LAB REPORT 1 Non material digital movies and finances
With the outgrowing number of streaming platform and VOD it is necessary to rethink film its materiality and the way we use this media.
From the discovering and over used VHS and taped VHS to DVD and blu-ray. The outrageous number of web devices that allow us to stream and download software.
We will try to answer to the question of how these news practices are affected the film industry and the marketing behind it. We will go over the number and diverse company behind each market and analyze the new marketing tools put in place to keep this market alive. We will also try to find out if we are really buying less film or if we are just consuming more of them.
Non material digital movies: individual/group practice
From a practice that used to be a real entertainment, used for date, family reunion and friend gathering. We now, are experiencing film differently, watching them mostly in front of our laptop in the privacy of our bedroom mostly alone.
We will study how and why the movie experience is becoming an individual practice and will go over the different technics used today to try to maintain family viewing and the importance of a share experience.
From data on number of screening which are made alone toward group screening, to a more complex issue of what capitalism is doing to the society we will try to answer the question of the impact of technology on our entertainment practice. What are the benefits of individual versus group screening?
The television and its use
Television is a major element of our household. From what used to be an event and this magical tools which open our eyes to the outside and further world, television became a simple background noise of our household. Is television becoming an obsolete object? How T.V production and commercial are trying to keep us entertain by it?
As television program is now being watched in front of our computer or cellphone what are the consequences on how we watch T.V?
Is the concept of television changed from a concrete object to a digital content and what are the consequences?
We will try to answer these question by studying how media program and content are now available to us and why since T.V is made watchable through each screen, do we still have T.V in our living room?
Movie theater
It is a fact that movie theater are suffering from what the internet now offers to us. From a practice that used to be one of the prominent entertainment outside our house to a practice that became an ordinary practice inside our house. Is movie theater suffering from the different media available online? Which technics are in used to make us still attract to movie theater? Is the experience of watching a movie with an unknown crowd in a big black room that different than our agitated living room or comfy bedroom? Is the movie experience disappearing from our list of experience?
We will try to explore and answer these questions using research data and studying how movies are now perceived.
Bibliography and webography
IBISworld industry risk rating report, movie theaters in the US, February 2015
Miller, Toby. Television Studies: the basics, Routledge students edition, 2010
Caetlin Benson-Allott, How the Remote Control Rewired the Home. The Atlantic.
Thomas Elsaesser. The New Film Studies as Media Archaeology
Sheila Murphy. Alt-Ctrl: The Freedom of Remotes and Controls.” How Television Invented New Media.
Film is probably one of the most common art entertainment. If there was a time where film were only watched outside of our household in movie theatre they are now one of the most accessible entertainment inside of them. With the development of technology and internet, the way we watched movie has radically changed in less than a decade in this early twentieth century. This lead to a radical impact on the financial situation of film businesses. That's why I wonder today how film industry manage to be still profitable in view of the numbers of free streaming or download platform that exist. how is film surviving the non digital era? Through my research I couldn't find something that was answering fully my question. But I heard how the film industry has been research and how they started to invade and try to make profit of what the internet has to offer. therefore we will try to answer this question studying the movie theatre business: going through statistics and exploring the different way movie theaters try to stay appealing to his audience. Secondly we will study the different marketing business and advertisement change made to attract the audience to movie theatre studying the new way of making trailers, and visibility of film poster. Lastly we will study how paid streaming website found a way to be still attractive despite of the numbers free streaming platform that invade the web. To go further we could ask ourselves, how is the experience of watching a film different from fifteen years ago?Are the movie theater condemned to disappear ?
