LO4- Task 5, Ethical, legal and regulatory issues

A) Impact and Effect

In the 1930's Theodore Adorno had this theory called the 'Hypodermic Syringe', this is the idea that the media has a negative impact. In Avatar there is an enormous amount of weapon use, the weapons are specifically used by the humans when they show ignorance towards the lives of the Na'vi. And though the film is very clearly fictional, Adorno's theory suggests that the audiences could interpret this ignorance/ violence towards minorities as acceptable as well as the use of guns and other weapons. Juxtaposed to this is Dennis McQuail's theory (1972) which suggests people interpret media differently and use it for different purposes e.g entertainment.

These theories demonstrate two different types of audiences, active and passive. An active audience are people who discuss and question what they see, this then prevents an audience from wrongly interpreting themes within a film. A passive audience are people who copy what they see on screen, this kind of audience of course supports Adorno's theory because it shows the negative impact of media on an audience. In Avatar for example there is a (sort of) sex scene between the protagonist (Jake) and Neytiri, the scene was even removed from the original version of the film because of it's suggestive content. If this was seen by a passive audience, it is likely that it would encourage sexual behaviour and as Avatar is certified 12 by the BBFC it makes this scene highly inappropriate.

A positive impact that Avatar might have is the way that the Na'vi people are so connected with the environment. This might affect an active audience so they too begin appreciating nature and the environment, similarly the scene where Neytiri saves Jake but is insulted at the way Jake disregards the life of the other animals.

B) Representation

Representation is the way that someone or something is represented, Stuart Hall (1980) said that "all representations are mediated", here Stuart Hall is saying that representations are created on purpose and this is how we get stereotypes.

Tessa Perkins (1979) declared that actually not all stereotypes are negative, for example in Avatar the Na'vi are often likened to the stereotypical American Indian where they are a spiritual and athletic people. The film has also received criticism for it's portrayal of white males as rationalist and technocratic. David Brooks (A columnist for the New York Times) even accused the film of "resting on the assumption that non-whites need the white messiah". Perkins also says that stereotyping, even when negative, comes from some element of truth "Stereotyping is not a simple process and contains a number of assumptions that can be challenged." For example, Earp and Katz (1999) said '' the equation of masculinity with pathological control and violence'', this is a negative stereotype about men but in Avatar the majority of the marines are men and they seek money, control and violence so the media portrays some truth to this.

So though the portrayal of men is certainly a negative stereotype, Sigourney Weaver (as mentioned previously) portrays a strong dominant woman, this is a countertype because it challenges typical stereotypes about women being the 'damsel in distress. This is displayed in the scene where Grace knocks over the mug which Parker is using as a makeshift golf hole whilst passing a sarcastic ''Oops''. Here the character, Grace Augustine, is challenging her superiors which in turn challenges the 'damsel in distress' stereotype.

C) Legal and Ethical

The BBFC, or British Board of Film Classification, is the primary organisation for film ratings and censorships in the UK. The BBFC initially gave Avatar a 12A certificate; however this has changed multiple times. The featurette 3D version of the film was certified on the 20th August 2009 as a 12A, but the 2D version was certified as a 12 on the 23rd February the following year. Between September and October of 2010 all versions of the film were certified as 12 which was most likely due to the introduction of the 'sex scene'. The film is rated PG-13 in America by the MPAA for all the same reasons except their classification also includes ''some smoking'' which is not seen as a problem in the UK.

The film keeps to these guidelines set by the BBFC by using different shot types. There are various scenes (such as when the antagonist kills Tsu'tey) which could have included more gore which would have been more inappropriate for younger audiences but by cutting the camera away from the scene it only gives the audience suggestions of violence rather than the violence itself.

The soundtrack for Avatar was originally composed by James Horner, and though the soundtrack was filmed specifically for this film 20th Century Fox would have still needed to get permissions from James Horner's record label 'Atlantic Records' which itself is a subsidiary of 'Warner Music Group' as well as having permission from James Horner himself. This is very important because if 21st Century Fox did not seek permissions for the use of this soundtrack despite it being made specifically for this film they would still be classed as copyright infringement and therefore could be sued by the owners of the soundtrack.

 The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) regulates advertising across all types of media in the UK. CAP (Committees of Advertising Practice) codes are rules made by the ASA for advertisers, agencies and media owners. The 'Non-Broadcast codes' are the CAP codes which regulate all types of non-broadcast advertising, this includes all print material.

