Discussions of our blog design were fairly brief – early on it was enthusiastically decided that our theme would be Alien. This gave us a coherent topic and allowed us to explore different aspects of the same movie. All of us had enjoyed the film and found it engaging, particularly when relating to audience tastes and spectatorship as the horror genre has an important relationship them. This then allowed us to individually decide on what aspect of the module to apply the chosen film to. Katie decided upon Fandom and the Viral Text, Malaika upon Spectator to Audience, Cayla and I upon Audience, Franchise and Cross-promotion. Whilst this covered most of the important aspects of The Movie Experience: Audience, Culture and Taste that relate to Alien, retrospectively we could have organised and planned a little better by choosing four separate topics. However, given the huge popularity of film franchises and their dominance in the film industry, perhaps emphasising this element was not such a bad decision.
Design
Given the limitations of a free WordPress account, it was difficult to fully visualise an Alien theme throughout the blog page as there is not a great deal of customisation available. However, with the use of screenshots and video links the design turned out to be more than satisfactory, whilst the project was not extremely demanding in terms of technical application. A page was designed using dark colours and brutalist fonts to coincide with the alien aesthetic, images of audiences to relate to the module and easy access from a static homepage to each writing via dropdown menus grouping each assignment – our essays, the descriptive article and our group reflection. Having had some previous experience using WordPress, Cayla was extremely useful in setting up the blog and contributing to many of the design aspects.
Feedback and
support
Feedback from the group was greatly appreciated from all members. I received some useful comments in terms of structure and content whilst offering help locating some of the sources used regarding Alien and the performance of film franchises. Looking back, perhaps a more formal feedback system in place from the start would have been more effective to ensure that we all had a chance to help each other with every part of the assignment and therefore improve the blog as a whole.
Reflection
I am generally satisfied with my overall participation after completing my essays, helping to provide reference suggestions to the group and discussing some ideas for the assignments. However, I feel I could have contributed more to the design of the blog and done more to offer feedback to other members of the group. I could have shown more initiative by organising a structured plan for more formal group discussions regarding the assignment to encourage better feedback for each member of the group and to ensure that everyone was on track and not struggling with anything.
Watershed is situated in Bristol city centre on the Harbourside, located in what used to function as a warehouse for Bristol’s trade industry. Upon entering, you notice that this is not the average cinema – cards and postcards are on display and leaflets containing articles on new releases are available. There is a Watershed Jukebox containing five different Watershed stories available to newcomers wishing to find out more about the place, as well as being an interactive donation box.
Moving upstairs, there is a notice board with information on the films currently being screened. There is also pen and paper available to anyone wishing to post a comment, encouraging customers to share their thought son a particular film and highlighting Watershed’s enthusiasm for cinephiles as well as regular movie-goers. At the top of the stairs there is more information available, with descriptions advertising each film, such as First Man from the “Oscar-winning team of Ryan Gosling and Damien Chazelle.” Whilst this is not unusual for most cinemas, it is advertised next to the foreign language film Dogman, which is instead described by its performance at Cannes Festival and focusing on Matteo Garrone, the director. There are advertisements for Watershed’s current film season – the portrayal of the witch within cinema. These are not merely Halloween films but a catalogue of important pieces demonstrating the development of the witch’s depiction in film ranging from the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz, to Hayao Miyazaki’s Anime film Kiki’s Delivery Service and more recent movies like I Am Not a Witch. This seems to aptly demonstrate Watershed’s inclusivity to all things film, whether it be mainstream Hollywood movies or arthouse and international movies, and an apparent desire to cater for more than just the entertainment side of film. This attitude to inclusivity continues throughout Watershed with ticket concessions for students/young people, overs 60s, the disabled and more. There are even plans to introduce gender neutral toilets – something currently quite rare in most cinemas today.
