Cognitive film theory: 2010 bibliography update

Last January, I posted my bibliography of books, articles, etc., on the subject of cogntive film theory and which can be accessed here. This post includes articles published in this area during 2010. The list is not exhaustive, but it is accurate.

1. Addis, Michael, and Morris B. Holbrook, ‘Consumers’ Identification and Beyond: Attraction, Reverence, and Escapism in the Evaluation of Films,’ Psychology and Marketing 27 (9) 2010: 821–845. doi: 10.1002/mar.20359.
2. Bartsch, Anne, ‘Vivid Abstractions: On the Role of Emotion Metaphors in Film Viewers’ Search for Deeper Insight and Meaning,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 240-260. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00198.x.
3. Bartsch, Anne, Markus Appel, and Dennis Storch, ‘Predicting Emotions and Meta-Emotions at the Movies: The Role of the Need for Affect in Audiences’ Experience of Horror and Drama,’ Communication Research 37 (2) 2010: 167-190. doi: 10.1177/0093650209356441.
4. Blumstein, Daniel T., Richard Davitan, and Peter D. Kaye, ‘Do Film Soundtracks Contain Nonlinear Analogues to Influence Emotion?,’ Biology Letters 6 (6) 2010: 751-754. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2010.0333.
5. Bordwell, David, ‘The Part-time Cognitivist: A View from Film Studies,’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 1-18. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040202.
6. Branigan, Edward, ‘Soundtracks in Mind,’ Projections 4 (1) 2010: 41-67. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040104.
7. Bruun Vaage, Margrethe, ‘Fiction Film and the Varieties of Empathic Engagement,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 158-79. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00200.x.
8. Carroll, Noël, ‘Movies, the Moral Emotions, and Sympathy,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 1-19. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00197.x.
9. Currie, Gregory, ‘Bergman and the Film Image,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 323-339. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00199.x.
10. Cutting, James E., Jordan E. DeLong, and Christine E. Noether, ‘Attention and the Evolution of Hollywood Film,’ Psychological Science 21 (3) 2010: 432-439. doi: 10.1177/0956797610361679.
11. Dadlez, E.M., ‘Seeing and Imagination: Emotional Response to Fictional Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 120-135. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00194.x.
12. Dennis, Tracy A., and Beylul Solomon, ‘Frontal EEG and Emotion Regulation: Electrocortical Activity in Response to Emotional Film Clips is Associated with Reduced Mood Induction and Attention Interference Effects,’ Biological Psychology 85 (3) 2010: 456-464. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2010.09.008.
13. Deutsch, Stephan, ‘Psycho and the Orchestration of Anxiety,’ The Soundtrack 3 (1) 2010: 53-66. doi: 10.1386/st.3.1.53_1.
14. Eder, Jens, ‘Understanding Characters,’ Projections 4 (1) 2010: 16-40. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040103
15. Elliot, Paul, ‘The Eye, The Brain, The Screen: What Neuroscience Can Teach Film Theory,’ Excursions 1 (1) 2010: 1-16.
16. Feagin, Susan L., ‘Film Appreciation and Moral Insensitivity,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 20-33. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00197.x.
17. Friend, Stacie, ‘Getting Carried Away: Evaluating the Emotional Influence of Fiction Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 77-105. doi:  10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00196.x.
18. Gaut, Berys, ‘Empathy and Identification in Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 136–157. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00211.x.
19. Giovannelli, Alessandro, ‘Cognitive Value and Imaginative Identification: The Case of Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut,’ The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 68 (4) 2010: 355–366. doi: 10.1111/j.1540-6245.2010.01430.x.
20. Grau, Christophe, ‘American History X, Cinematic Manipulation, and Moral Conversion,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 52-76. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00210.x.
21. Grodal, Torben, ‘High on Crime Fiction and Detection,’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 64-85. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040205.
22. Harold, James, ‘Mixed Feelings: Conflicts in Emotional Responses to Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 280-294. doi:  10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00209.x.
23. Hirose, Yoriko, Alan Kennedy, and Benjamin W. Tatler, ‘Perception and Memory Across Viewpoint Changes in Moving Images,’ Journal of Vision 10 (4) 2010: 2. doi:10.1167/10.4.2.
24. Hopkins, Robert, ‘Moving because Pictures? Illusion and the Emotional Power of Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 200-218. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00208.x.
25. Kauppi, Jukka-Pekka, Iiro P. Jääskeläinen, Mikko Sams, and Jussi Tohka, ‘Inter-subject Correlation of Brain Hemodynamic Responses During Watching a Movie: Localization in Space and Frequency,’ Frontiers in Neuroinformatics 4 2010: 5. doi: 10.3389/fninf.2010.00005.
