"Odeon Ends Alice in Wonderland Boycott" - The Guardian. Adam Dawtrey. Thursday 25 February 2010

Three major multiplex cinema chains in the UK, Vue, Odeon and Cineworld, all planned to boycott the film "Alice in Wonderland" and not show it in their cinema's. This arrangement had been made due to Disney's plans to release the film three months ahead of schedule.

Cineworld soon agreed to make a deal with Disney, and Vue quickly followed, however Odeon wouldn't give in and maintained that they would show the film. Although they were saying to the public they wouldnt were arranging secret deals with Disney until they got an offer that they couldn't refuse. I think that Odeon would have made the right decision taking the film as it was such a popular film and them being the biggest cinema chain in the UK would have made their customers unhappy by not showing the film and many of them would have gone to watch the film in another cinema. The company also would have benifited from holding out against Disney as it meant Disney would have been more desperate to strike a deal with them, because their cinemas are so popular in the UK.

Disney claims that flexibility is necessary to combat piracy, whereas cinemas think it will seriously damage their box-office takings. In agreement with Cineworld, Disney agreed to only break the four month waiting period with three films in the nest to years, this included Alice. Odeon apparently have secured a much longer and subtantial agreement with Disney as well as fresh ageement on commercial terms. This means that Odeon will be able to protect their box-office takings against breaking the theatrical window.

Disney also tried to get a shortned theatrical period in many other countries that it was being released in. I assume that Disney wanted to do this to increase their dvd sales around the Christmas period.

The Wicker Man

The Wicker Man is a film set on an island off of the coast of Scotland, called Summerisle, Sergeant Howie is called anonymously to search for a missing girl. When he gets to the island everyone denies her existence and are very unhelpful, Howie however is determined to find out about what happened to her.

Starred

•     Edward woodward

•     Christopher lee. played lord summerisle.                New film coming “The Wicker Tree” with Robin Hardy 

•   Britt Ekland played willow. 

Production Details

•  The Wicker Man was associated with the British Lion Film Corporation which produced and distributed the film. The company were taken over by EMI, the executives disliked the film and made several cuts of it.

American Popular Film of the Time

• The Exorcist. William Friedkin. USA. 1973 This film was American and very successful in 1973, it had a much bigger budget.

Relation to Culture of the Time

Played off of societies fears at the time, meaning when it was released it mostly seemed scarier than today. Although it is still known as one of the best British horrors of all time.

In Summerisle the islanders are very open about sex, Howie sees people having sex in open areas and it seems to be a thing that is celebrated among them. Howie feels very uncomfortable with this and it alienates him further from the islanders strange beliefs. This representative of what was actually happening during the late 60s/ early 70s, many people were becoming more open about sex and religious views became much less valuable and became out dated and old fashioned. These fears are very much reflected in the film.

Sergeant Howie represents the alienation in the film, he goes to a strange, natural place and with his foreign, modern beliefs it is immediately apparent that he is an outsider. The opening sequence of the film shows an airplane flying into a natural looking island, these binary opposites symbolize the contrast in Niel being from the modern, more civilized world than Summerisle.

 Additionally...

•       The audience of this film at the time would have probably been attracted to this film if they were fans of the talent, for example, Christopher Lee was a very famous actor of the time and they might have wanted to see him in this.

Britishness- What is Britishness?

• The Royal Family
• the London Eye
• Big Ben
• Red Buses
• Telephone Boxes
• Black Cabs
• Theatre
• Tea and Scones
• Roast Dinners
• Aston Martins
• Mini Cooper
• Sheep
• Bull Dogs
• Rugby
• Cricket
• Tennis
• Pubs- "Pint"
• Shakespeare
• Punks
• Goths
• Chavs- counsil house- knife crime
• The Aristocracy- Elecution
• Police- "Pigs"- "Coppers"- "The Bill"

