Consider how imaginative technique are used by media from your cross-media study to attract and maintain audience. Support your answers with reference a range of examples from three media platforms [32 marks]
Through careful examination and analysis of the films Ill Manors, A field In England and Belle, I was able to see their difference and similarities. For example, all industries used imaginative techniques to attract and maintain their audiences.
Ben Drew’s film ill Manors used a variety of imaginative techniques on the e-media platform to attract and maintain his audience. One of the ways to promote Ill Manors besides attract a bigger fan base was the tag London campaign. In synergy with the film’s soundtrack album, Ben Drew’s (also known as Plan B) fans tweeted their opinions on modern Britain along with the hashtag #illmanors. Some of these tweets were recreated by graffiti artist which were projected on London landmarks such as the Tate Britain and the House of Parliament. As Plan B portrayed that the government, especially David Cameron, do not aid young people or those who are less fortunate, projecting the tweets on the House of Parliament was significant. This helped to emphasise the political aspect of the film’s narrative besides draw attention to the film and soundtrack album. The fact that the audience was involved in promoting ill Manors by helping with the campaign made it quite successful. The website that offered links to the audience to buy, watch listen to ill Manors-related products. The graffiti and references to ‘broken Britain’ would appeal to the target audience of ill Manors of young, disaffected, urban people. Although, ‘lines of appeal’ (Dyer) might be ‘art’ (linking to the graffiti) and ‘glamorous locations’ (the ionic London landmarks). This would perhaps attract and maintain the interest of a middle class, left win, intellectual audience. Also the DVD release helped to maintain the audience as ill Manors came out in June but the DVD was released in September. The time gap enabled the audience to still look forward to a release from ill Manors. Another key aspect of the Ill Manors e-media promotion was the use of celebrity endorsement. Ben Drew asked celebrities to tweet and re-tweet references to the film to generate interest around the premiere of the film and the cinema release date. Later, is a great example of the two-step flow theory with ‘opinion leaders’ (celebrities) being use to promote the film to a wider audience which will attract people.
The print for ill Manors was another imaginative technique used to attract and maintain its audience. For example, the audience was attracted by the strong ill Manors brand. On every print platform, whether it was a billboard, poster or a DVD cover, the same font was used on ill Manors which made it recognizable for the audience. The font portrays estate buildings which links with the narrative for the film. In order to maintain but also attract the audience, Ben Drew went on interviews and magazine cover photo shoots. On the Men’s Health front cover magazine, he was photographed with a £1000 jacket. The medium shot of him differed from his usual look and attitude. His old fans who listens to his soundtracks would be surprised at this as his songs are towards the urban side however, Men’s Health magazine is directed towards the higher class social group and overall is a formal magazine. He was interviewed about how he had to lose weight for ill Manors which enabled the target audience to find personal identification (Blumler and Katz) in the article as they would be able to relate to his situation especially seeing is the demographics for the magazine is men aged 20-40 and the magazine promotes how they can lose weight. To attract a larger audience, Plan B was also on the front cover of the NME magazine. This picture was greatly effective but most importantly different from the Men’s Health magazine because he was photographed with his middle finger up and it said “…David Cameron be very afraid”. This depicts Plan B’s whole point about ill Manors and his soundtracks because he targets the government for the reason why there is a ‘broken Britain’. The magazine mostly targets reformers and people in the lower class group, D or E who would be interested to see why there is a threat towards David Cameron. The picture would send enigma codes to the audience and would draw attention to ill Manors as, in the article where Plan B was interviewed, in synergy, he mentions his soundtrack album. These imaginative print platforms helped attract audiences but also maintain as people would have been intrigued to find out Ben Drew’s personal opinion for ill Manors through the magazines.