Turning right at the top of the stairs you come to the Bar/Café area. Here everything about Watershed breaths independence; the rustic aesthetic and craft beers, independently sourced food, the cinephile décor including pictures of cult classics like Bladerunner and Pulp Fiction, and the authentic artwork from artists such as Matt Groening and Joe Magee. There is a strong emphasis on environmental awareness demonstrated by the recycled paper menus, organic Fairtrade coffee and the various plants inside the bar area. The relaxed atmosphere and free Wi-Fi make this an ideal place not just for social means but also for meetings on projects and other work.
Around the bar area there are advertisements that show Watershed as a charity that constantly looks to fund and collaborate on new artistic and technological projects, encouraging a depth and diversity to the people who can enjoy everything that happens at Watershed. Moving past the bar area you can see where a great deal of these projects come to life – in the studios. Fitted with state-of-the-art equipment, such as Apple Mac computers, various screens and audio equipment, and including free, informal talks and masterclasses, the studios lose none of the relaxed and open atmosphere of the bar area – making it an ideal location for young and creative people to work.
Showcase Cinema De Lux – Bristol
Located in one of the busiest parts of Bristol, Cabot Circus, Showcase Cinema De Lux primarily offers spectacle. As you walk through the glass doors into the venue, even the lobby seems grandiose and a large box-office area anticipates large audiences with ample room for queuing. Vast posters are scattered around advertising the latest spectacle coming to screens, often the next Marvel film or horror flick, with the emphasis being largely on the stars involved and the impressive 4k screens and Dolby Digital Sound systems available at Showcase to experience them with. An extensive snack bar is ready to provide audiences with large bags of popcorn, various well-known brands of fizzy drinks and other comfort food enticing ticket-holders to indulge.
Showcase offers a range of premium experiences to complement their already impressive technical attractions, including screenings in 3D, the Director’s Hall and the XPlus experience. The Director’s Hall offer customers private access to the Director’s Lounge prior to screenings, where alcoholic beverages are served alongside pizza and basic Mexican style dishes in a more intimate environment. The XPlus screenings, however, demonstrate the most Showcase has to offer in terms of spectacle with giant wall to wall screens and Dolby Atmos Surround Sound, inviting prospective customers to “get inside the movie.” In many cinemas 3D screenings might be considered an adequate attraction for those wishing to fully experience a film. At Showcase, however, everything has to be bigger, bolder and more comfortable for people who want it – and can afford it.
More often than not the quality of the viewing experience is about as far as the appreciation of a film goes at Showcase. Here, movies are seen as night outs with friends or colleagues to relax and enjoy themselves in a luxury cinema. Showcase tries to attract businesses to hold conferences and meetings in their facilities, probably in the hope that they will enjoy a film together afterwards or be enticed by the advertising strategically positioned around the venue.
Whilst Showcase’s premium experiences may put many people off with their bloated prices, there are various concessions available for young people, students, elderly etc. There are also various aids for people with disabilities, with full wheelchair access to all screens, subtitled screenings for the hard of hearing, autism friendly screenings (which include softer lights and lowered volume), and audio description availability. Whilst many of these things are standard requirements for most venues, it is an apparent effort to make the cinema experience at Showcase available and affordable to all.
The Showcase cinema is an altogether different experience to Watershed. Whilst Watershed caters for all things film (academic or entertainment) and all things creative (as shown by the charity’s support of numerous projects), Showcase is noticeably a business that thrives off excess and, whilst it lacks the range of films offered at Watershed, provides the most enjoyable movie experience in terms of spectacle.
Film franchises are often defined as a collection or series of films revolving around the same character/characters or different stories contained in the same fictional universe. Studios often use intellectual properties in order to capitalise on existing popularity, such as in the Universal Monsters movies of the 1930s, which saw famous works like Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein adapted for the screen. The success of franchises has become a huge part of the movie business as many Marvel films keep breaking box-office records and making vast profits. This essay aims to analyse some of the key components of film franchising and to discuss a few of the Alien series’ themes as well as its position in a world where cinema is dominated by franchising.