Movie theatre
Movie theatre used to be an entertainment. Used as an excuse to go out with friends family or even a date. Movie theatre was (or is) this magical place where everything was possible. Tuck in this black box, more frequently at night time, surrounded by strangers, we allowed ourself to forget about everything. Here sited in our seat, we were for two hours this super hero, this endearing middle aged women, this men that for some reason got into big trouble and acted more brave than anyone you know combined. Now, with technology movies are mostly seen from our couch, bedroom kitchen table.. we want to explore here the different consequences that this change has. How and if movie theatre are in danger, in other words, what outcome can we predict for Movie theatre? Going through documentaries I found the two side of the story: some predicting the disappearance of movie theater, some others stating how there is more spectators these past few years. This paper will try to explore this question going over statistics about movie theatre attendance, and try to dig through the most thrustful statistics. Then we will explore in what way does movie theatre try to stay an attractive place to spend our Friday night at. And lastly we will discuss through sociologic research, if movie theaters are still as magic as they used to be and therefore able to overcome this internet supremacy. To go further we could ask ourselves if movies are becoming more an individual practice than a social one? Or if movie theaters are more in danger in the USA than in other country like France? Bibliography
Harwell, DREW .. "Forget Netflix. Movie Theaters Are on Track to Have Their Best Year Yet." Washington Post. The Washington Post, 23 Feb. 2015. Web. 11 Mar. 2015.
Meyer Birgit, Peter Pels, Magic and modernity,Stanford University Press, 2003 - Body, Mind & Spirit - 390 pages
Siegal, Jacob. "Study Reveals Why We’ve Stopped Going to the Movie Theater." BGR. Boy Genius, 15 Jan. 2015. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
Strauss, Karsten ,. "TV and Film Piracy: Threatening an Industry?" Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 06 Mar. 2013. Web. 05 Mar. 2015.
LAB REPORT 3
The Movie theatre experience in France versus USA
Film was invented by the Lumière Brothers in the city of Lyon, France. Since then, Film became one of the most popular forms of entertainment in France and shortly after, all over the world.Since the early twenty-first century, the film industry did suffer from the emergence of the internet and free streaming websites, and from the multitude of devices that allows us to watch movies nowadays.“America's movie theaters have been dragged, kicking and screaming, into the digital age, not without a lot of collateral damage” (Susman).However these new technologies did not impact the popularity of movie theatres equally through the world. Having lived in both France and North America I did notice a strong difference of how film and movie theatres were seen and experienced. This is the reason why I would like to study here the differences of the “movie theatre experience” in the U.S. versus in France; in other words, why is the experience of going to the movie theatre different in the USA compared to France?
-----------Through my research it became clear to me that movie theatres in these two countries are facing different issues: -In the U.S.A we are experiencing changes toward movie theatre facilities. Increasing comfort and home-like atmosphere became the main priority. “theaters are going after new revenue and changing the moviegoing experience for millions of Americans, turning some multiplexes into luxury outposts and quasi-community centers while assigning new meaning to the concept of "dinner theater“ (Puente). This can be explained by the fact that services in the USA are extremely valuable and important to people. Americans are known to always expect improvement from services and entertainment industries. -In France, two different type of movie theatres coexist: one is purely commercial and can seem similar to americans movie theatre - the multiplex: there, food, VIP screenings, comfortable and large seats are all available. The movies shown are mostly blockbuster Americans movies.The second are independent movie theaters following the “art and essais” program: they promote independent, low-budget European and American movies. Food is mostly prohibited in these theatres and the theatre rooms are not focused on comfort and latest technology experience (such as 3D films) even if all movie theatre in France are now equipped with digital projection.
-----------If movie theatres are facing different issues in these countries it is because they faced different financial situations: -In the USA most movie theatres are part of large corporation. They are financially independent and therefore depend on frequentation to get a sufficient sales revenue. Some independent movie theatres exist, but represent a small amount of movie theatres throughout the country, and are mostly supported by private donation. -The french government is well known for financially supporting its culture: therefore, movie theatres have more freedom towards what they are programming ( here we are talking about independent movie theatres: an independent theatre is to be seen as movie theatre not part of a chain, or if so: still has freedom of its film programming ). The attendance of a movie is less important as it doesn't define the financial support given.
-----------Throughout the last decade, American movie theatres did suffer from a decrease in attendance: “2014 is the first time since 2011 that admissions have dipped below 1.3 billion, and the numbers are the lowest since 1.21 billion in 1995. That’s a 6% decline from 2013, when 1.34 billion tickets were sold”(Han), we understand now why they had to think of other ways to attract people. In France it is actually the opposite: movie theatres have reached record audience this two past years.“Avec plus de 208 millions d'entrées en 2014, le box office est en hausse de 7.7% par rapport à 2013” (With more than 208 billions entry in 2014, the box office raised of 7.7% in comparison of 2013. by Destouches ) This is not explained due to movie theatre renovation, but because of numerous successful French movies that were released during these last years (La famille Belier, Lucy...).
