Audience and Industry

I will be researching two films and finding out details of where they came up with the idea of it and how they developed it into being a sensation. The films that I will be researching include; Les Miserables and The Avengers.

The Avengers

Development

The avengers is made up of many of the marvel superheroes including; Thor, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Captain America, Hawkeye and other heroes like this. These were created back in the 1900’s and the marvel industry decided to collaborate the heroes together rather than do separate films. Have you ever noticed how in the marvel films there is always a bit at the end that leads you up to the avengers? The idea for the film had already been created while the singular films were made, so The Avengers had already been created without the need for more ideas. It is basically all the marvel films merged into one.

Many different studios were used to make this new marvel film possible. The one main studio which is the Marvel Studios was also involved in all the previous films so using it for the avengers was most probably essential for it work properly. The marvel studios also have association with the Walt Disney Studios and motion pictures. The actual owner of the Marvel studios is someone called Kevin Feige and he is also the film’s producer and the head of the Marvel Studios so he has many jobs. The owner of the Walt Disney Studios is Dave Hollis and he also holds the role of vice president.
The film itself had quite a big budget for it to be made and that was around $220 million dollars. However they would film everything within that cost and couldn’t go over at all. In the box office the film did very well and they received $1.5 billion dollars. A very large profit.

Pre–Production

The people who wrote the script for The Avengers were called Zak Penn and Joss Whendon. Joss also directed the film himself. The Avengers had many stars involved in it. The people in the film include; Chris Hemsworth, Robert Downey Jr and Chris Evans along with many others. The film was all filmed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in the USA.

Whilst filming was taking place the producers had to send out a team of about 20 people to go into New York to take photos just so that they could re-create the whole of New York in a 3D program. This was so that they could create realistic explosions. The majority of the fight scenes done were actually down to the use of CGI and with the exception of a couple they actually re-made the whole of a real life set.

Production

The filming of The Avengers film only took around 2 months to do however this did not include editing and VFX etc. To film The Avengers the cameras that they used were I-MAX 3D Cameras of which there are only 26 in the world.

Post-Production

The people that actually sat and edited the film were called Jeffery Ford and Lisa Lassek. Eventually the film was released on April 11^th 2012. The Avengers had Industry light and magic who are very good at VFX. To do it all they use their very own programming that is similar to the 3DS Max and it has used a lot of similar things like Vray and FumeFX.

The film had many different formats of marketing and this included the use of social media. They did pop ups and twitter posts, advertising the film with sponsors and posting trailers that anyone can watch to become interested in the film. The trailers were put on many places like YouTube, Television, Billboards and even put at the start of other films just for another marketing strategy.

The Avengers received many reviews and the majority of them were positive. One review that I found on the website Rotten Tomatoes stated that it was the most exciting and enjoyable experience they have had with a film. Another said that it was the best action film they had ever seen. After looking through more reviews I noticed how many of the reviews/fans said that The Avengers film was very intense and how upbeat and action packed it was.

The film came out on Blu Ray and DVD on September 17^th 2012 so quite a few months after it came out in the cinema.

 
Les Miserables

This film was initially based in the late 1980s as an on stage musical. There were a few studios that allowed Les Miserables to be made as a film rather than keeping it as a traditional play. These studios included; Universal Pictures, Relativity Media, Cameron Mackintosh Ltd and Working Title film. The Universal Pictures studio is owned by a man called Ronald Meyer. The film had a specific set budget of $40 million dollars as they didn’t want to overdo it. The people that actually finalised the decision to make the film and produced the film are called Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Debra Hayward and Cameron Mackintosh.

Pre-Production

The person who actually scripted the film and wrote all the lines was someone called William Nicholson. He came up with the initial sequence and character roles for the film version of the play. The person who directed the film himself was Tom Hooper. This man was in charge of direction and set up/improvement. There were many stars in this film including Hugh Jackman, star of Wolverine, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, star of The Princess Diaries and Amanda Seyfried, main star of Mamma Mia. The whole film was made in the UK at a place called Chatham Historic Dockyard, Chatham in Kent.

Production

The amount of time this film took to make has not been confirmed yet but it is usually around 2 months for shooting. This is not including editing and changes that have been made.  The cameras that they used for Les Miserables were from a company called Light and these were 3D cameras. This would give the audience a choice of whether they wanted to watch the film in 2D or 3D.

Post-Production

The editing of the film was done by a woman called Melanie Ann Oliver and it was also edited again by someone called Chris Dickens. The film was then released on December the 5^th in the UK at the London premier but then released on the 25^th December 2012 in the USA.

The special effects in Les Miserables were mainly used in the scenes which consisted of the characters performing a song. This was so that they could flesh out the scenes. It would also enhance the performances.

This film only used three marketing strategies, so this was quite a few less than The Avengers. Les Miserables only used trailers, social media and posters. Posters would be large and found on buses and in cinemas themselves. This so if someone was to go to a cinema to pick what to watch, Les Miserables would effectively stand out to the audience, hopefully encouraging more people to go and watch it. It actually received a total of $1.8 billion dollars in gross.

A lot of the film reviews were saying that Les Miserables was a film that made you feel intense and gave a somewhat thrilling feeling by honouring the emotional core of the story. Other reviews also spoke about how it was a sweeping film that was well anchored, cast and is ‘such a clutch’.

The Blu Ray disc and DVD came out eventually on March 22^nd 2013.