The Prospects For A Reinvigorated And Diverse British National Cinema

The Prospects For A Reinvigorated And Diverse British National Cinema

'Is there scope for British Cinema in the future?' could be one

interpretation of this statement and one that I intend to explore. I

believe that with the dominance of Hollywood overpowering the British

film industry, the past century has seen the traditional British

cinema suffer. Although audience figures were utterly immense in the

earlier half of the 20th century, we could argue that the Hollywood

film industry enticed the majority of these people. I therefore

disagree with the above statement and propose to look at how the

British film industry has failed the nation and the reasons why.

With recent hit British films such as 'Harry Potter and the

Philosopher's Stone' and 'Bridget Jones' Diary' enticing massive

audiences to British cinemas nationwide, we begin to see some truth in

this statement. And certainly, with respect to a number of other

British successes, it could be reinforced. However, it appears to be

one off hits that the British film industry relies upon whereas

Hollywood can boast hit films, in one way or another, near enough

every year. I intend to look deeper into how Hollywood succeeds vastly

dominates the film industry and the evidence to prove this fact.

To do this I will need to survey attendance figures, highest grossing

British films as opposed to Hollywood 'movies' over the decade and

other relevant information. Therefore, using statistics from the

British Film Institute, such as audience figures over the last century

and the top ten films of all time, I can begin to observe how Britain

has suffered at the hands of Hollywood.

To b...

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...the overriding point that all of these 'special effects

successes' are American.

'Bend it Like Beckham' (Gurinder Chadha, 2002) grossed £2 million in

its first weekend.

I personally think that if Britain's film industry is to be

'reinvigorated' it needs to take on the American approach, namely

large-scale funding, marketing and distribution of films. America

produces numerous films every year, some of which fail, expected as

not all films are successful. This may be seen as a gamble, yet

Hollywood continuously remains financially sound and scoops immense

profits annually. So this idea may be gambling with British taxpayer's

money but in the long run profits can begin to heighten. So unless

these techniques are taken on board, this country cannot even begin to

compare with the US, even in the foreseeable future.