The document discusses several major film studios and their involvement in the horror genre. It analyzes Lionsgate, Warner Bros., 20th Century Fox, and Universal Pictures to determine the best distributor for a horror film opening sequence. Warner Bros. is identified as the top choice because it has distributed many successful horror films like Friday the 13th, generating over $91 million worldwide, compared to smaller returns from films distributed by other studios.

1. Institution Research
The horror genre has a total of 346 movies released and many set for
production. In the years they were released, the domestic gross would be
$8,662,469,379, which would be equivalent to a gross of
$12,729,024,148in today’s inflation adjustment.
The most popular film genre today is
This table shows that comedy genre is the most popular dominating 23.48%
of the overall market, whilst our chosen genre horror, with only 4.77% of the
market. There is a lot more comedy movies however compared to horror
therefore being a more popular genre to produce films for, but comedy can
be incorporated into horror like many have already such as ‘Shaun of the
dead’ and ‘zombieland’.

2. A bar graph showing the top grossing horror film distributors from 2004 –
2012

3. Looking at the graph above, it shows that the top film distributer of horror
films to this day is Lionsgatebeing responsible for the distribution of films
like ‘Hostel’, ‘Saw’ and its sequels, ‘The Last Exorcism’, ‘The Possession’, ‘My
Blood Valentine’ ‘The Haunting In Connecticut’ etc. The graph also shows
the main popular disturbers for the horror genre.
20th Century Fox, is a film corporation and one of the 6 major American film
studios. It is most popular for films such as Star Wars, Avatar and The
Chronicles of Narnia. They create mostly comedy and family films like Alvin
and the Chipmunks and Night at the Museum. But on the other hand, they
have produced films in the genre I have chosen to work on being horror with
the likes of disturbing and producing them. They distributed ‘From Hell’,
‘Jennifer’s body’ and ‘Shutter’ along with others. As 20th century fox is such a
large corporation and a successful distributer as ‘Jennifer’s body’ making a
worldwide gross of $31,556,061 so this would be a good corporation to
choose for the distribution of our opening sequence, but they do no
completely specialize in horror so it may not appeal to all their audience.
Warner Bros. is another popular and successful large film studios based in
California and New York, doing distribution, production and the creation of
films. Compared to 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros. had produced more well-
known and popular films, With 20th Century Fox sticking to more
comedy/fantasy/family genres whilst Warner Bros have seemed to dabble in
all different genres with great success to attract a large audience. Some of the
most well known horrors such as ‘Friday the 13th’, ‘The Wickerman’, ‘Orphan’
and ‘House Of Wax’ have been distributed and in some cases also produced
by Warner Brothers. Comparing the success of ‘Jennifers Body’ to ‘Friday the
13th’ making a worldwide gross of $91,379,051, our opening horror sequence
would be best distributer by Warner Brothers to maximize success and sales.
Also Universal Pictures known as Universal Studios, is also one of the 6
major film studios and is one of the oldest American movie studios still in
continuous production. Universal prefer to create films on
Drama/Romance/Adventure and have been most successful from ‘The
Bourne Ultimatum’, ‘King Kong’ and ‘Brokeback Mountain’. Sticking to their
‘safe’ genres they do not tend to create many horror films but they have
distributed ‘Drag Me To Hell’ and ‘The Strangers’. As Universal seems to
have less experience in my chosen genre I don’t think that this would be as
suitable for the distribution of my horror opening sequence, with therefore
Warner Brothers so far my still top choice.
Lionsgate is a Canadian entertainment company formed in Vancouver. As of
2007, it was the most successful independent film distribution company in

4. North America, which as our horror opening sequence would be classed as
being from an independent film company and not from a big producer this
may be a good company to distribute our film sequence. Some of the most
popular films created by Lionsgate were ‘Tyler Perry’s Madea Goes to Jail’
which made $41 million in its opening weekend. It distributed ‘Kick Ass’,
‘Rambo’ and ‘The Bank Job’. Their films usually stick to the similar genres of
drama/action and thrillers. But on the other hand the horrors it had
produced and distributed are well-known and very successful
gory/psychological horrors of Saw 3D, Saw 1/2/3/4/5/6, making a total
gross of $415,914,068. They also produced/distributed ‘The Last Exorcism’,
‘My Bloody Valentine’ and ‘The Eye’. Personally I think their only
memorable film/films where that of the Saw series but began to decrease in
popularity over time as new and more different horror films were being
produced that delved into other topics and unknown stories, so I don’t think
that Lionsgate would be suitable for the distribution of my type of film.