26. Kim, Seahwa, ‘The Rationality of Emotion toward Fiction,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 106-119. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00203.x.
27. Kim, Sue J. ‘Anger, Cognition, Ideology: What Crash Can Show Us about Emotion,’ Image and Narrative 11 (2) 2010: http://www.imageandnarrative.be/index.php/imagenarrative/article/view/71/0.
28. Laine, Tarva, ‘The Diving Bell and the Butterfly as an Emotional Event,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 295-305. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00207.x.
29. Lamarque, Peter, and Peter Goldie, ‘Whimsicality in the Films of Eric Rohmer,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 306-322. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00206.x.
30. Livingstone, Paisley, ‘On the Appreciation of Cinematic Adaptations,’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 104-127. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040207.
31. Matravers, Derek, ‘Why We Should Give Up on the Imagination,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 190-199. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00205.x.
32. Michel, Eva, ‘The Role of Individual Differences in Cognitive Skills in Children’s Learning Through Film,’ Journal of Media Psychology 22 (3) 2010: 105-113. doi: 10.1027/1864-1105/a000015.
33. Nixon, Lizze, ‘I Focalize, You Focalize, We All Focalize Together: Audience Participation in Persepolis,’ Image and Narrative 11 (2) 2010: http://www.imageandnarrative.be/index.php/imagenarrative/article/view/78.
34. Oliver, Mary Beth, and Tilo Hartmann, ‘Exploring the Role of Meaningful Experiences in Users’ Appreciation of “Good Movies,”’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 128-150. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040208.
35. Planitnga, Carl, ‘“I Followed the Rules, and They All Loved You More”: Moral Judgment and Attitudes toward Fictional Characters in Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 34-51. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00204.x.
36. Planitnga, Carl, ‘Affective Incongruity and The Thin Red Line,’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 86-103. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040206.
37. Prince Stephen, ‘Through the Looking Glass: Philosophical Toys and Digital Visual Effects,’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 19-40. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040203.
38. Schaefer, Alexandre, Frédéric Nils, Xavier Sanchez, and Pierre Philippot, ‘Assessing
    the Effectiveness of a Large Database of Emotion-eliciting Films: A New Tool for
    Emotion Researchers,’ Cognition and Emotion 24 (7) 2010: 1153-1172. doi 10.1080/02699930903274322.
39. Schramm, Holger, and Werner Wirth, ‘Exploring the Paradox of Sad-film Enjoyment: The Role of Multiple Appraisals and Meta-appraisals,’ Poetics 38 (3) 2010: 319-335. doi: 10.1016/j.poetic.2010.03.002.
40. Schwan, Stephan, and Sermin Ildirar, ‘Watching Film for the First Time: How Adult Viewers Interpret Perceptual Discontinuities in Film,’ Psychological Science 21 (7) 2010: 970-976. doi: 10.1177/0956797610372632.
41. Smith, Murray, ‘Feeling Prufish,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 261-279. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00202.x.
42. Smuts, Aaron, ‘The Ghost Is the Thing: Can Reactions to Fiction Reveal Belief?,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 219-239. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00201.x.
43. Stevens, Catherine, Heather Winskel, Clare Howell, Lyne-Marine Vidal, Cyril Latimer, Josephine Milne-Home, ‘Perceiving Dance: Schematic Expectations Guide Experts’ Scanning of a Contemporary Dance Film,’ Journal of Dance Medicine and Science 14 (1) 2010: 19-25.
44. Suckfüll, Monica, ‘Films That Move Us: Moments of Narrative Impact in an Animated Short Film,’ Projections 4 (2) 2010: 41-63. doi: 10.3167/proj.2010.040204.
45. Visch, Valentijn, Ed S. Tan, and Dylan Molenaar, ‘The Emotional and Cognitive Effect of Immersion in Film Viewing,’ Cognition and Emotion 24 (8) 2010: 1439-1445. doi: 10.1080/02699930903498186.
46. Wessel, Ineke, Rafaële J.C. Huntjens, and Johan R.L. Verwoerd, ‘Cognitive Control and Suppression of Memories of an Emotional Film,’ Journal of Behaviour Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry 41 (2) 2010: 83-89. doi: 10.1016/j.jbtep.2009.10.005.
47. Yanal, Robert J., ‘Hybrid Truths and Emotion in Film,’ Midwest Studies in Philosophy 34 (1) 2010: 180-189. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4975.2010.00212.x.
48. Zacks, Jeffrey M., Nicole K. Speer, Khena M. Swallow, and Corey J. Maley, ‘The Brain’s Cutting-room Floor: Segmentation of Narrative Cinema,’ Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 4 2010: 168. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2010.00168.
49. Zhu, Xun, Xiaoying Wang, Carolyn Parkinson, Chengxu Cai, Song Gao, and Peicheng Hu, ‘Brain Activation Evoked by Erotic Films Varies with Different Menstrual Phases: An fMRI Study,’ Behavioural Brain Research 206 (2) 2010: 279-285. doi: 10.1016/j.bbr.2009.09.027.

