“Discuss the ways in which media products are produced and distributed to audiences, within a media area you have studied (film)”

In this essay I will be discussing the ways in which ‘The Dark Knight’ was produced and distributed to the audience. The film industry is a very successful industry within media, whether you make a film in Britain or Hollywood, they both have the same process. The process consists of; pre-production, production, distribution, marketing and exhibition.

In 2008, director Christopher Nolan released his sequel to ‘Batman Begins’ titled ‘The Dark Knight”. It is the first live action Batman film without the word ‘Batman’ in its titles. Christopher Nolan wasn’t willing to jump into a second ‘Batman’ movie without first being convinced there was a compelling reason to a sequel. After tossing around ideas as to where the story would go, David S Goyer and Christopher Nolan and his screenwriting partner Jonathan came up with the basic ideas of ground to cover in ‘The Dark Knight’. The screen writer David S Goyer created two sequels which introduced the Joker and Harvey Dent before the release of Batman Begins. The cast stayed the same from the previous film and as the first film was very successful, the actor’s wages would have increased. The film was shot within the budget, £185,000,000 and made gross revenue of £1,001,413,744. This indicated to the audience the success of the film, as it was shot in budget and made a lot of profit. Filming took place in Hong Kong from November 6 to 11 2007, at various locations. This included the International Finance Centre; this is Hong Kong’s tallest building. This scene is for where Batman captures Lau.

The studio which produced the film was Legendary Picture, a subsidiary company to Warner Bros Picture. The studio is very well known due to the many classic and most successful movies of all time, Warner Bros Pictures is a leading motion picture studio. Also Warner Bros Pictures distributes New Line Cinema and DC Entertainment releases. ‘The Dark Knight’ is based on the DC Comics character Batman from May 1939 by ‘Detective Comic’. ‘Batman’ also had an animated television programme which was quite successful. They have become one of the world’s biggest franchises due to all the toys and books and movies. Warner Bros Pictures, decided to produce the next sequel due to the success of the pervious film.

The film is dedicated to two star actors Conway Wickliffe and Heath Ledger. In September 2007 whilst planning a stunt with the Batmobile in a special effects facility in England, Conway Wickliffe was killed when his car crashed. A month after in London, there was a 200-foot fireball filmed for an opening sequence; they received calls from local residents who feared a terrorist attack on the station. Heath Ledger dyed from a toxic combination of prescription drugs which lead to intense attention from the press which made newspaper headlines.

‘The Dark Knight’ was produced, distributed and marketed by Warner Bros Pictures, they are one of the top five studios, this highlights that they are a very successful company. There were a few trailers made for the movie. There was one main trailer and a few short trailers, this highlighted different clips that were in the movie, this created suspense for the audience. However the short trailers only include basic features such as the name of the film ‘The Dark Knight’ and the stars involved and the release date with short clips. These trailers are used in Cinema’s when viewing another movie and on TV shown as adverts to distribute the movie.

Another way in which they got ‘The Dark Knight’ well known to the audience was the posters that they created. These posters came out before the release of the film, this is because it then grabs the audience’s attention straight away and encourages them into wanting to watch the film when it’s released, and this is also because many people know that the previous Batman was a successful movie and raised a lot of money.   Also there were various print advertisements, they were found in newspapers and magazines to give further publicity to the film. Word of mouth is an excellent way to get the film well known; this is the use of technology as we have social networking sites which help to get the film well known. Social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook are a great way as you can RT certain tweets about ‘The Dark Knight’. This could include Synergy, which is interconnected marketing and distribution of media products across a range of platforms and sectors.

Moreover, the online marketing campaign included a website for ‘The Dark Knight’, they website allowed the audience to see updates, email newsletter and special chats with Batman, the director which DVD owners could get involved with. They could also order the film on demand through the official website and download on the go. Not only could they download on the website but they could download the free iPhone app which they could also watch and download the movie. The app consists of many video clips and scenes from the movie. ‘The Dark Knight’ has many freebies such, wallpapers, phone wallpapers, ringtones, sound clips, buddy icons for MSN, Skype, Facebook Twitter icons. All these freebies highlight that they believed that the film was going to be successful. This is another way of getting the film known to the audience.

‘The Dark Knight’ had a guaranteed audience due to previous movie therefore they knew they were going to make a lot of money. Therefore the ways in which media products are produced and distributed to audience is through the same process of pre production, production, distribution, marketing and exhibition. All of these stages are important for a movie to be successful. If you don’t have a good marketing campaign then you are likely to have poor reviews as you haven’t aimed your product to your target audience. This is by showing different ways of marketing. For example social networking sites in order for word of mouth to be spread.