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Distribution of The Descent
Cambridge Technicals
Unit 1: Introduction to Media Studies – LO3: Distribution and
Marketing.
The Descent is a horror movie by Celador Films where five girls,
one who has been mentally disturbed by the death of her husband
and daughter, descend down to a cave and end up being trapped
with unknown creatures known as crawlers. It was released in
2005 and by Pathe in Europe, with North American distribution
handled by Lionsgate. For this task, I will describe how Pathe had
distributed The Descent in the UK.
I will split the forms of distribution into three categories:
• Primary distribution, how the film has been distributed first.
This is commonly the cinema.
• Secondary distribution, how the film has been distributed
outside of primary distribution, for example television, disc
formats, on-demand and digital download from online
stores.
• Finally, illegal distribution, how the film has been
distributed in a manner breaking certain laws (commonly
under copyright law), for instance torrents, direct downloads
or copying.
Primary Distribution
Primary distribution is how and where the film will be distributed
first. The common place to distribute films to the mainstream
audience through primary distribution would be large, company-
owned cinemas. The UK houses several companies specialising in
cinemas, including Cineworld, Vue Cinemas and Odeon.
Sometimes, a film may be released at a festival before it gets a
mainstream cinema release. This was the case for The Descent.
The Descent was distributed in cinemas for theatrical release. It
debuted at the Dead by Dawn festival in Scotland on 6th July
2005. It was then distributed to mainstream cinemas on 10th July
2005. It showed on 329 screens, earning £2.6 million, however the
London bombings that had happened at the same time as the
movie’s release has been said to affect box office sales. In the
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US, it managed to earn $26 million on its release date of August
4th
2006. In places in Europe other than the country the movie was
produced in, which we know as the UK, only a limited selection of
cinemas managed to show The Descent.
Secondary Distribution
The Descent was soon released on other forms of distribution
since 2006. You can buy this movie on DVD, which was released
on Boxing Day in 2006. Its price has decreased to £5 or below as
the movie ages, however the recommended retail price at the time
may be been £10 or more. DVDs are usually the first form of
secondary distribution, as many people own devices capable of
playing DVDs, such as computers, DVD players, televisions and
game consoles. A BluRay version of the movie can be bought
since its release on 9th
November 2009, which due to the
production of BluRay discs may cost £25 or more. Sometimes,
The Descent is bundled with other horror movies, costing at least
£17. An example of such bundles can be seen here, from Zavvi,
whom is selling a bundle that contains The Descent, 28 Days
Later (created by British film company DNA Films) and Dog
Soldiers (another movie directed by Neil Marshall). Popular places
to buy DVDs in the UK, including ones for The Descent, include
LOVEFiLM, Amazon and HMV.
The movie can also be bought in digital formats, however the UK
cannot use such digital formats. Digital formats are preferred as
they don’t create physical clutter on a shelf, pile, etc. and they
could be played (almost) anywhere. iTunes is selling the film for
14.99 USD, and Amazon’s Instant services sell the movie for 6.99
USD, with a rent price of 1.99 USD so you can watch the movie
for around 24 hours. Google Play provides the same prices as
Amazon for this particular movie.
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There is no triple pack for The Descent. A “triple pack” is a set of
methods to play the movie in any aspect of your home: A DVD to
allow playback on the common TV or DVD player, a BluRay for
those wishing for higher quality or enhanced audio with their
BluRay players, and a digital format to allow playback on your
computer, tablet, smartphone or portable game console (Sony’s
PSP and Vita, for example, as they provide the best support for
digital video formats). People may buy triple packs as they contain
every format needed to play the movie anywhere and everywhere.
Sometimes, a TV channel may distribute films. Syfy, in Latin-
American areas and the US, distributed the Descent to television.
Canada’s “The Movie Channel” distributed The Descent in such
country. In the US, the ending where Sarah is seen hallucinating is
cut, as Americans are known to never like a film that has an
“uber-hopeless” (quote from director) ending. The Latin American
and Canadian showings showed the original ending, however
Syfy’s US showing showed the cut ending.
A quick Google search for “The Descent Netflix” gives a result
showing the movie’s page on Netflix’s US site, as well as in
Mexico and Brazil. Netflix is one of the mainstream services that
offer streaming, however they do not offer The Descent in other
countries than the American continents so far. People consume
media at a fast rate, and with sites like YouTube that provide on-
demand video, people expect to watch everything, including
movies, instantly, which is where Netflix comes in.
While the UK has access to a DVD and BluRay release of The
Descent, they will find it harder to find a digital copy of the movie,
which is why they may resort to…
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Illegal Distribution
Illegal distribution is when the film is distributed in a way that
doesn’t comply to copyright or distribution laws, and/or usually
not satisfying the distribution company. Many people know the
act of illegal distribution to be called piracy. The film company
treats copying, peer-to-peer networking (for instance, torrents)
and direct downloading from a server as piracy.
People pirate (illegally download) movies like The Descent for
several reasons. A common reason that people download illegally
is due to lack of money. Another common reason said is due to
the digital rights management on digital and disc formats of the
movie. Such formats may include restrictions to make sure no
more than a certain amount of devices can play a movie, or
require the user log into a certain account of another service
before playing the movie. Some users experience issues with the
restrictions on certain computers, and resort to a version of the
film released on unrecognised, shady websites with a format that
doesn’t use restrictions. Another reason seen on websites is that
the pirates see it as “try-before-you-buy”. Other, yet not very
popular reasons also include age limits (The Descent has a rating
of 18 by the BBFC) and dislike for the company or director behind
the film.
Some countries’ copyright laws allow copying of films and other
media (typically audio and software) as long as the film is copied
for back-up purposes, for instance when a film was bought on
DVD and the buyer wants to back the movie up to their hard drive
in case the disc gets damaged and becomes unreadable by disc
drives. Some countries’ laws also allow copying for educational
purposes, an example would be Heath Park’s media department
giving the students a copy of The Descent to watch on their own
desktops for analysis. It is however illegal to copy your store-
bought film for a friend, for instance, as the friend has not bought
it for themselves to watch and no-one involved in the official
distribution is receiving any money for this form of distribution.
A quick Google search for “the descent movie” can show results
for “torrent” downloads or direct downloads. Torrent downloads
are when multiple people have the same file containing a film and
are distributing it to others. Direct downloads are when the file is
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being distributed and received on one server and is easy to take
down sometimes. Some direct download sites offer an option to
stream the content they want to watch, similar to that of YouTube
and Netflix. Google has a feature for related results, showing “the
descent movie watch online free”, “the descent movie download”
when I had searched for “the descent movie”. Google are working
to remove such results, and have put notices on search results
when a certain intellectual property is being uploaded illegally to
the Internet and being indexed by Google.