The UK Top 100, 2007 to 2009

A few months ago I looked at the clustering of UK films at the UK box office (here). This week I look at the top 100 films at the UK box office from 2007 to 2009, inclusively.

Data was taken from the UK Film Council and Box Office Mojo. The ranking of a film in the top 100 according to Box Office Mojo is determined by its total box office gross. The total box office data given by Box Office Mojo is in dollars, and this was converted into pounds by multiplying by 0.51 for 2007 and 2008 and 0.61 for 2009. These figures are, therefore, estimates and this should be kept in mind when interpreting the results. To sort the data into groups, the opening weekend gross (including previews) and the total box office data were entered into PAST (v. 2.04) and then allocated by using k-means clustering into 5 groups. I would have gone further into the data to compare films ranked lower than 100, but the UK Film Council box office archive does not have data for many of these films.

It is clear from the graphs of each year (Figures 1 to 3) that there is strong correlation between a film’s opening weekend gross and its total gross. The Spearman rank correlation between these two variables for 2007 is rs (98) = 0.8995, p = <0.001, and the mean proportion of a film’s total gross accounted for by the opening weekend is 0.2644 (95% CI: 0.2473, 0.2815). For 2008, rs (98) = 0.8642, p = <0.0001, and the mean proportion is 0.3019 (95% CI: 0.2826, 0.3212); and for 2009, rs (98) = 0.8993, p = <0.0001, and the mean proportion is 0.2808 (95% CI: 0.2633, 0.2983). Overall, there is little variation from year to year across the top 100 as a whole.

In each graph we see the same types of films in the different clusters. The purple cluster includes the top performing films in each year, and these are typically franchise movies (James Bond, Harry Potter, Spider-man, Shrek, The Simpsons, Batman, Indiana Jones, etc). Although the number 1 grossing film released in 2008 is Mamma Mia! The lack cluster are films that did not achieve such stellar results, but wich are nonetheless big budget studio fare. This cluster includes films from the Transformers, Twilight, and Iron Man franchises (which is probably a little disappointing for the producers), along with several family films (Wall-E, Monsters v. Aliens, Kung Fu Panda). The red cluster includes some films that perhaps achieved more than was expected (Atonement, St. Trinian’s, Juno, Paranormal Activity) as well some films that achieved much less than could be expected (Ocean’s Thirteen, Rocky Balboa, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men Origins: Wolverine). A small budget film in this group is performing strongly, but a big special effects movie in this group is soon going to be the end of your franchise. If your big budget effects movie ends up in the green group then the end will come very quickly, so don’t expect to see anymore Ghost Rider (2007) or GI Joe (2009) movies  in the future.The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Watchmen, and Fame (all from 2009) ended up in this group, and you would have to say that overall this represents poor performance on the part of these films. The green cluster includes many films that performed perfectly respectably (The Last King of Scotland, Notes on A Scandal), but which did make the same cross over achieved by Atonement or Juno. The blue cluster includes films that opened poorly before things went down hill. It is gratifying that this includes Rambo. It also includes Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium which British audiences evidently did not want to watch, along with several poor quality horror films (Halloween, Hostel Part II, The Hills Have Eyes 2), as well as the unending cycle of awful spoof movies (Meet the Spartans, Disaster Movie, Epic Movie, Superhero Movie) that must do enough business in the US to justify the cost. Many of the other blue films are movies slightly outside the mainstream that have made it into the top 100 (This is England, Eastern Promises). Notable failures in the blue cluster include Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Hannibal Rising from 2007, How to Lose Friends and Influence People and The X-Files: I Want to Believe and from 2008, and Revolutionary Road and The Men Who Stare at Goats from 2009.

We also see similar numbers of films appearing in each cluster in each year. The top 3 clusters (purple, black, and red) account for 31 films in 2007, 30 films in 2008, and 29 films in 2009. The black cluster in 2009 is larger than in the other years but this may be due to the fact that the data for this year includes Avatar, which simply trounced everything forcing other films that would have made the purple group in other years down one step.The green cluster includes 24 films in 2007, 29 films in 2008, and 31 films in 2009; while the blue cluster has 45 films in 2007, 41 films in 2008, and 40 films in 2009.

The number of films in each cluster, and the mean total and weekend gross are presented in Tables 1 to 3.

Table 1 Cluster size, and mean total and opening weekend grosses for the top 100 films at the UK box office in 2007

Table 2 Cluster size, and mean total and opening weekend grosses for the top 100 films at the UK box office in 2008

Table 3 Cluster size, and mean total and opening weekend grosses for the top 100 films at the UK box office in 2009

The outlier in the red cluster to the left of Figure 1 is PS I Love You, which was released on just 80 screens at Christmas 2007 for the first two weeks, producing a very low opening weekend, but was then released wide on 365 screens in the first week of January 2008 and immediately grossed a respectable £1.79 million for that weekend. This film probably underperformed at the box office, and if it had been released wide for its opening weekend could be expected (on the basis if its subsequent weekends) to have made closer to (if not actually into) the black cluster. I can’t imagine what advantage was gained from releasing a romatic film at Christmas on just 80 screens, especially when it is well-known that the opening of film is the most crucial period in its box office life.

Figure 1 Top 100 films at the UK box office in 2007

Although the top 3 groups (red, black, and purple) in 2008 include roughly the same number of films as the other years, it is immediately apparent from Figure 2 that films in the red group performed less well in this year. Unlike 2007 and 2009, the majority of films in this cluster achieved a total gross of less than £10 million, and from Tables 1 to 3 we can see that the mean total gross is lower for this year than in the others (ANOVA: F (2, 48) = 17.14, p = <0.0001; Tukey HSD: 2007/2008 – p = 0.0004, 2008/2009 – p = 0.0001, 2007/2009 – p =0.4363). The total box office gross for the top 100 films in 2008 was £780.7 million, the lowest of any year covered here (2007 = £868.2 million, 2009 = £1002.7 million).  The outliers in the green cluster are In Bruges, which seems to have been released twice – once in March on 75 screens and then again in April on 270 screens; and There Will Be Blood, which opened on just 24 screens but grew this to 199 screens in week 5 of its release. These are exceptions to the rule that opening weekends are destiny. In the case of In Bruges, we see a small budget film getting a second, bigger lease of life after an initial run as distributors and exhibitors respond to audiences and reviews. The release of There Will Be Blood can be explained by looking at America. In the US this film was released on just 2 screens in December 2007 before going to 1620 screens after 7 weeks by February 2008 – when it was nominated for eight (and later won two) Academy Awards – so this is perhaps the definition of an awards film. Without the Oscars, the release of this film would have been that much more limited.

