average by almost twice of the other films. On a screen-by-screen basis, Attack the Block was the week's strongest performer. The North American theatrical run began in July 2011 and was only a limited release, yet despite being shown for less than two months and in only 66 cinemas at its peak, the film grossed $1,024,175 (£659,040) on its American theatrical run. 

Attack the block had a budget of £8 million pound and made £3,831,475.
In America they managed to gross $1,024,175 
(£659,040) after only 2 months in 66 theatres it managed to 
gross that much at the films peak.



The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc in the UK on 19 September 2011,^[21] and in the US on 25 October 2011. In the category of Action, Adventure and Comedy on the website Amazon.com, Attack the Block is currently #59 on the DVD bestsellers list.
 

Social media has highly effected the way in which the distributors of movies target there audience.

Because the target audience for this movie is fairly young and is brought up amongst new technology it is more likely that the target audience will find out of this film through the internet via social networking sites (facebook, twitter, youtube).

With social networking sites like this it is very easy to "share" things. This is known as viral marketing.

This is the reason why the distributor sets up things like this so that the target audience spread it amongst eachother eventhough we see advertising every where, were more likely to consume things are friends are consuming being most people follow a trend. 

  

Getting the target audience to interact gives them a sense of inclusion as if they are apart of something bigger which Maslow referred to as the aspire.

This movie was distributed by by StudioCanal UK formerly known as Optimum Releasing. It is a film distributor for both the uk and Ireland. However it is apart of a bigger french brand which releases over 200 films a year. 

A succesful British film that was distributed by studio canal is the awakening who had a £.3.1 million budget and manage to gross £2.9 million in box office. It was a successful film as it was opened at the Toronto international film festival which must have been such an honor only increasing studio canals credibility.

The whole film was filmed in South London so it was a bit more economical as they didn't have to film in other countries where as hollywood movies do in order to boost how professional it may be depending on the film.

Although most of the actors are not world renown the british audience can still relate to them as it is of course a british film. For the american audience its a change as it is not as mainstream as they are used to in Hollywood. It is also good because the teenagers that were cast in the film actually came for public schools within estates and auditioned for the place so it makes the film more realistic. 

One of the most notable actors are Nick Frost who plays in Hot fuzz, Shaun of the dead and the latest Paul. Joddie whitiker is also starring and is known for her roles of st trinians as the receptionist. Both the british audience and loyal american audience will know this if they are very big and dedicated fans.

Merchandise is also used to boost advertisement as fans may where them and that might attract more people to investigate the spread of the trend. Its almost like a fashion trend every one wants to be aware of the latest films the same way they do clothes.  

Review websites are also a way of advertising as people give there opinion of the film which astroturfs to other people. This helps boosts the films notibilty. It helps if the review is good so its positive advertising. Websites such as imdb help as they are a famous website who offer the people the choice to rate the movie.