Ownership Essay

 

The film industry is dominated by the Big 5 conglomerates, Disney, paramount, universal, Sony and Warner bros. These conglomerates have acquired many subsidiaries over the years which has created an oligopoly that effectively acts as a monopoly, controlling the majority of media output and raking in billions of dollars each year.

Part of understanding the media industry, is understanding the contrast of the Big 5 and the independent film making industry. The Big 5 have the financial means to hire A list actors and buy top quality equipment. Independent filmmakers do not have such advantages and this makes it much harder to compete with the likes of the Big 5. However it does not guarantee success for a Big 5 film, or failure for an independent film. Passion of the Christ was one such independent film that succeeded in the Hollywood stage. It was the highest grossing R-rated film for several years before being dethroned by Deadpool. The Interview is an example of a Hollywood film that did not succeed albeit to more political factors. However political factors are less likely to be an issue for independent filmmakers. The Batman released in 2022 is a Hollywood film that succeeded as expected, drawing in $770 million in a reduced theatrical window of 1 month. Even this is nowhere near the heights that the highest grossing films of all time have reached, with the highest being Avatar at $2.847 billion.

An independent film most of the time can only be considered successful for its scale. What We Do in the Shadows was considered a success for the type of film it was grossing just $7.3 million for its $1.6 million budget compared to the batman which grossed $770 million on a $200 million budget. Both were successful in their own right in regards to their scale. 

Another benefit of the Big 5’s financial advantage is their ability to utilise cross media convergence and synergy. To effectively use these requires a lot of money , the vast majority of which sits in the hands if these conglomerates, and not the independent filmmakers. This means these filmmakers are further disadvantaged in an already dominated industry.

The Hobbit films did this with Air New Zealand with a viral safety video that promoted the film even further than it already had been because of the existing fan base from the previous Lord of the Rings films as well as the books from decades earlier.

This also links to the types of films being produced. Hollywood focuses on franchises with myriad prequels and sequels catering to these established fan bases. Organisations like the New Zealand film commission (NZFC) seek to make films that tell New Zealand stories. This is partly because of the lack of popular franchises that come from independent and small scale films. They have to look at alternative ways to get their content out to the world. The film industry is harder to succeed in unlike a platform like YouTube or TikTok which has a much wider variety of successes. This in turn is part of Shirkys end of audience theory which is based off the belief that audiences are no longer passive and seek to produce media as well as consuming it. This has coined the term “prosumers”. There are opportunities for prosumers to succeed but succeeding at the level of the Big 5 is unrealistic for most.

However a problem that the Big 5 has to deal with especially with the rise of streaming services is piracy. As films are released theatrically they can be pirated in 2 months or on streaming within 2 hours. Independent films have the issue too as they are more likely to be released straight to streaming. Success in the industry comes with its benefits as well as its drawbacks, but either way is not very easy to attain.