Figure 2 Top 100 films at the UK box office in 2008

In 2009, there were two films that grossed considerably more than other films: Avatar and Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (although most of the gross for Avatar was accumulated in 2010). Avatar was released at Christmas and so its opening weekend accounts for only 9% of its total gross, whereas 38% of the gross for Harry Potter was accumulated on it opening weekend. The 2nd tier of films (the black group) exhibits much more variation for the opening weekend grosses in this year than for 2007 and 2008. There is much less separation between the red and black clusters in Figure 3, and this again may be due to the distorting effect of Avatar. Again we see some films that have very low opening weekends relative to their total gross: Gran Torino in the green cluster and Vicky Christina Barcelona in the blue cluster. AS before this can be attributed to distributors dipping their toe into the market with limited releases, before expanding the number of screens the following week. Whether or not this actually provided an advantage for these films is unknown, but a bigger opening weekend for Gran Torino would have pushed it towards the red cluster. Unlike PS I Love You, they are much harder to market to a specific audience and so perhaps the is some nervousness on the part of distributors to commit so many screens without such a defined audience. Who watches Woody Allen movies nowadays?

Figure 3 Top 100 films at the UK box office in 2009

Overall, there is remarkable stability in the top 100 films at the UK box office, which is exactly what studios pay to see. By applying clustering to box office data in this manner we can identify some of the structure in this data, and to identify those films which performed above or below expectation, and to compare the performance of similar films from year to year.

Research on film industries

THis week a collection of articles looking at film industries from perspectives that are typically different from that typically found in film studies. As usual, the version linked to may not be the final version published.

There is a lot of interesting research of film industries available through the Copenhagen Business School’s Knowledge portal (here), and by searching its research database and open archive. The CBS has a robust approach to open access and most of the research is available in English. Topics include:

• The internationalization of the Indian film industry
• City branding and film festivals
• Film labour markets
• The Danish film industry
• Globalization and the cinema

Bakker G 2004 At the Origins of Increased Productivity Growth in Services: Productivity, Social Savings and the Consumer Surplus of the Film Industry, 1900-1938, Working Paper 81, Department of Economic History, London School of Eocnomics.

This paper estimates and compares the benefits cinema technology generated to society in Britain, France and the US between 1900 and 1938. It is shown how cinema industrialised live entertainment, by standardisation, automation and making it tradable. The economic impact is measured in three ways: TFP-growth, social savings in 1938 and the consumer surplus enjoyed in 1938. Preliminary findings suggest that the entertainment industry accounted for 1.5 to 1.7 percent of national TFP-growth and for 0.9 to 1.6 percent of real GDP-growth in the three countries. Social savings were highest in the US (c. 2.5 billion dollars and three million workers) and relatively modest in Britain and France, possibly because of the relative abundance of skilled live-entertainment workers. Comparative social savings at entertainment PPP-ratios inflate British social savings to above the US level. Converging exchange rates and PPP price ratios suggest rapid international market integration. The paper’s methodology and findings may give insight in technological change in other service industries that were also industrialised.

Cazetta S 2010 Cultural clusters and the city: the example of Filmbyen in Copenhagen, ACEI 16th International Conference on Cultural Economics, 9-12 June 2010, Copenhagen, Denmark.

This paper explores the origins and development of Filmbyen (FilmCity), a media hub created around Lars von Trier‟s film company Zentropa in the outskirts of Copenhagen.

In the first part of the paper the theoretical framework is introduced, with a review of the relevant literature concerning the role of culture in urban development and with a focus on clustering in the cultural industries.

Subsequently, after analyzing what kind of impact the film industry has on local economic development, and more specifically what role it plays in urban and regional development strategies (looking at Greater Copenhagen), the case of Filmbyen is studied in detail. The location patterns of film and film-related companies based in this special district are investigated with a small-scale survey – observing in particular what are the advantages of clustering, what networks are created, what kind of urban environment comes about.

Coe NM 2000 The view from out West: embeddedness, inter-personal relations and the development of an indigenous film industry in Vancouver, Geoforum 31: 391-407.

This paper considers the development of a particular cultural industry, the indigenous film and television production sector, in a specific locality, Vancouver (British Columbia, Canada). Vancouver’s film and television industry exhibits a high level of dependency on the location shooting of US funded productions, a relatively mobile form of foreign investment capital. As such, the development of locally developed and funded projects is crucial to the long-term sustainability of the industry. The key facilitators of growth in the indigenous sector are a small group of independent producers that are attempting to develop their own projects within a whole series of constraints apparently operating at the local, national and international levels. At the international level, they are situated within a North American cultural industry where the funding, production, distribution and exhibition of projects is dominated by US multinationals. At the national level, both government funding schemes and broadcaster purchasing patterns favour the larger production companies of central Canada. At the local level, producers have to compete with the demands of US productions for crew, locations and equipment. I frame my analysis within notions of the embeddedness or embodiment of social and economic relations, and suggest that the material realities of processes operating at the three inter-linked scales, are effectively embodied in a small group of individual producers and their inter-personal networks.

Hoefert de Turégano T 2006 Public Support for the International Promotion of European Films, European Audiovisual Observatory.

Jones C 2001 Co-evolution of entrpreneurial careers, institutional rules, and competitive dymanics in American Film, 1895-1920, Organization Studies 22 (6): 911-944.

