'Film's New World Order' by Michael Gubbins

'Film's New World Order'

Over the course of the weekend I was able to read through this article (title mentioned above) writen by Michael Gubbins, the current editor of the Screen International and Screen Daily, disscuses how modern day Hollywood is strugling with several problems, particularly of the economic sort and how this will present Independent film companies and European Union member states with the chance to expand thier film industry.

Gubbins lists the problems being the looming 'credit crunch', the writers' strike, debates with actors as well as the fear of DVD revunes because of their new media successors. Also Gubbibns also mentionshow news analyst Global Media Intellegence (GMI) claims that this summer's record breaking were in fact covering economic losses for major studios, and that blockbusters last year collectively lost $1.9 billion, while back in 2004 blockbusters made profits that altogether summed up to $2.2 billion.

Ira Deutchman founder and CEO of Emerging Pictures suggests that that this has offered the oppurtunity for Indie's to make sure that the business remains dominated in the studios rather then online, though Deutchman states this will take place over a period of time and that the public will not see this potential right now. Deutchman claims how major studios are not able to handle money responsibly and that there are less expensive way of making and distributing these movies, "they take way too much money out of the equation".

Chris McGurk of Overture Films, states how films are more successful when directors have tighter control particularly on marketing and distribution. Gubbins metions Pedro Almodovar (director of Volver suprisingly!) and how that he works close with his brother Agustin, through their company El Deseo, making sure they have input in the marketing process of their films, with Agustin Almodovar quoting "We make business our ally." This is a possibble reason why Pedro enjoyed such success with Volver, because Almodovar clearly had the intention to market the film to a Western audience.

A particular quote from the article that relates back to my hypothesis is 'Many film companies focus largely on local film or look outward to wider global audiences'