The document compares the low-budget film Paranormal Activity and the high-budget film Avatar in terms of their production companies, budgets, box office earnings, and the success of their production companies' other films. Paranormal Activity was produced by lesser-known Solana Films on a $15,000 budget, while Avatar was produced by major studio Twentieth Century Fox on a $237,000,000 budget. Both films earned much more than their budgets but Avatar earned over $760 million worldwide compared to Paranormal Activity's $107 million. Twentieth Century Fox is a more established and successful production company compared to Solana Films.

1. LOW BUDGET VS. HIGH BUDGET

2. Paranormal Activity (2009)’s main production companies were Solana Films
and Blumhouse Productions. However, Paramount and DreamWorks can be
acknowledged for the distribution of the movie.
Avatar (2009)’s main production companies were Twentieth Century Fox Film
Corporation and Dune Entertainment. The distributor of the movie was
Twentieth Century Fox.
1)WHAT ARE THE MAIN INSTITUTIONS
USED FOR EACH OF THE FILMS? (IN TERMS
OF PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION?)

3. Paranormal Activity’s budget was a measly estimated $15,000 in comparison to
Avatar’s estimated $237,000,000.
2)HOW MUCH MONEY WAS USED TO
PRODUCE EACH FILM? (THE BUDGET)

4. Paranormal Activity made £3,593,762 in it’s opening weekend in the UK and
grossed a total of over $107,917,283 in the USA.
Avatar made £8,509,050 in it’s opening weekend in the UK and grossed a total
of over $760,505,847 in the USA.
3)HOW MUCH MONEY WAS MADE FROM
EACH OF THE FILMS?

5. Paranormal Activity's production companies aren’t known too well at all.
Solana Films are only responsible for the Paranormal Activity franchise
although Blumhouse Productions can be acknowledged for a select few other
recent movies of the same genre such as Sinister, Insidious and Dark Skies.
Avatar’s production company is a very well-known household name. Twentieth
Century Fox can be graced for their extensive back-catalogue of many
different movies of varied genres. Everyone knows at least five movies that
have been produced by them.
4)HOW WELL KNOWN ARE THE PRODUCTION
COMPANIES FOR BOTH THE HIGH-BUDGET AND
LOW-BUDGET FILM?

6. Paranormal Activity’s institution ‘Solana Films’ operates in a very simple way-
using fairly traditional equipment due to their small budget. Whereas Avatar’s
production company, Twentieth Century Fox are able to use millions of
pounds worth of high-tech equipment to produce their film as their budget is
giant and they’ll be getting all of their budget money back in the form of the
total gross after the film has finished it’s theatrical period.
5)LIST THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE
HIGH-BUDGET FILM AND THE LOW-BUDGET
FILM IN TERMS OF THE INSTITUTIONS.

7. I cannot think of any similarities between both institutions as they are both so
different to each other- one has only worked on one franchise and the other is
responsible for over 1500 movies. Both movies are similar in that they both
did exceptionally well in the box office and made considerably more money
than was invested in their budget.
6)LIST ANY SIMILARITIES THAT EXIST BETWEEN
THE HIGH-BUDGET FILM AND THE LOW-BUDGET
FILM IN TERMS OF THE INSTITUTIONS.

8. Solana Films:
Paranormal Activity 2- made $84,749,884 total gross.
Paranormal Activity 3- made $104,007,828 total gross.
Paranormal Activity 4- made $53,884,821 total gross.
In comparison to the original’s total gross of $107,917,283, the sequels haven’t done as well as
most sequels tend to do (disregarding the ‘Iron Man’ franchise). However, ‘Paranormal Activity 3’
did nearly as well as the original with only a few million dollars short of gross. I believe that the
sequels did not make as much money due to the fact that the selling point of the first movie was
that we, as an audience, did not know what to expect.
Twentieth Century Fox:
Black Swan- made $106,952,327 total gross.
Love & Other Drugs- made $32,357,532 total gross.
Prometheus- made $126,464,904 total gross.
In comparison to Avatar’s total gross of $760,505,847, none of these examples of Twentieth
Century Fox’s other movies did nearly as well. This could be due to James Cameron’s popularity
amongst film-lovers with his back-catalogue which contains classic movies such as
Aliens, Terminator 2 and of course, Titanic.
7)WHAT OTHER FILMS HAS THE PRODUCTION
COMPANY MADE? WERE THESE AS SUCCESSFUL?
WHY/WHY NOT?

9. Paranormal Activity’s main production company was Paramount Pictures.
Paramount make a whole variety of different genres of movies. For
example, they are responsible for the Transformers and Madagascar
franchises. Avatar’s main production company was Twentieth Century Fox.
Twentieth Century Fox, like Paramount, produce a good variety of movies.
‘How To Train Your Dragon’ and ‘X-Men: First Class’ are good examples of
Twentieth Century Fox’s back-catalogue. This variety is good because many
different audiences are affected by the company as opposed to an institution
which only caters for a certain genre of film. The genre of films that the
company usually produce is very important when considering who could
produce a potential movie as their history of movies within the same genre
can speak for how well or how unwell they make movies of the particular
genre. For example, producers of a horror movie would not consider a
production company that specialises in cartoon children's movies to make
their film.
8)WHAT GENRE OF FILMS DOES THE COMPANY
USUALLY PRODUCE? IS THIS IMPORTANT WHEN
CONSIDERING WHO COULD PRODUCE YOUR FILM?
WHY?

10. Solana Films appeal to horror movie enthusiasts whereas Twentieth Century
Fox aim for all audiences. These two audience aims are definitely reflected
through their film choices.
9)WHAT AUDIENCES DO EACH OF THE
INSTITUTIONS AIM TO APPEAL TO? IS THIS
REFLECTED THROUGH THEIR FILM CHOICE, OR
DOES THIS VARY?

11. I believe that Twentieth Century Fox definitely outperforms Solana Films as
they aim to offer many different genres of film to a wide and extensive
audience whereas Solana only cater for horror movie enthusiasts. Twentieth
Century Fox are definitely more successful than Solana Films and this is
reflected by the total gross of their films and the amount of movies in which
they have produced. Twentieth Century Fox is also a well-known, popular
institution as opposed to Solana Films, of which I hadn’t even had heard of
until now, bearing in mind that I've shamefully watched all of the Paranormal
Activity movies time and time again.
10)WHICH INSTITUTION DO YOU FEEL
OUTPERFORMS THE OTHER AND COULD CLAIM
TO BE MORE SUCCESSFUL, CONSIDERING YOUR
RESEARCH? EXPLAIN YOUR REASONS.