British Horror Film List

Decade	TITLE	DIRECTOR	YEAR	FILM COMPANY
50s	The Quatermass Xperiment	Val guest	1955	Hammer Film Productions
	The Curse of Frankenstein	Terence Fisher	1957	Hammer Film Productions
	Cat Girl	Alfred Shaughnessy	1957	Insignia Films
60s	The innocents	Jack Clayton	1961	20th century fox film corporation
	The plague of zombies	John Gilling	1966	Hammer Film Productions
	Scream and screams	Gorden Hesser	1969	American international pictures
70s	The abominable Dr Phibies	Robert Fuest	1970	American International Pictures (AIP)
	The Wicker Man	Robin Hardy	1973	British Lion Corporation
	Frightmare	Pete walker	1974	Peter Walker (Heritage) Ltd.
80s	An American Werewolf in London	John Landis	1980	PolyGram Filmed Entertainment
	The Company of Wolves	Niel Jordan	1984	Incorporated Television Company (ITC) Palace Pictures
	Hellraiser	Clive Barker	1986	Cinemarque entertainment BV
90s	Hardware	Richard Stanley	1990	Palace Pictures
	Haunted	Lewis Gilbert	1995	October Films
	The Asylum	John Stewart	2000	Nunhead films
00s - recent	28 days later	Danny Boyle	2002	UK film council
	Resident evil	Paul W.S Anderson	2002	Davis-Films Impact Pictures
	Shaun of The Dead	Edgar Wright	2004	Universal Pictures, Studio Canal, Working Title Films

Renee Zellwegger

Renee first came to real fame after her role in Jerry Maguire in 1996, the after her roles in Me, Myself And Irene and Bridget Jones’ Diary she became more of a household name.

Filmography

New in Town (2009)
My One and Only (2009)
Case 39 (2009)
Appaloosa (2008)
Leatherheads (2008)
Bee Movie (voice). (2007)
Miss Potter (2006)
Cinderella Man (2005)
Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason (2004)
Shark Tale (voice) (2004)
Cold Mountain (2003)
Down With Love (2003)
Chicago (2002)
White Oleander (2002)
Bridget Jones' Diary (2001)
Me, Myself And Irene (2000)
Nurse Betty (2000)
The Bachelor (1999)
One True Thing (1998)
Liar (1997)
A Price Above Rubies (1997)
Jerry Maguire (1996)
The Whole Wide World (1996)
Empire Records (1995)
The Low Life (1995)
8 Seconds (1994)
Reality Bites (1994)
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 4: The Next Generation (1995)

Renée’s role in Bridget Jones’ Diary was very successful and lead to her being more acknowledged as a star. Chicago did very well in the box office. Monsters Vs Aliens was a huge animated film and did really well in the cinema in 3D.

Her role as Roxy Heart in Chicago was extremely popular and she won her a Golden Globe and got her nominated for a BAFTA and an Oscar. She won a Golden Globe for Cold Mountain as well as an Oscar and a BAFTA.

Leonardo DiCaprio

1. Leonardo DiCaprio has had a career in the film industry spanning from 1991 when he made his film debut in Critters 3. Kristine Peterson. USA. 1991, he had a small part and the film was low budget. From this low budget, unknown horror film Leonardo DiCaprio has become one of the biggest names in the film industry to date with many fans all over the world.