According to the Washington post “And, yet, despite all these wonderful innovations, Americans are not going to the cinema the way they once did” (Basulto), despite the improvement of movie theater, the attendance is still going down in the USA. This has been blamed mainly on ticket prices and on the development of movie platforms such as netflix. So what future can we predict for movie theatres in the USA? And what would happen to French cinema if the government stopped their financial aid, which has already been reduced these past ten years?
Bibliography and webography
Basulto, Dominic .. "Who Needs Movie Theaters Anyway?" Washington Post. The Washington Post, 6 Jan. 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Destouches, Thomas .. "Box Office France : Plus De 208 Millions De Spectateurs En 2014 !" AlloCiné. Tiger Global, 2 Jan. 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015
Han, Angie .. "2014 Box Office: Attendance Hits 20-Year Low." Film RSS. Film Cast, 02 Jan. 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015
Puente, Maria .. "Movie Theaters Are Turning up the Luxury with Food, Bars, Seats - USATODAY.com." Usatoday.com. USA Today, 14 Mar. 2010. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Siegal, Jacob. "Study Reveals Why We’ve Stopped Going to the Movie Theater." BGR. Boy Genius, 15 Jan. 2015. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
In this paper I would like to explore and understand why a practice such as Cinema which once was one of the best entertainment we had, is now almost seen as a simple object of commodity. The main consequences being that the number of attendance in movie theatre in the USA has been decreasing for years and that the issue I would like to focus on. To understand why this is happening, I would like to go through the different elements of this change, to explain the cause of this lower of attendance in Movie theatre. We will try to go through the different cause of this decrease such as : the development of digital technologies, movie prices, financial support and the cultural specificity of Americans. If this issue is important to me it is because I see myself as a filmaholic, in consequences I always considered Movie theatre as my second home. Once was a time where I was going one to two times a week to watch a Film, in a somewhat comfortable movie theatre but still a love of mine.
However my experience in North America has shown me that Film and Movie theatre are not perceived the same way as back in France.To a culture where I'm from where Movie are still some kind of event, here Movie theaters seems to be mostly perceived by the average americans as a service, a commodity. Something they attend one on a while as a change in their habits but without the big excitement that Europeans can have. This issue of the decrease of attendance affects the entire Film business who had and has to reshape entirely their marketing tools so as to bring people to the movie theatre ( more appealing trailers, Premiere...) . And these movie theatre are competing between each other to attract the most people possible. Therefore they have to make themselves more appealing than others and for that, they use different element such as marketing tools (cheap Tuesday, cheap entrance for the first time scheduled) and increase their seat comfortability as to offer the maximum service possible to their customers ( vip rooms, restaurant style food, reclined seats etc). Cinema doesn't face the same issue they once had, since the digital technologies and internet took such a strong place during this last decade. Therefore this attendance decrease has a repercussion on film business that might be reshaped again throughout the next decade. Numerous articles agree that movie theatre has been decreasing this past decade, according to T. Seppala, 2014 was the worst year since 1995 for Movie theatre. The ticket prices has been blame to cause less people to be able to attend movie more frequently. Indeed people are not ready ( and mostly can't afford) a 15-20$ tickets to a movie they are not even sure how good it will be and for the average viewer this is a crucial element. The united states is well known to be the place where everything is possible. Therefore services are a really strong element of the society. Because of that Americans are always looking for a cheaper, closer and more adaptable solution, to what they want and I believe this is one of the reason why people don't really care about going to the movie. Wealthy people even built their own private movie theatre without entrance fees and where they can pause the film whenever they want. Therefore in this paper I will try to explain why movie attendance in the USA has been decreasing, focusing my research on the last decade to take a closer look to movie practice in this digital era. This close up on the last decade will allow me to focus on the last change in movie theatre, the web era and the recent economy. I will sometimes refer to France as a counter example where Movie theatre attendance hasn't declined. This will allow me to argument on the cultural differences and to justify some assumption I would make toward financial support and spectatorship.