For the promotion of Avatar this poster was used (right), the poster is very simple so it does not show any harm or widespread offence. The poster displays some characters and the location so it is very clear that this is a sci-fi or fantasy film, as well as not showing any reference to pricing etc. this means that the film cannot be classed as misleading. Therefore, it would be appropriate to advertise towards a mass audience on billboards or the web in order to attract a mass mainstream audience, because the poster's content is not offensive.

And that is just about all you need to know about Avatar and how ethical, legal and regulatory issues affect film. Thankyou, and as the Na'vi would say "hayalovay", until next time.

LO3- Task 4, Distribution and Marketing

 A) Distribution channels

Hello, I'm back again. And this time I'm here to talk to you about advertising, distribution and promotion.

First off, Distribution. This is when something is shared to its audience. 20th Century Fox are very good at distribution because as a conglomerate they have an enormous amount of revenue and can use various subsidiaries such as The Fox Broadcasting Company or 21st Century Fox's subsidiaries such as Sky here in the UK.

There are various ways to watch a film, all of which I'm sure you're familiar with. You can now watch films at the Cinema, own them on DVD, use streaming services such as Netflix, or watch them on TV. Illegal download sites such as PirateBay and torrent sites such as Putlocker were proved very popular choices of watch Avatar after Torrentfreak put the film at the top of their list of 'Most pirated movies' back in December 2010. The film was downloaded from torrent sites over an estimated 16.6 million times and whilst I do not recommend either of latter two choices, it does show how many ways there are to no watch a film and this is partly to do with the introduction of technological convergence.

Technological Convergence is when technologies come together to provide new services, for example an iPhone (or any smartphone) is no longer just a phone, it's now a computer, a portable games console, a camera etc. This is incredibly useful to distributors because it is more cost effective and makes them more accessible to their audience This is incredibly useful to ditributors as social media is arguably the most effective form of marketing. 20th Century Fox took advantage of social networks on December 3rd 2009 (just a week before it's London premiere) MTV.com made a webcast called 'Avatar Live' which was hosted by Facebook, this was an interview where questions were submitted by fans. This not only allowed the producers to connect with their audience but gained them nearly 1.3 million fans!

B) Advertising

As mentioned social media is incredibly useful to distributors when promoting the film prior to the film's release but social media also enables fans to promote the film even after the film has been released. As Avatar's target audience are 'digital natives' they are likely to have their own blogs,  video blogs (or Vlog if you want to be 'down with the kids'),  podcasts,  forum memberships etc. Which they would use to promote and/or review the film. Roger Ebert took straight to his website on December 11 2009 when he gave Avatar a 4/4 and stated that "Once again, he [James Cameron] has silenced the doubters by simply delivering an extraordinary film."

Another way James Cameron's Avatar was marketed was through creating 'Avatar Day' on the 21st August 2009. On this day 100 IMAX cinemas worldwide showcased 16 minutes of footage from Avatar, Mattel revealed action figures based on the characters in Avatar and Ubisoft released the trailer for the game based on the film. And on August 20th Avatar broke records when the teaser trailer became the most streamed thing on Apple.com in it's first day. This is an incredibly clever marketing technique because it makes the target audience interact with Avatar before and after the film's release.

All the ways in which Avatar was marketed involve some form of new media, an incredibly important part of Avatar's marketing success was the rise of Web 2.0. Web 2.0 is "the change in the internet being a static, one way form of communication to a two way interactive medium" as described by David Gauntlett (2002). This means that upon the release of teasers, film trailers etc. fans were able to access forums, blogs and social media networks to discuss what they had seen and get more involved in the film.

The official Avatar website was essential to promoting the film in 2009, and is now an essential part of promoting the film's future sequels (through the 'News' section). On the website the audience have access to the film's soundtracks, exclusive wallpapers and much more. But most importantly the audience can contribute to the website through the 'Pandorapedia' which is a wiki dedicated to Avatar, as well as hosting a blogging community. This is another example of the importance of Web 2.0.

James Cameron himself, in my opinion, was possibly the most effective piece of marketing overall. As stated at the 'Den of Geek' "the assumption that people went in [to the cinema] with was that James Cameron had come up with something truly spectacular." And this is simply due to James Cameron's reputation  and the long awaited release since his last film (Titanic) was released 12 years previous.

