The document discusses film distribution, including what distribution involves, the roles of major studios and independent distributors, and strategies for marketing and releasing an independent low-budget thriller film. Distribution companies are responsible for marketing, release dates, and platform selection. They make licensing deals with producers and determine distribution plans. For an independent British thriller, targeting a UK audience, the document recommends partnering with an independent British distributor like Warp Films or self-distributing and focusing marketing on social media, posters, and TV advertisements of a similar genre.

1. Distribution Companies

2. What is Distribution?
 Distribution is about releasing and sustaining films in the market place.
 Vertical Integration - the three stages are seen as part of the same larger process, under the
control of one company
 Horizontal - distribution is necessarily a collaborative process, requiring the materials and rights
of the producer and the cooperation of the exhibitor to promote and show the film in the best
way possible

3.  A film distributor is responsible for the marketing, setting release date and deciding whether a film
should be shown in cinemas or other platforms such as DVD.
 A studio or production company have to make a licensing agreement with a distribution company,
they do this by either a sales agent acting on the behalf of parent studio, a deal with a studio or
production company to distribute all of their movies or a single title where a deal was made at any
stage.
 They then prepare a distribution plan, this plan is used to decide how and when to release the film
and through market research they will find a audience for the film.
 The distribution company then screens the film to buyers from cinema companies, but only if the
distribution company doesn't already own a chain of cinemas.
 The distribution company and cinema company then make a deal on the terms of the lease
agreement.

4. Distribution Companies
Unsurprisingly, the major Hollywood studios dominate the film distribution
business.
 Momentum pictures
 Lionsgate
 Paramount
 Warner bros
 Walt Disney
 20th century fox
 Universal
 Sony

5. Our Film
Major
Newline cinema is a popular distributor for psychological thriller films due to it’s films popularity. This
distributor has released films such as The Butterfly Effect and the successful film Se7en. This would
be a good distributor to use for our film, even though we aren’t producing a high budget film
Paramount is another possible mainstream distributor for our film as it has distributed popular
endorsed films such as shutter island. Due to its release of a film such as this it could be a distributor
for our films because we follow a similar idea as the main character suffers from flashbacks and
hallucinations.
Because of this these distribution companies will be most effective in the releasing and marketing of
our film.
Independent
Warp films are a small British institution. This would be a more realistic distributor for our film as it
doesn’t distribute high budget films and targets British audiences. Due to our film having only British
actors/actresses and being a low budgeted film Warp films could distribute our thriller as they have
released films similar to our own

6. Target audience
Uk audiences only or wider appeal?
Due to the actors and actresses in our film being primarily British, this will
have an effect on the audience it attracts, in addition our film will only be
low budget, meaning it will only really reach a wholly British audience.
However thrillers tend to have a wider appeal and attract a large audience
due to the genres exciting themes of suspense, mystery etc these are
relatble to a wider, international audience who enjoy the thrill and tension
they get from this genre.

7. Marketing strategies, Release strategies and
Exhibition options
 Marketing strategies for our film due to the low budget will mainly be based on social media, this means
we will have to have a lot of advertisement purely on social media such as teaser trailers, trailers, previews
on YouTube and promoted on Twitter, Facebook etc
 In addition to this we will have publicity stunts on big social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook in
which the actors/actresses get involved and characters within the film this will keep the audience excited
and in anticipation. We will also create pages on these sites to advertise and promote the film with
spoilers and updates on the film.
 We will also use other methods of marketing to promote our film such as posters and features in TV
magazines, we will make the design of these eye catching and appeal to our target audience. In addition
to this we will use typical strategies of marketing such as TV advertisements in between programs of
similar genre and story, meaning it will attract audiences who enjoy films of the thriller genre. Also will
include advertisements on billboards and on sides of buses this will mean we will be able to attract a
wider audience.
 For the release of our film we will mainly use online strategies such as Netflix and other popular sites this
is due to our low budget, however through popular demand on thriller films and the major promotion of
our film our film may gain popularity meaning there could be a chance to release it in cinemas etc.

8. Self distribution
 When self distributing your own film it allows you to gain full control and responsibility of your film this
means you deal with all the distribution and promotion yourself, due to the fact there is no third party
involved means you will save money as the expenses aren’t taken out of your budget to share with the
film distributor
 However self distribution is very time consuming and means you have the responsibility of dealing with
the legal rights of the film causing some difficulties to where and when you can distribute your film
decreasing the amount of sales made on the film