However my research will go toward the average americans, without taking in consideration the way people consider Film in their lives, as I will consider equally, auteur cinema to blockbuster when I will go through the box office charts.
Bibliography and webography
Barnes, Brooks."A year of disappointment at the movie box office".The New York times[New York] Dec 26, 2011. 3 pages. Print
Basulto, Dominic. "Who Needs Movie Theaters Anyway?"The Washington Post, 6 Jan. 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Dargis, Manohla. "Out There In the Dark, All Alone". The New York times,[New York] Apr 10, 2011. 2 pages. Print.
Destouches, Thomas. "Box Office France : Plus De 208 Millions De Spectateurs En 2014 !"AlloCiné. Tiger Global, 2 Jan. 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015
Han, Angie. "2014 Box Office: Attendance Hits 20-Year Low."Film RSS. Film Cast, 02 Jan. 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015
Puente, Maria."Movie Theaters Are Turning up the Luxury with Food, Bars, Seats" USA Today, 14 Mar. 2010. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Seppala, Timothy J. "2014 Was the Worst Year for Movie Attendance since 1995." Engadget, 2 Jan. 2015. Web. 19 Apr. 2015.
Siegal, Jacob. "Study Reveals Why We’ve Stopped Going to the Movie Theater." BGR. Boy Genius, 15 Jan. 2015. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
Non material digital movies and finances
With the outgrowing number of streaming platform and VOD it is necessary to rethink film its materiality and the way we use this media.
From the discovering and over used VHS and taped VHS to DVD and blu-ray. The outrageous number of web devices that allow us to stream and download software.
We will try to answer to the question of how these news practices are affected the film industry and the marketing behind it. We will go over the number and diverse company behind each market and analyze the new marketing tools put in place to keep this market alive. We will also try to find out if we are really buying less film or if we are just consuming more of them.
Non material digital movies: individual/group practice
From a practice that used to be a real entertainment, used for date, family reunion and friend gathering. We now, are experiencing film differently, watching them mostly in front of our laptop in the privacy of our bedroom mostly alone.
We will study how and why the movie experience is becoming an individual practice and will go over the different technics used today to try to maintain family viewing and the importance of a share experience.
From data on number of screening which are made alone toward group screening, to a more complex issue of what capitalism is doing to the society we will try to answer the question of the impact of technology on our entertainment practice. What are the benefits of individual versus group screening?
The television and its use
Television is a major element of our household. From what used to be an event and this magical tools which open our eyes to the outside and further world, television became a simple background noise of our household. Is television becoming an obsolete object? How T.V production and commercial are trying to keep us entertain by it?
As television program is now being watched in front of our computer or cellphone what are the consequences on how we watch T.V?
Is the concept of television changed from a concrete object to a digital content and what are the consequences?
We will try to answer these question by studying how media program and content are now available to us and why since T.V is made watchable through each screen, do we still have T.V in our living room?
Movie theater
It is a fact that movie theater are suffering from what the internet now offers to us. From a practice that used to be one of the prominent entertainment outside our house to a practice that became an ordinary practice inside our house. Is movie theater suffering from the different media available online? Which technics are in used to make us still attract to movie theater? Is the experience of watching a movie with an unknown crowd in a big black room that different than our agitated living room or comfy bedroom? Is the movie experience disappearing from our list of experience?
We will try to explore and answer these questions using research data and studying how movies are now perceived.
Bibliography and webography
LAB REPORT 2
The business of filmFilm is probably one of the most common art entertainment. If there was a time where film were only watched outside of our household in movie theatre they are now one of the most accessible entertainment inside of them. With the development of technology and internet, the way we watched movie has radically changed in less than a decade in this early twentieth century.
This lead to a radical impact on the financial situation of film businesses.
That's why I wonder today how film industry manage to be still profitable in view of the numbers of free streaming or download platform that exist. how is film surviving the non digital era?
Through my research I couldn't find something that was answering fully my question. But I heard how the film industry has been research and how they started to invade and try to make profit of what the internet has to offer. therefore we will try to answer this question studying the movie theatre business: going through statistics and exploring the different way movie theaters try to stay appealing to his audience.
