Why the Golden age was defeated

In the United States, art films are mainly associated with indie films outside the Big Hollywood studios. Most of the costs are low and are often created by young filmmakers. Unlike French art films, which have received a lot of support from the authorities, the Government's support for art films is negligible in liberal-policy America. But this does not affect the American art film in the squeeze of Hollywood blockbusters to find a living space. The fundamental reason is that American art films form a set of market-based competitive strategies that are not competing for the mainstream film market dominated by Hollywood blockbusters, but rather the segment of the film market with specific audiences. In general, the industrial operation of American art films shows the following three core features.

Art Movies don't reject the market, they know who the audience is.

First of all, in the creation level, American art film creators, although they also stress personal expression, but most do not reject the market, but hope that the art of expression and market value to find a balance between. As one American independent filmmaker says: "Although in the ideal state, independent film is purely Non-mainstream, with a purely original point of view, but in fact there is no pure independent film such things, there are still economic laws to play a role, the film must enter the market, and need people want to see. "So in a creative way, American art films are not as radical as pioneer experimental films, but relatively mild," he said. For example, in the narrative structure, although American art films often show a different structure from the mainstream Hollywood films, would undermine, dilute, or complicate the "classic" narrative, characterized by a linear process of development, a clear causal chain, an omniscient view, a closed end, and a looser or "go-to-center" structure, But it is fundamentally narrative, and the audience can still understand the brain. If in the scale of artistic innovation and stereotypes, pioneer experimental films and Hollywood mainstream film separation end, then the American art film positioning is closer to mainstream Hollywood movies, rather than pioneer experimental films.

But unlike mainstream Hollywood films, which focus on young audiences, American art films target more mature movie audiences, especially the "baby boomers" generation. As Gibban Tababian, one of the founders of Saint-Dun College, described: "They are not the 18-24-year-old teenagers who are keen to watch movies and all kinds of movies, but rather middle-aged leftists with specific preferences, or gentle graduate students, anti-war activists or racist advocates, Or read "The New Yorker", the successful person driving Volvo. ”

American Art Films Meet the needs of these particular audiences. They show the seriousness of being dumped by mainstream Hollywood movies, controversial themes, such as the survival situation of marginal groups, the diversity of ethical dilemmas, and so on, send out the neglected voices in the mainstream culture, which accords with the cultural interest and identity politics of the more mature audiences, and creates an attractive film subculture.

A different mapping system from Hollywood: see how art theaters operate

The second aspect of the industrialized operation of American art films is embodied in the construction of the differentiated mapping channel system. American art films do not "melee" with Hollywood blockbusters, and the establishment of a set of film festivals, art theaters, independent film and television channels, audio-visual and online broadcast composition of the system, and the distribution of Hollywood blockbuster shows a consistent "window" features, that is, the film along the different display window in turn to obtain revenue. But in the operation of each display window, it shows a different style from the mainstream Hollywood movies in order to give full play to the market potential of art films.

Take the operation of an art theater as an example. American Art theaters currently have about 1000 screens to show independent films, foreign films and replay classic films. Most of these theaters are located in the yuppie and baby-boomer urban areas, or in university towns, where the most loyal viewers of art films live, which are more educated, richer, and even older than mainstream commercial cinema audiences. According to Juliet Goodfriend, an art theatre survey, only 13% of viewers in American art theaters are teenagers, and 1/3 of viewers are aged 65 or older. For this kind of audience service laid the foundation for the smooth survival of the art theater. Compared with ordinary commercial cinemas, the operation of American art theaters is characteristic, first of all, its theater environment is often more comfortable, such as the 2007 landmark Line launched a "living room" theater, which is very small, usually can only accommodate 30-50 people, but the environment is very comfortable, with a sofa, side table, Facilitate the discussion and exchange of the audience. Second, such cinemas tend to provide better catering and ancillary facilities to earn more money outside the box office. For example, the first theater, which opened at the Hilldale Mall in Wisconsin in 2007, has a matching café, bistro, indoor and rooftop bar, and an art gallery for the sale of art and derivatives at the local and Sundance film festivals, in addition to the 6 studios. Unlike art theaters in other parts of the world, which often rely on government subsidies to survive, American art homes have won the space for themselves by commercial development.

It is worth pointing out that the systematic construction of the mapping channel, although rooted in the American art film itself market appeal, but also inseparable from a small number of artistic feelings of the film big Guy's generous work. For example, Hollywood star Robert ˙ Rodeford, who has far-reaching influence on contemporary American art films, founded in 1981 the Sundance Academy, which was designed to help first-run filmmakers, and in 1984 set up the film festival, which quickly became the annual event of the American art film industry, holding Stephen ˙ Soderbergh, A large number of art film masters such as Quentin ˙ Tarantino. In 1995, Radford also collaborated with Viacom's Showtime network to create the Sundance Film Channel, a paid cable TV channel based on an art film. In 1997, it signed a contract with a popular film company with its own home line in 25 states to set up the Sundance Cinema Group to form a chain of cinemas showing independent films. In the course of the development of American art films, the heroic acts like Radford have played a role that can not be neglected.

Not on the entire courtyard, but on progressive platform distribution.

The third aspect of the industrial operation of American art films is embodied in the issue and marketing strategy, the film side of American art films will often first send films to a series of film festivals. The film festival is an exceptionally important financing and marketing platform for art films, and art films without contracts can sell themselves at the festival because of the variety of publishers involved, and the main film festival is the best place to get the attention of the purchase manager. Art films that have been awarded contracts can also be screened at various film festivals for early warm-up, winning media attention and Word-of-mouth, and more attention will be paid to film awards, especially in prestigious film festivals such as the Sundance Independent Film Festival and Oscar awards.

American art films are not published in the same way as mainstream Hollywood films, which take the form of "Platform release", which is shown at the same time in the thousands of screens, instead of the "platform release" model that gradually expands the scale of the show. That is, first in some cities that have important influence in the American art Film market (such as New York, Los Angeles) Choose a few theaters to be first screened, usually lasts 1-2 weeks, and invites film critics and media representatives to create a reputation for the film. If the film has a good market performance and response, it will go to the expansion of the screening stage, in hundreds of or even thousands of theaters. When the "Crying Game" was first opened only on 2 screens, the audience received a good response to increase to 22 screen, and after the heroine won the Oscar for Best Actress nomination, the issuer quickly expanded the size of the distribution to 365 screens. Compared to the mainstream movie theater distribution usually take a short period of time in the large-scale saturation distribution, platform-type distribution is conducive to film building word-of-mouth, but also conducive to the issuer to control the cost of marketing, timely according to market conditions to expand the size of the issue or suspend the release of the decision, so deeply favored by the art

In the specific marketing strategy, American art films do not reject the use of some market-based means, even more radical than the mainstream Hollywood movies. For example, the Miramax company, which has an important influence in the art film distribution industry, was once famous for its sexual elements in marketing films. In marketing sex, lies and video, Miramax the serious psycho-analytic film as a sexual relationship, sexy and intense comedy, and linked to the popular American "sexual security" topic, on the poster is two men and women naked hug the picture, to attract the audience's attention. Although the film has a strong artistic appeal in subject matter and plot, and won the Cannes Golden Palm Award, won a great reputation, but its market success can not be separated from Miramax effective marketing, to help the film from the "art film community" jumped out, and gained greater market space, Finally won a 24.74 million-dollar box-office in the United States.

This article extracts from the Peng Media Research and Development and consulting Director of the paper "French and American art film Development Strategy Research", contained in "Contemporary film" 2014 9th.