An historical case analysis of the American film industry is undertaken to gain a better understanding of the co-evolutionary processes of entrepreneurial careers, institutional rules and competitive dynamics in emerging industries. The study compares technology and content-focused periods, which were driven by entrepreneurs with different career histories and characterized by distinct institutional rules and competitive dynamics. Archival data and historical analysis is used to trace how entrepreneurial careers, firm capabilities, institutional rules, and competitive dynamics co-evolved. A co-evolutionary perspective is integrated with insights from institutional and resource-based theories to explain how the American film industry emerged, set an initial trajectory with specific institutional rules and competitive dynamics, and then changed.

Mezias Sj and Kuperman JC 2001 The community dynamics of entrepreneurship: the birth of the American film industry, 1895-1929, Journal of Business Venturing 16 (3): 209-233. [NB: this is not the full abstract, which is actually longer than some research papers].

This paper provides insight for practitioners by exploring the collective process of entrepreneurship in the context of the formation of new industries. In contrast to the popular notions of entrepreneurship, with their emphasis on individual traits, we argue that successful entrepreneurship is often not solely the result of solitary individuals acting in isolation. In many respects, entrepreneurs exist as part of larger collectives. First and foremost, there is the population of organizations engaging in activities similar to those of the entrepreneurial firm, which constitute a social system that can affect entrepreneurial success. In addition, there is also a community of populations of organizations characterized by interdependence of outcomes. Individual entrepreneurs may be more successful in the venturing process if they recognize some of the ways in which their success may depend on the actions of entrepreneurs throughout this community. Thus, we urge practitioners and theorists alike to include a community perspective in their approach to entrepreneurship. We also suggest that one way of conceptualizing the community of relevance might be in terms of populations of organizations that constitute the value chain. For example, in the early film industry a simple value chain with three functions—production, distribution, and exhibition—is a convenient heuristic for considering what populations of organizations might be relevant. As we show in our case study of that industry, a community model offers insights into the collective nature of entrepreneurship and the emergence of new industries.

Orbach BY and Einav L 2007 Uniform prices for differentiated goods: the case of the movie-theater industry, International Review of Law and Economics 27 (2): 129-153.

Since the early 1970s, movie theaters in the United States have employed a pricing model of uniform prices for differentiated goods. At any given theater, one price is charged for all movies, seven days a week, 365 days a year. This pricing model is puzzling in light of the potential profitability of prices that vary with demand characteristics. Another unique aspect of the motion-picture industry is the legal regime that imposes certain constraints on vertical arrangements between distributors and retailers (exhibitors) and attempts to facilitate competitive bidding for films. We explore the justifications for uniform pricing in the industry and show their limitations. We conclude that exhibitors could increase profits by engaging in variable pricing and that they could do so more easily if the legal constraints on vertical arrangements are lifted.

 

Death of the BFI

Ed Vaizey, the Minister for Culture and Creative Industries, announced on Monday the government’s pans for reforming the UK Film Council, the British Film Institute, and the Regional Screen Agencies. The full text of the speech can be accessed at the Department of Culture, Media, and Sport (DCMS) website here. Today, I will go through this speech piece by piece to give it some context and identify some problems and questions that need to be addressed.

Throughout I will include links to online papers of research on the British film industry as they are relevant to my discussion. Not every link will be to the full paper, and some papers will not be the final published version. Some general papers that are useful to read include:

Dickenson M and Harvey S 2005 Film policy in the United Kingdom: New Labour at the movies, Political Quarterly 76 (3): 420-429.

Magor M and Schlesinger P 2009 ‘For this relief much thanks:’ Taxation, film policy and the UK government, Screen 50 (3): 299-317. DOI:10.1093/screen/hjp017.

Redfern N 2007 Defining British cinema: transnational and territorial film policy in the UK, Journal of British Cinema and Television 4 (1): 150-164. DOI 10.3366/JBCTV.2007.4.1.150.

Other useful research articles can be accessed from my earlier collection of papers on the British film industry here.

The New BFI

It has been widely reported in the British press that the BFI has been given control of film policy and that the UK Film Council has been disbanded. This is not the case. What we call the BFI will cease to exist. What will replace it will be some new institution called the BFI that is the UK Film Council in all but name plus the old BFI. The BFI is dead. Long live the BFI.

The section that introduces the government’s major decision in restructuring the UK’s film institutions begins with the following assertion:

We need a new strategic body to oversee the future development of film in this country.

There is no justification given for this statement – it is simply asserted. The decision to disband the UK Film Council was (we were informed) part of a general cost-cutting exercise to reduce the size of the UK’s public debt. That was why the BFI lost £45 million of funding for the BFI Film Centre in June 2010. Now the game has changed, and the restructuring of the UK’s film institutions is part of a strategic plan (which no-one has seen) that is apparently so necessary it cannot wait. Is this decision the product of an economic or political process? It appeared to be one and now it’s the other – when did that change? If we need to cut costs in a recession then fair enough; but if we need a new approach to film policy then this is neither the responsible nor the democratic way to do it.

In fact, this plan is neither new nor cost-saving.

There is quite simply nothing original in the government’s decision to merge the UK Film Council and the BFI. Last year, the Labour government proposed giving control of the BFI to the UK Film Council. The DCMS press release for the proposed merger dated 20 August 2009 can be read in full here, but it is worth considering this quote from that press release in the context of Monday’s speech.