Secondly we will study the different marketing business and advertisement change made to attract the audience to movie theatre studying the new way of making trailers, and visibility of film poster.
Lastly we will study how paid streaming website found a way to be still attractive despite of the numbers free streaming platform that invade the web.
To go further we could ask ourselves, how is the experience of watching a film different from fifteen years ago?Are the movie theater condemned to disappear ?
Movie theatre
Movie theatre used to be an entertainment. Used as an excuse to go out with friends family or even a date. Movie theatre was (or is) this magical place where everything was possible. Tuck in this black box, more frequently at night time, surrounded by strangers, we allowed ourself to forget about everything. Here sited in our seat, we were for two hours this super hero, this endearing middle aged women, this men that for some reason got into big trouble and acted more brave than anyone you know combined.
Now, with technology movies are mostly seen from our couch, bedroom kitchen table.. we want to explore here the different consequences that this change has. How and if movie theatre are in danger, in other words, what outcome can we predict for Movie theatre? Going through documentaries I found the two side of the story: some predicting the disappearance of movie theater, some others stating how there is more spectators these past few years. This paper will try to explore this question going over statistics about movie theatre attendance, and try to dig through the most thrustful statistics. Then we will explore in what way does movie theatre try to stay an attractive place to spend our Friday night at. And lastly we will discuss through sociologic research, if movie theaters are still as magic as they used to be and therefore able to overcome this internet supremacy.
To go further we could ask ourselves if movies are becoming more an individual practice than a social one? Or if movie theaters are more in danger in the USA than in other country like France?
Bibliography
LAB REPORT 3
The Movie theatre experience in France versus USA
Film was invented by the Lumière Brothers in the city of Lyon, France. Since then, Film became one of the most popular forms of entertainment in France and shortly after, all over the world.Since the early twenty-first century, the film industry did suffer from the emergence of the internet and free streaming websites, and from the multitude of devices that allows us to watch movies nowadays.“America's movie theaters have been dragged, kicking and screaming, into the digital age, not without a lot of collateral damage” (Susman).However these new technologies did not impact the popularity of movie theatres equally through the world.
Having lived in both France and North America I did notice a strong difference of how film and movie theatres were seen and experienced. This is the reason why I would like to study here the differences of the “movie theatre experience” in the U.S. versus in France; in other words, why is the experience of going to the movie theatre different in the USA compared to France?
-----------Through my research it became clear to me that movie theatres in these two countries are facing different issues:
-In the U.S.A we are experiencing changes toward movie theatre facilities. Increasing comfort and home-like atmosphere became the main priority. “theaters are going after new revenue and changing the moviegoing experience for millions of Americans, turning some multiplexes into luxury outposts and quasi-community centers while assigning new meaning to the concept of "dinner theater“ (Puente). This can be explained by the fact that services in the USA are extremely valuable and important to people. Americans are known to always expect improvement from services and entertainment industries.
-In France, two different type of movie theatres coexist: one is purely commercial and can seem similar to americans movie theatre - the multiplex: there, food, VIP screenings, comfortable and large seats are all available. The movies shown are mostly blockbuster Americans movies.The second are independent movie theaters following the “art and essais” program: they promote independent, low-budget European and American movies. Food is mostly prohibited in these theatres and the theatre rooms are not focused on comfort and latest technology experience (such as 3D films) even if all movie theatre in France are now equipped with digital projection.
-----------If movie theatres are facing different issues in these countries it is because they faced different financial situations:
-In the USA most movie theatres are part of large corporation. They are financially independent and therefore depend on frequentation to get a sufficient sales revenue. Some independent movie theatres exist, but represent a small amount of movie theatres throughout the country, and are mostly supported by private donation.
-The french government is well known for financially supporting its culture: therefore, movie theatres have more freedom towards what they are programming ( here we are talking about independent movie theatres: an independent theatre is to be seen as movie theatre not part of a chain, or if so: still has freedom of its film programming ). The attendance of a movie is less important as it doesn't define the financial support given.