Another way Ben Drew was able to attract and maintain audiences for ill manors through an imaginative manner was through the broadcast platform. He went on numerous TV chat show, interviews for instance the Tedx Lecture where he explained thoroughly his beliefs and values and why he wanted to create Ill Manors. Plan B explained that ill Manors is an oppositional reading (Hall) because he wanted to contradict the dominant ideology for young people as the media always convey young people as dangerous and as CHAVS (Council House And Violent). Young people in the media are continually associated with moral panic (Cohen) and Plan B wants to contradict this which would appeal to the eyes of reformers and strugglers. Plan B was also interviewed in a different way on the SBTV. Whilst he was editing for ill Manors, one of his unknown actors interviewed him. Even though the interview was informal, it would have help attract and perhaps maintain the audience for ill Manors because everyone is able to see him at work. Plan B is portrayed as a hard worker in this interview because he explains how the editing is going. The comedy of the interview would appeal to the core audience for ill Manors which would be young people as there is also a sense of rebellion in the beginning of the interview. A way in which Ben Drew was able to really maintain his audience was through the music video. His old fans would want to listen and find out how this links with the film but also it would attract new listeners. The music video is in synergy with the film ill Manors because the narrative is similar. However, the music video portrays a more powerful as well as meaningful message which would have been able to spread through YouTube and it was also on the Ill Manors official website. Through e-media, print and broadcast Ben Drew was able to attract and maintain his audience.
A Field in England used distribution as their main imaginative technique to attract audiences. A Field in England is an art house film which differs from a typical Hollywood movie and was made for £300K. The film was known for its imaginative distribution as they released all their platforms on the same day. They simultaneously released the film in VOD, free broadcast TV, DVD/Blu Ray and cinema. Field in England’s audacious approach to distribution certainly generated media interest and debate about the future of the current Hollywood model as it became the number one trending topic on Twitter in the UK. The advantage of doing so was that it attracted a lot of people and many were curious to find out why this film decided on doing such a unique distribution. The only problem that arose was that advertising and promoting the film would only be for a short period seeing how every platform had already been released. However, they film did get people talking and because it was a British film, it attracted the American audience as well as the British.
Lastly, the independent case study I chose was Belle. An imaginative way Bell attracted and maintained audiences is through print work. The main character Gugu Mbatha-Raw was on front covers of magazines such as ‘Rolling Out’ and was on most of all the print platforms used to promote the film. The brand used was effective as it was constructed around the font of Belle as it is a recognizable way to recognize the film. Also the main when shown on print works is in the costume for the film and is posing in a sophisticated and powerful manner. The brand connotes strength and power to the ones who are looked down on but also it connotes the 1700s and how racial opinions were much different than how they are today. Overall, it connotes the settings of the film which brings the powerful meaning behind Belle. This can be said to be similar to Ill manors because the ill Manors brand was also the font of ill Manors and how they conveyed the setting of the film which was estate buildings which then gives more information on the meaning behind the film. The fact that the film’s mise-en-scene was in 1700s Britain and the actors had British accents, which would appeal to the American audience. Another imaginative way in which Belle attracted and maintained their audience was through the e-media platform. On Instagram and Twitter hashtags of #bellefilm was going around and people were linking the hashtag with #12yearsaslave as both movies had a similar narrative. Also on Facebook, Oprah Winfrey stated how much she loved the film Belle and advised her fans to go watch the film. She then uploaded a picture of her with the stars of Belle. This is an example of the two-step flow theory because, as a famous person who has millions of fans that look up to her and listen to her advice besides opinion. Oprah has shown her fan base that she loves the movie. This promotes the film because her fans would be interested to watch the movie and perhaps even love it because Oprah did. Also the picture she uploaded helps to promote the film and the stars as people would recognize them after seeing the picture. Through the print platform, Bell attracted a bigger audience however through the e-media platform, Belle maintained audiences due to the continuous use of hashtags and uploads on social media.
To conclude, all three cross-media studies was able to attract and maintain audience by using imaginative techniques through the e-media, print and broadcast platforms.
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