The overall remit of the BFI and UKFC will not be reduced. The proposal is for a streamlined organisation, which can spend more of its money on film and services and less on infrastructure, and in turn offer better support for Britain’s film culture and promotion of its film industry. Its remit would span securing investment across the sector, steering the industry through the transition to digital, championing the cultural importance of the UK’s film heritage and guaranteeing that the full diversity of film culture is available to all.

The announcement on Monday made it clear that the current government intends to do exactly the same thing, only they are going to call it the BFI instead of the UK Film Council. Nonetheless, Vaizey describes his speech as ‘an exciting new vision for the British film industry.’ Under Labour’s scheme the BFI would have retained a separate identity as a provider of educational and heritage services due to the fact that it is a registered charity and was established with a royal charter. The Conservative plan will simply create a single body responsible film policy, production investment, training, information gathering, heritage, and education.

This means the end of the BFI as we know it, and will require a new royal charter for the BFI along with a review of its status as a registered charity. This was acknowledged by Amanda Nevill, Director of the BFI, in 2009 when the merger of the UK Film Council and the BFI was originally proposed, as you can read in her letter here. A new royal charter will not be difficult to implement – they are renewed and updated as the law changes and (as far as I can recall) the current charter dates from 2000. The charitable status will probably prove to be more difficult to deal with: the ‘new BFI’ will now be responsible for directly providing funding to private corporations for commercial benefit, which is an interesting definition of ‘charity.’ Of course, this was always the case for Lottery funding for the film industry (which hardly meets the definition of ‘good cause’), but the UK Film Council was an arm’s-length government body and not a registered charity. I assume that the ‘new BFI’ will have similar status as a government-backed body and not as a charity.

The need to restructure was sold to the British public as a need to cut costs and improve accountability in a time of economic hardship, but it would appear that the money saved by this reorganisation is only £3 million. There was nothing in the speech about how much it is going to cost to implement these reforms. Furthermore, this money will be invested in film production (as it would have been under Labour) and will not be used to reduce the expense of quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations (QUANGOS) to the British taxpayer. Greg Dyke, the current Chairman of the BFI, was quoted in The Guardian as saying

We [the BFI] can certainly do it significantly cheaper … how much cheaper we don’t know yet. The UK Film Council carried quite a large overhead.

Surely the rationale for this restructuring is that it would be cheaper and it was known that it would be cheaper.* If the BFI don’t know how much cheaper it is going to be, what then is the basis for the projected saving of £3 million? Why wasn’t a proper audit conducted prior to the decision to abolish the UK Film Council? It is also important to remember that the BFI that will apparently be much cheaper is not the BFI as it exists now, but will be the ‘new BFI’ (i.e. the UK Film Council and the BFI merged together) and no-one knows how much overhead that will carry. If the decision has been made on the basis of the current BFI that will cease to exist next year, then this is stupidity of the highest order. With the transfer of the (potential) £3 million from administration costs to production investment the actual saving to the taxpayer in the short-term is zero, and this does not include the cost of the restructuring. Overall, this is an old plan originally proposed last year that has no basis in fact (as admitted by Dyke), and has been conducted at an indecent pace. In March 2010 (when the Labour government was pursuing its plan for restructuring), the saving was estimated by the Hollywood Reporter to be £10 million per year by 2012/2013 (here). Perhaps the new government’s plan will save this much by then – given that it is essentially the same plan as that of the previous government we should not be surprised if they make similar predictions and produce similar results. But has anyone seen any evidence that the current government’s decision to create a new BFI would be substantially cheaper than the Labour plan to hand control of the BFI to the UK Film Council? As the due diligence process is now beginning after the decision has been taken, does any evidence of substantial savings exist at all? If it does, why hasn’t it been made available to taxpayers?

Perhaps I’m being too hard. Perhaps there is something truly original in this speech that will fundamentally transform the British film industry. At one point Vaizey praises the BFI for its ability to reach many different audiences:

It has the breadth and depth to support excellence and high quality film, while also developing audiences for British films, through its distribution and exhibition arm, which already services more than 600 venues, from remote screenings in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland to the Imax in London.

Is the new BFI going to function as a state-funded distributor for British films as this sentence implies? Probably not – even though this would make a far larger difference to the British cinema.

Creative England

The nine English regional screen agencies (RSAs) are to be disbanded and replaced with a single organisation – Creative England – that will be organised around three production hubs based in the north, the midlands, and the south (though we don’t have any detail on where they will be).

The name ‘Creative England’ is vague and does not feature the words ‘film,’ ‘cinema,’ ‘media,’ ‘screen,’ ‘television,’ or ‘moving image.’ This body will replace not only the RSAs, but also their umbrella organisation Screen England. Why could this name not be retained so that the emphasis on the film/television/media/video game industries could be made explicit? ‘Creative England’ is precisely the sort of title that one would give to a general body responsible for the arts and/or creative industries in England if the decision were made to remove the Arts Council of England (ACE) from existence. Is the government creating a specifically film orientated set of institutions to replace the RSAs? Or is Creative England going to be a much larger organisation for all the creative industries? This is exactly what happened with Creative Scotland, which was created from the merger of Scottish Screen and the Scottish Arts Council, and focusses on the ‘arts, screen, and creative industries.’ The creation of Creative England would suggest that this will happen in the English regions (not including London, of course) – there will be one body that includes the screen industries but which is also responsible for areas of the arts and creative industries. This will inevitably harm the film industry outside London, and is a very bad thing indeed.