Another thing that I think affected Avatar is it's enormous amount of positive reviews after it's release. Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a rating of 89% based on 292 reviews. Richard Corliss of Time magazine, like many other critics, paid particular homage to the films special effects and even went as far as calling the film, "the most vivid and convincing creation of a fantasy world ever seen in the history of moving pictures." Obviously all these methods of marketing worked as MTV estimate that 59 million people in the US alone have seen Avatar (as of January 2010) and they managed to rake in a record-breaking $2.7 billion.

Because the Fox Broadcasting Network is also owned by 21st Century Fox,  this means that through using cross media ownerships they would have been able to advertise Avatar on all of the networks channels relatively free,  20th Century Fox also went into joint venture with Mattel to release a series of action figures based on the characters from Avatar prior to the film's release.

And that is all you need to know about distribution, marketing and how it relates to James Cameron's Avatar. Remember to keep returning to this blog if you would like to know and until then, goodbye. 

Tutor feedback for LO2, Task 3

LO2, Task 3

Hi, I'm back again and this time I'm going to be talking about how producers identify their target audience.

Identifying a target audience is important to producers because it enables them to think about what content to put in their film in order to appeal to the most suitable audience. means it is unlikely, for example, that the next reboot of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise is likely to feature a cameo appearance from My Little Pony's Rainbowdash.

One theory on how producers identify their target audience was by Ien Ang in 1991. She proposed that media conglomerates create an image in their head of an ideal audience, going in to specific details such as what they wear, eat, drink etc. John Hartley also suggest this in 1987 when he said that "invisible fictions of the audience which allow the institutions to get a sense of who they must enter relations with." Meaning that the producers need to know their audience in order to target them effectively.

 I made this audience profile collage to represent the target audience for Avatar. This shows the median age of my audience is 22, it also shows they enjoy various magazines, games, high budget science fiction films, fast-food and conventions. This audience profile also shows that my audience would be either 'Settled Surburbans' or 'Urban Ventures' which are summaries created by the National Reader Survey, or NRS. 

ABC1  is a demographic profiling system also created by the NRS which determines an audience's spending power, my audience profile shows that my audience would fit into the BC1C2 category meaning my audience are typically middle class to skilled working class.

This is my imaginary entity which shows my understanding of a specific member of the target audience:

Sam is a 22 year old male from Manchester who has just finished his degree in Media. Sam is completely obsessed with film, when he’s not marathoning the Star Wars or middle earth franchise with beer, buckets of fried chicken and his geekiest friends, he’s creating his latest costume for next year’s ComicCon or travelling the stars in the latest Halo instalment.

He’s often picked on by others, including members of his own family, because he does not have a girlfriend and  LARP (Live Action Role Playing) is allegedly not a grown up thing to do at the local park on a Sunday morning. But Sam is a dedicated brother of the ‘Ice Cream Watch’ and if you don’t believe there is any importance in his mission to the ‘Slide of Doom’ then you know nothing John Snow.

 Gender

I think that the target audience's gender for my film is male, one reason for this is the protagonist who is played by Sam Worthington. As he is a male I feel this would make it easier for a male audience to relate to the character and therefore raise a male audience's appeal towards the film.The protagonist is a paraplegic (and an alcoholic in the special edition) but he does not let any of is problems get in his way and is very courageous, so in this sense he represents the 'ideal self' (Carl Rogers- 1980).

The protagonist, Jake Sulley, is part of the military and as the military is often stereotypically associated with men and the majority of the military are made up of men (this is supported by this document on the official parliament website which shows only 12.8% of the British military are female,) this also reinforces gender stereotypes due to the violence stereotypically associated with male dominance.

The character of Dr. Grace Augustine is juxtaposed to this as she represents a highly empowered character in this story which as she is female is a character who is more likely to appeal to a female audience. However, this character is played by Sigourney Weaver who plays similar characters in various films which also have large male audiences, most notably the Alien franchise. In fact, Richard Dyer (1972) said that "A star is an image not a real person that is constructed," this is known as a 'Star persona' which leads to many characters being typecast, Sigourney Weaver has constructed her star persona so well that she is often nicknamed 'The Sci-Fi Queen'.

Age

NSFW or nah?