Alien was released in 1979 and, after a cautious release schedule, was a huge success both critically and commercially – according to IMDb (2018) it was the fifth highest grossing film in the U.S. during 1979. However, it was not until 1983 that a possible franchise was considered by Fox, and a sequel was planned when James Cameron expressed his interest to producer David Giler. Film franchises were already a large part of the film industry at that point – the James Bond franchise saw the release of six films during the 1980s, whilst Star Wars had already demonstrated the economic possibilities of Fantasy and Science Fiction franchises. Eventually, 1986 brought the release of Aliens, which appealed to fans by building upon the already established themes of the first and brought the studio another great success, paving the way for the future installations in the franchise.
Popular culture is full of references to the Alien franchise, with numerous parodies and pastiches appearing throughout various media, such as Mel Brooks’ sci-fi parody Spaceballs, which essentially recreated the famous chestburster scene. Martin Barker (4) describes a reference to Alien in Doctor Who and argues that the “dialogue’s explicit reference to Alien – the casual acknowledgment of the concept of such a thing as a facehugger – hints at the extent to which Alien has pervaded popular culture.” The strength of the imagery has resulted in many people who have not even seen the movie to recognise certain aspects of it. Much like when audiences see a James Bond film they expect gadgets, beautiful women, martinis etc.; when audiences go to see an Alien film they expect a blend of science fiction and horror, largely because of the way in which Alien is perceived in popular culture.
However, since Aliens, the franchise has leaned towards more action-orientated films – while the gore and body count from the original remains, the pace of the narrative has increased. The first instalment is a masterclass in atmosphere and tension building, whilst the second is a much more kinetic experience, propelling the audience through intricately staged set-pieces. Action franchises have typically been more successful than their horror counterparts – with over fifty percent of franchise films being classed as action movies (Filson and Havlicek, 452) – and so following James Cameron’s success with The Terminator, it is clear why Fox approved of the direction that Cameron was to take the franchise.
Given the first film’s lack of star actors and R rating, advertisement played a key role in the film’s initial success. Using the slogan ‘In space no one can hear you scream’ – now cemented in popular culture – Alien was presented as the scariest film of all time and rumours circulated about viewers running screaming from movie theatres during previews. As a high concept film described as ‘Jaws in Space,’ Alien generated huge anticipation for audiences and, much like Stephen Spielberg’s Jaws, can be considered an event movie – a film in which the release had significant cultural impact. Audiences still anticipate the next movie in the franchise, with Prometheus and Alien: Covenant asking more questions about the Alien universe than they appear to answer. Director Ridley Scott has recently discussed his aims to “open it up,” eyeing a franchise “as big as Star Wars” (Singer, 27). Whilst appearing to follow the trend of many modern blockbusters it is important to note that many such franchises are now following in Alien’s footsteps with more female led movies, such as Rey in Star Wars, Wonder Woman in the DCEU and the upcoming Captain Marvel in the MCU.
Since the start of the franchise, each film has focused on a strong female protagonist. Alien introduced audiences to a female lead in the typical ‘masculine’ role and a gender interchangeability to the crew, whilst Aliens emphasised a maternal struggle between Ripley and the alien queen. Since Sigourney Weaver’s departure after Alien: Resurrection, two different actors have assumed roles in the mould of Ellen Ripley: Naomi Rapace in Prometheus and Katherine Waterston in Alien: Covenant. This arguably shows a direct contradiction to many other action-orientated film franchises – Marvel are still awaiting the release of their first female-led instalment, and the James Bond franchise has always been male-dominated. Even in the reinvention of Bond in Casino Royale we see a deconstruction of his masculinity (literally as the villain Le Chiffre thrashes his manhood) and, as Douglas L. Howard (43) argues, “according to the film, this aspect of his character and his personality is an intangible beyond the physical.” Whilst the most positive representation of women in Bond can be seen, as Lee Pfeiffer (Howard, 44) argues, as “the ultimate symbols of female liberation,” we are still aware of the masculine fantasy as many of these women succumb to Bond’s allure. Instead what Alien presents is an almost genderless crew where the hero is determined not by sex, but by character – offering a more inclusive premise to audiences and exploiting a gap in the film franchise market that had not previously been explored.