There are some parts of the country where levels of film production is very low – the North, the West Midlands, and the East Midlands. The South West, the North West, and Yorkshire and the Humber fare rather better. For data on the distribution of feature film production in the UK you can read my earlier posts here and here. The reduction of film production in England to four hubs – London, plus three others – will inevitably impoverish some parts of the UK. This will hit those parts of the UK where heavy industry has declined and in which new digital and media-based businesses have been expected to reinvigorate the local economy. A recent article in The Sunday Times by Rod Liddle looked at the example of Middlesbrough, and noted just such a development. These places will lose their regionally specific support, making economic recovery and regeneration that much harder. There does not appear to be any plan for maintaining local agglomeration effects with only a single hub between a group of regions.

Why does the south of England get another hub in addition to London? Presumably this hub will have to be based in the South West – the government region in the south furthest from London – as the East, South East, and London will be amply covered by Film London. This will create a situation where the midlands and the north of England (not to mention Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland) are outgunned, and simply reintroduces the core-periphery model that the RSAs were intended to counterbalance.

On the role of networks and the presence of the BBC in a production market I recommend Gail Davies’ Ph.D. thesis from University College London: Davies G 1998 Networks of Nature: Stories of Natural History Filmmaking from the BBC, University College, London: unpublished Ph.D. thesis.

On clustering, cultural industries, and film and television in the UK see Turok I 2003 Cities, clusters, and creative industries: the case of film and television in Scotland, European Planning Studies 11 (5):  549-565.

The ‘new BFI’ will have to be an improvement on the old BFI in its relationship with the regions. The BFI was strongly criticised in the UK Film Council’s report Film in England in 2001 (read the report here). The main areas of criticism were that too great a proportion of funding was spent on activities in London at the expense of the regions, that the support for education programmes outside London was inconsistent and direct funding had been minimal, the failure to put into place a coherent planning framework for the regions, and the perception that the regions were simply delivery mechanisms for BFI products and services. The failure of the BFI was the reason the UK Film Council  and the Regional Screen Agencies were created. The BFI is simply not a body with a record of success in building and sustaining film policy in the UK and nothing has changed in the past decade to suggest that it will become such an institution – but then this won’t matter next year because the BFI that failed in the past will no longer exist. If the ‘old’ BFI attitude re-emerges then in ten years time we will simply have another restructuring that takes us back to where we are now.

This decision also raises the question of the government’s general economic policy with regard to the regions of the UK. The development of regional film policy in the UK since 2000 did not emerge in isolation, but was part of a wider Labour programme of economic development for the arts and the wider economy that sought to develop business clusters and agglomeration effects. It was largely inspired by the work of Michael Porter, as can be seen in this annex to a report from the Department of Trade and Industry from 2001. Regional film policy under New Labour should be interpreted in the context of this broader economic policy framework for the regions. What is the new policy framework for the regions and the film industry in the regions under the coalition government? Again, you have to wonder about the logic of this decision in the absence of a clear answer to this question.

It would appear that the government intends to have no regional film policy.

On the subject of regional film policy in the UK, you can access Jack Newsinger’s Ph.D. thesis at Nottingham University: Newsinger J 2009 From the Grassroots: Regional Film Policy and Practice in England, University of Nottingham, unpublished Ph.D. thesis.

Film London

Film London will not be included as a part of Creative England, and will take on an international rather than a regional role. Film London is to be handed responsibility for promoting the UK to international producers as a whole. In and of itself not a major change in policy, though it is disappointing that this could not be given a name to reflect the whole nation. From the perspective of the English regions little will probably change – they are already dominated by London and will remain so. Of more concern is what will happen to Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. In my essay I noted that Scotland and Northern Ireland had some connections with the global film industry independent of London. By making Film London responsible for promoting the UK as whole, this will force filmmakers in these regions to go through London where previously they may have been able to work directly with producers from outside the UK. It will be necessary to follow-up my research in five years time to see if there has been any loss of autonomy. Again, this will only entrench a core-periphery model that we were supposed to have seen consigned to the past.

I looked the relationship between the regions and London in my paper ‘Connecting the regional and the global in the UK film industry,’ a draft version of which can be accessed here. My essay was published in Transnational Cinemas last week, and as of Monday’s speech is now out of date! Redfern N 2010 Connecting the regional and the global in the UK film industry, Transnational Cinemas 1 (2) 2010: 145-160. DOI: 10.1386/trac.1.2.145_1.

Supporting British Film

In his speech, Vaizey also took the time to commend Odeon cinemas who have introduced a new scheme to promote British films to audiences. Odeon Premiere Card holders will be rewarded with extra points if they go to see a British film. The Odeon website will promote British films, and will recommend a ‘British film of the Month.’ Odeon will consider giving guaranteed support to a ‘British film of the month.’

Can there be anything more depressing than the fact that support for the British films on cinema screens has been reduced to a loyalty card? The Eady Levy may not have worked, but at least it was not an insult to the intelligence. Odeon’s other commitments are pathetic. Would Odeon – or any other exhibitor – screen any film that it did not promote on its website? They would have a truly unique approach to marketing if they did. Odeon has not even committed to screening one British film a month – they are only considering it. They have not defined what British means in this context – Vaizey cites Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, part 1 as a successful British film, but surely Odeon’s commitment to promoting British cannot be limited to such studio films they would have shown anyway. We are promised a wider choice of British film, but they don’t define what they mean by this either. (There are no details on the Odeon website). Nonetheless, Vaizey praises Odeon in his speech for supporting British film ‘as much as they can.’ It’s just that this turns out to be not very much at all.