The BBFC gave Avatar a certificate of 12, however I think that this film is aimed at a slightly older audience. I think this film is mainly aimed at people in their twenties and early thirties because of the film's content. Though the film is appropriate for a younger audience, I feel like some of the themes and plot-lines would be too complicated for a younger audience to understand particularly the science behind the diegesis, even my brain is still struggling to understand the Na'vi hair-tentacles (right).

Another reason I think the film is aimed at an older audience is because there are no children in the film, therefore I think it would be much easier for an older audience to be able to relate to the characters particularly as many of the actors were in this age range at the time of filming.

The film's director, James Cameron, had always planned on doing sequels to Avatar. And I think this is why the film aimed to have a 12 rating, as the film is also aimed at 'Settled Surburbans' who are likely to take their young children with them when going to see the film. This means that younger audience members grow with the films and become more eager to watch sequels in the future as the film essentially becomes a part of their childhood.

I also think that technology is a very important part of Avatar, an important thing about Avatar and a lot of other sci-fi and fantasy films is the fictional universe they create. And in more recent years, these universes are expanded because of the way fans are allowed to connect all over the world via the internet. Most people in the world have instant access to the internet in present day, but as this graph shows they are typically young adults so this is another way to reach out to that target audience. Members of this target audience are known as 'Digital Natives', this is again important because it shows how much this audience will value the use of CGI within Avatar, this can also influence their hobbies so that they revolve around technology meaning things like Avatar's official game are also very marketable to this audience.

Lifestyle

The NRS, National Reader Survey, are an organisation who specialise in demographic information.

Their audience classification system allows a producer to target their audience based on their type of lifestyle. I think that my audience fit in to the 'Settled Surburbans' and 'Urban Ventures' lifestyles (as stated in my audience profile). These lifestyles not only reflect the target age group, but also tell the producer how much disposable income a person has. This is important because it tells the producer who is most likely to consume the products based on their lifestyle.

Most of the leading characters in Avatar, including the protagonist, were in their early 30's so the 'Settled Surburbans' audience can more easily relate to the characters as they would be of a similar age.

Because the film is a science-fiction/ fantasy film, it will appeal to 'urban ventures' as they are more likely to go to events like 'Comiccon'. Denis McQuail (1972) theorised that people consume products for four reasons (Surveillance, Escapism, Building personal identity and Building personal relationships). This reflects the 'Urban Ventures' lifestyle because by going to film conventions and dressing up as the character they are still using escapism even after watching the film, this also helps them to build a personal identity because the film has shaped their interests around the film as well a building relationships because cosplaying allows others to make assumptions based on their aesthetics.

'Settled Suburbans' are likely to have relatively young children, I feel that this is another important factor to my target audience because (as previously mentioned) they are likely to take their children with them to see Avatar which is possibly why a lot of the showings were given the 12A certificate. Again as previously mentioned, this means that the children can enjoy the films from a young age and would be excited to see future sequels.

Spending Power

The NRS, or the National Reader Survey just in case you've forgotten already, use the ABC1 demographic profiling system. This is the most common targeting profiler and it is used to determine people's spending power and how much disposable income they have.

This, like lifestyle, helps to determine how much money the audience can spend on the companies product which is essential in turning a larger profit.

I feel that my audience would fit into the B, C1 and C2 social grades in this profiling system, also as stated in my audience profile. This means that my audience are typically either middle class, lower middle class or skilled working class. This is mostly due to the fact that AvaThis means that producers are more likely to aim the product at a people with more disposable income.

The disposable income of this particular target audience is important because of their 'Digital Native' lifestyle. This means they are more likely to be influenced by any technological merchandise, this also means they are more likely to be able to afford the various editions of the Avatar DVD (these include Blu-Ray, 3D, Special Edition and Extended Edition). They may even want to spend their money on the extras available on the Avatar website and if like 'Sam' they would like to attend ComicCon that means they also need plenty of money to spend on the Avatar merchandise.

The reason that I decided this film was not aimed at upper class people is in relation to lifestyle. Upper class people are not likely to be very family orientated due to high frequency workloads. As mentioned previously, bringing children to see the film is essential to building an audience for the entire franchise and not just the singular film.

Alternatively, (and slightly ironically) if an adult is consuming a media companies products, and paying for their children to also consume these products then they would also need more disposable income than most which is another reason why people in the D and E social grades would not be a suitable target audience.

And that is all I have to say for now, if you're still eager to know more then remember to keep up to date with this blog. And so until my next blog post, au revoir!