-----------Throughout the last decade, American movie theatres did suffer from a decrease in attendance: “2014 is the first time since 2011 that admissions have dipped below 1.3 billion, and the numbers are the lowest since 1.21 billion in 1995. That’s a 6% decline from 2013, when 1.34 billion tickets were sold”(Han), we understand now why they had to think of other ways to attract people.
In France it is actually the opposite: movie theatres have reached record audience this two past years.“Avec plus de 208 millions d'entrées en 2014, le box office est en hausse de 7.7% par rapport à 2013” (With more than 208 billions entry in 2014, the box office raised of 7.7% in comparison of 2013. by Destouches ) This is not explained due to movie theatre renovation, but because of numerous successful French movies that were released during these last years (La famille Belier, Lucy...).
According to the Washington post “And, yet, despite all these wonderful innovations, Americans are not going to the cinema the way they once did” (Basulto), despite the improvement of movie theater, the attendance is still going down in the USA. This has been blamed mainly on ticket prices and on the development of movie platforms such as netflix. So what future can we predict for movie theatres in the USA? And what would happen to French cinema if the government stopped their financial aid, which has already been reduced these past ten years?
Bibliography and webography
LAB REPORT 4
American's don't go to the movies anymore
In this paper I would like to explore and understand why a practice such as Cinema which once was one of the best entertainment we had, is now almost seen as a simple object of commodity. The main consequences being that the number of attendance in movie theatre in the USA has been decreasing for years and that the issue I would like to focus on.
To understand why this is happening, I would like to go through the different elements of this change, to explain the cause of this lower of attendance in Movie theatre. We will try to go through the different cause of this decrease such as : the development of digital technologies, movie prices, financial support and the cultural specificity of Americans.
If this issue is important to me it is because I see myself as a filmaholic, in consequences I always considered Movie theatre as my second home. Once was a time where I was going one to two times a week to watch a Film, in a somewhat comfortable movie theatre but still a love of mine.
However my experience in North America has shown me that Film and Movie theatre are not perceived the same way as back in France.To a culture where I'm from where Movie are still some kind of event, here Movie theaters seems to be mostly perceived by the average americans as a service, a commodity. Something they attend one on a while as a change in their habits but without the big excitement that Europeans can have.
This issue of the decrease of attendance affects the entire Film business who had and has to reshape entirely their marketing tools so as to bring people to the movie theatre ( more appealing trailers, Premiere...) . And these movie theatre are competing between each other to attract the most people possible. Therefore they have to make themselves more appealing than others and for that, they use different element such as marketing tools (cheap Tuesday, cheap entrance for the first time scheduled) and increase their seat comfortability as to offer the maximum service possible to their customers ( vip rooms, restaurant style food, reclined seats etc).
Cinema doesn't face the same issue they once had, since the digital technologies and internet took such a strong place during this last decade.
Therefore this attendance decrease has a repercussion on film business that might be reshaped again throughout the next decade.
Numerous articles agree that movie theatre has been decreasing this past decade, according to T. Seppala, 2014 was the worst year since 1995 for Movie theatre.
The ticket prices has been blame to cause less people to be able to attend movie more frequently. Indeed people are not ready ( and mostly can't afford) a 15-20$ tickets to a movie they are not even sure how good it will be and for the average viewer this is a crucial element.
The united states is well known to be the place where everything is possible. Therefore services are a really strong element of the society. Because of that Americans are always looking for a cheaper, closer and more adaptable solution, to what they want and I believe this is one of the reason why people don't really care about going to the movie. Wealthy people even built their own private movie theatre without entrance fees and where they can pause the film whenever they want.
Therefore in this paper I will try to explain why movie attendance in the USA has been decreasing, focusing my research on the last decade to take a closer look to movie practice in this digital era. This close up on the last decade will allow me to focus on the last change in movie theatre, the web era and the recent economy.
I will sometimes refer to France as a counter example where Movie theatre attendance hasn't declined. This will allow me to argument on the cultural differences and to justify some assumption I would make toward financial support and spectatorship.
However my research will go toward the average americans, without taking in consideration the way people consider Film in their lives, as I will consider equally, auteur cinema to blockbuster when I will go through the box office charts.
Bibliography and webography