Casino Royale offers a useful comparison with Prometheus in terms of franchise strategy. Both moved away from an established actor in the lead role and both were prequels that capitalised on the audience’s knowledge of earlier entries in the franchise. Studios are always looking to keep franchises fresh, particularly after a previous instalment’s failure –both Die Another Day and Alien: Resurrection were not positively received – and whilst many of the Bond semantics are still there, Howard (49) argues that “getting Bond wrong” by experimenting with the syntax was “right for a film franchise in need of new energy.” Ridley Scott’s Prometheus also changed aspects of the Alien formula by slowing the pace and focusing on a mystery that would open up the universe – as per Scott’s previously mentioned plans for the franchise. This appears to have paid off from a franchising point of view as Prometheus currently ranks at the top of the series in terms of domestic box-office performance (Filmsite.org, 2018) – in spite of the mixed reviews upon release.
As is the case for many successful movies, studios will often look to capitalise on that success with branding. After the merchandising success of Star Wars, large budget movies have been hugely dependent on their potential in terms of branding. Paul Grainge (109) cites Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman as “an archetype of industrial thinking about how films should earn their investment” and a perfect example of a movie created for its capacity to sell merchandise. In the months leading up to the film’s release, Batman merchandise not only made Warner Bros. a profit, but it served as promotion for the movie itself, resulting in over $250 million at the domestic box office upon release (Grainge, 110). This cross-promotional relationship between movie and merchandise has become an integral part of all mainstream film franchises. In the case of the Alien franchise, products like Alien: Isolation, a 2014 video game set in the same universe as the films, have a dual-advertising effect – it may appeal to fans of the franchise and also function as an advertisement for the films. Whilst audience reactions to franchise films have tended to grow more negative as the number of instalments have increased, budgets and international box office returns have risen (Filson and Havlicek, 464). This highlights the importance of branding and cross-promotion as more large budget American franchises, such as Michael Bay’s Transformers series, may increasingly rely on big-budget special effects and global branding more than audience and critical reviews.
Whilst the Alien series largely adheres to franchising in terms of its relationship with audiences, use of cross-promotion and its plans for future instalments, the franchise offers commentary on the corporate world that it is ironically part of. Aliens appears to depict corporate sexism, such as in an early scene where Ripley’s words of warning are dismissed by a male-dominated board room, and in Prometheus we see founder and CEO of Wayland Corp., Peter Weyland, reject his daughter in favour of his artificial son – David. In Alien, Ash is virtually the embodiment of the inhumanity in the company and Chris Lay (Irwin, 15) observes that Ash has “no desires independent of the company’s goals,” emphasising a corporate world where any other interests are secondary. As American producer Don Simpson stated,“the pursuit of money is the only reason to make movies” (Branston, 48), and as studios continuously look to take advantage of franchising through industrial and cultural means, with franchises like the MCU and Star Wars dominating the box-office, the more accurate that statement may seem.
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Bibliography
Barker, Martin, et al. Alien Audiences: Remembering and Evaluating a Classic Movie. Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.
Branston, Gill. Cinema and Cultural Modernity, OUP, 2000.
Grainge, Paul. Brand Hollywood: selling entertainment in a global media age. Routledge, 2007.
Howard, Douglas L. “Do I look Like I Give a Damn?”: What’s Right About Getting it Wrong in Casino Royale,’ in Linder, Christoph(ed.), Revisioning 007: James Bond and Casino Royale, London and New York: Wallflower Press, 2009, pp. 33-48.
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