2. Filmography

Critters 3. Kristine Peterson.USA. Horror.1991

Poison Ivy. Katt Shea. USA. Thriller. 1992

This Boy's Life. Michael Caton-Jones. Biography/ Drama. 1993

What's Eating Gilbert Grape.Lassie Hallstrom. USA. Drama. 1993

The Foot Shooting Party (short).USA. Annette Hayward-Carter.1994

The Quick and the Dead. Sam Raimi. USA. Western. 1995

The Basket Ball Diaries. Scott Kalvert. USA. Biography/ Crime.1995

Total Eclipse. Agnieszka Holland. UK/France. Biography/ Drama.1995

Romeo + Juliette. Baz Luhrmann.USA. Drama. 1996

Marvin's Room. Jerry Zaks. USA. Drama. 1996

Titanic. James Cameron. USA. Drama. 1997

The Man in the Iron Mask. Randall Wallace. USA/ UK. Action. 1998

Celebrity. Woody Allen. USA. Comedy. 1998

The Beach. Danny Boyle. USA/ UK. Adventure. 2000

Don's Plum. R.D Robb. USA. Drama. 2001

Gangs of New York. Martin Scorsese. USA. Crime/ Drama. 2002

Catch Me If You Can. Steven Spielberg. USA. Biography/ Drama. 2002

The Aviator. Martin Scorsese. USA. Biography. 2004

The Departed. Martin Scorsese. USA. Crime. 2006

Blood Diamond. Edward Zwick.USA. Drama. 2006

Body of Lies. Ridley Scott. USA. Action. 2008

Revolutionary Road. Sam Mendes.USA. Drama. 2009

Shutter Island Martin Scorsese. USA. Thriller. 2010

Inception. Christopher Nolan. USA. Action. 2010

3. It was Titanic that really made Leonardo a household name, reinforced DiCaprio’s reputation as an actor, and made him a well-known international star. Titanic was the highest grossing film of all time from 1997 until 2009 when it was over taken by Avatar. Last year Leonardo starred in Shutter Island and Inception, which were both huge box office successes and made DiCaprio the highest grossing actor of 2010.

4. DiCaprio owns a production company called Appian Way Productions

5. DiCaprio has been nominated for 3 Oscars; Best Actor in a leading role for both Aviator and Blood Diamond, and he was nominated for Best Actor in a supporting role for what’s eating Gilbert Grape. He was nominated for 2 BAFTA awards for Aviator and The Departed. He has been nominated for 6 Golden Globe awards for, what’s eating Gilbert grape, Titanic, Catch me if you can, The Departed Blood Diamond and Revolutionary Road. In 2004, he won the award for The Aviator.

6. DiCaprio has become well known to the public as a dedicated environmentalist and philanthropist, he has The Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation that he established in 1998 as an attempt to join with other organisations to raise awareness for environmental issues. He is also a board member of the world wildlife Fund. 2010 saw two big blockbuster hits for Leonardo, Inception and Shutter Island, thanks to these films being such huge successes he was the highest grossing actor of 2010, bringing lots of attention from the media in December. DiCaprio also hit the headlines in November he donated 1million dollars to help save the tigers. He is seen as a positive public figure because of these things.

7. After being repeatedly slated by critics for mainly starring in romantic films DiCaprio has enhanced his reputation by becoming more involved with other non- romantic genres, such as recently starring in films like Blood Diamond and Body of Lies.

8. In quite a few of his films DiCaprio has performed self-conflicting characters with deep, confusing emotions, this suits his acting abilities as he manages to convey sense through confusing characters. In the past DiCaprio had been as being samey and only playing soppy characters, because that was all he could he could do. He has proved this very wrong.

9. Leonardo has also been a producer on some quite well known films, with his production company Appian Way, some of these include:

The Devil in the White City (producer) (announced), in which he is also due to star,

Red Riding Hood (producer) (post-production), which is due to be a big success when released

Orphan (producer)

The 11th Hour (documentary) (producer), a documentary narrated by DiCaprio for his Leonardo DiCaprio Fund to raise awareness of global warming

 The Aviator (executive producer), the 2004 film directed by Scorsese that also starred Leonardo

The Assassination of Richard Nixon (executive producer), the 2004 film starring Sean Penn that won special recognition in the excellence of film making from The National Board of Review USA and was nominated for three other awards.

"UK Film Council Chairman Condemns Closure"

- The Guardian, Oct 20th 2010

After the spending reviews in July the government have decided that they are going to abolish the UK Film Council to cut down on bureaucracy. This has forced many major players in the film industry to exit the public sector for good. Tim Bevan, the producer of Love Actually said, "That would be a majorly regressive step for film in Britain. The closing down of the Film Council is a very bad idea. I don't think any money is going to be saved by the closure of it." He claims many other big stars have said the closure of the UK Film Council is a very bad idea and will make it harder for British films to contend with Hollywood.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/oct/20/uk-film-council-arts-cuts