Evaluation question 3 'What kind of media institution might distributed your media product and why?'

The distribution companies are in three groups the majors the mini major and the independent.
The major film companies are mostly American for example "20th Century Fox", "Paramount"and "Warner Bros.". The major film companies are almost all based in Hollywood they spend huge amounts of money on making, distributing and exhibiting films and they make huge returns from the films. This is because they can afford the star actors, the breathtaking sets, the special effects and the expensive rigs, cameras and lighting. Due to this the films are much more spectacular to watch on the big screens which is why they make so much more money.
The mini major film companies are companies such as "Lions Gate" and "Miramax", which are big companies but not as big as the majors. They tend to make smaller films which still make a profit but not one as large as the majors. The mini major companies are usually picked up and absorbed by a major and are given money to be left alone to carry on making films while the major companies still get a piece of the profit and less competition.
The independent film companies such as "BBC films" and "Film 4" make small films with a very small budget because of this they film mostly on site so they have to spend as little money as possible, they have unknown actors because they can't afford the big stars and there is usually a small marketing campaign for example putting the trailer on the radio, youtube and sending emails which is all very cheap to do. Independent films are known for winning awards for example the film "Fish Tank" won the Jury Prize at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, and also won the 2010 BAFTA for Best British Film.

     The institution which might distribute my media product would be a independent film company. this is because it is a low budget fairly simple film. Although it does have a similar style to the Hollywood films it isn't in the same league as the big Hollywood productions, as there is no big stars, no special effects and no sets. The film might be shown on television on film4 as they show small budget independent films for example "Train spotting" unlike the BBC which shows the bigger films which are more popular. the film would be distributed by mostly word of mouth using twitter and other social networking sites due to the low budget we cannot spend huge amounts of money on television advertisements, billboards and radio advertisements.

Film 4 shows independent films and most of these are targeted for the working class like "Train-spotting", and "Last King of Scotland".

BBC shows films like "The Duchess" which is targeted at middle upper class. This shows the difference between the two channels.