The UK and Hollywood

The contradictory nature of UK film policy in this speech can be identified in the statements regarding the British national cinema and Hollywood. On the one hand we have the ever-elusive goal of what Vaizey refers to as a ‘sustainable, independent British film industry;’ while on the other we have the rejection of the opinion that the growth of the British film industry must come at the expense of US production in the UK. Vaizey refers to ‘some people’ – he does not say who – who belive these aims are contradictory.

I do not see this as necessarily being a problem. I think that it is important to maintain a distinction between ‘British national cinema,’ which is that part of our film culture and film industry that is specifically British (however you wish to go about defining that); and the ‘UK film industry,’ which is the totality of film production, distribution, and exhibition activity within the United kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland including British national cinema. (See my 2007 paper on defining British cinema for how this can work – the link is at the head of this post). It is possible for film policy to seek to develop both ‘British national cinema’ and the ‘UK film industry.’ Indeed, it is desirable that it should do so. Attempts to create a ‘sustainable, independent British cinema’ are not inimical to the goal of positioning the UK film industry in the world as a production hub, and it is foolish to argue otherwise. Almost certainly, one will not survive with the other.

There is nothing remotely controversial about Vaizey’s statement that the film industries of the UK and the US are intimately connected and this connection should be maintained. It would suicide to behave in any other manner. It’s just that if he wants to create a ‘sustainable, independent British film industry’ while maintaining American investment, then he has to say how this is going to be achieved. It would help if he defined what was meant by ‘sustainable,’ ‘independent,’ and ‘British’ in this context. A film industry that relies of government subsidy, that requires government intervention to create and fund a body to lobby for a film industry that could not do this for itself, and that is overwhelmingly dependent on investment from another country doe not sound very sustainable, independent, or British. This is of course the great problem of British film policy that every government has so far failed to deal with, and so it is unfair to berate this government as being especially incapable. But there is nothing innovative in this ‘exciting new vision for the British film industry’ that suggests they will be any more successful than anyone else.

Tax Incentives and subsidies

The one good thing to be made clear by this speech is that the tax incentive for production will be maintained and (one hopes) not subject to the sort of endless interfering witnessed prior to 2006. This financial measure is by far the most important for film production in the UK to be competitive in a global market, and the fact that it will continue uninterrupted is more important than rearranging the management structure of the BFI.

Increased investment from the BBC and Channel 4 are also referenced, but as the BBC’s funding from the licence fee is cut and the television advertising market is in the toilet this is not a long-term strategy. (There was an interesting piece in the Guardian on Monday about declining DVD sales and what this will mean for BBC Worldwide – read it here). Vaizey notes that Sky does not invest significantly in film production and hopes that this will change in the future. This is as close to criticism of a Rupert Murdoch-owned media outlet as a Conservative MP has ever come.

We are also told that the Lottery money available for investment in British film will rise from £27 million per year to £43 million by 2014. This is apparently is evidence of the government’s ‘commitment to film’ but turns out to be the money that would have been available anyway had it not been diverted to pay for the 2012 Olympic games. Vaizey is very keen to stress the ‘commitment to film,’ as the Conservatives have a poor record of dealing with the industry going back to the 1980s; but he is taking credit for this ‘increase’ in funding without actually doing anything. This does, of course, raise a number of questions about what sort of state the British film industry would be in had the money not been spent on the Olympics , and no doubt we will have some research to provide the answers in due course.

What is missing from the speech?

Originality, logic, daring, creativity, policy, basic accountancy, a detailed description of what will actually happen – take your pick.

Three issues do stand out.

First, the statement issued by Tim Cagney (here), Managing Director of the UK Film Council, included the following paragraph:

A number of important areas of film activity which are currently funded by the UK Film Council – including film exports, research, statistics and market intelligence, work on intellectual property and combating film theft, co-production support and diversity initiatives – have not been mentioned in the DCMS announcement today.

As the ‘new BFI’ will essentially be the UK Film Council in all but name with responsibility for the National Film Archive and BFI Southbank, I assume that these functions will be transferred to the new body (though I wouldn’t be too hopeful for the diversity initiatives). These areas are, however, much easier to dispose of than core activities such as distributing lottery funding and will be at some risk for cost-cutting. I’m not convinced that research and market intelligence are within the government’s remit – the former lies within the scope of academia and both are also the province of the film sector itself. We should not see a downturn in either, although accessing relevant material may become harder and/or more expensive. If public money (i.e. tax incentives and Lottery funding) is to be spent on the film industry, then statistics must be collected so that public can understand and assess how its money is spent.

Although there is some discussion of the UK film industry’s place in the world, this is framed entirely in terms of its relationship to the United States. Europe and India are not mentioned at all. As I showed in my post on UK film production and the world last month (here), the number of US films with budgets of £500,000 of greater to be produced in the UK has been relatively stable over the period 2003 to 2009, whereas there has been a substantial decline in the number of connections to other important production partners (i.e. France, Germany, Canada, Spain, Italy, Ireland) following the introduction of the cultural test in 2005. The US is the most important source of production investment in the UK and the UK film industry has benefitted from the favourable exchange rate of the past couple of years; but as the economic situation changes, this advantage will disappear and without a diverse production base the UK will not be able to make up the loss from the UK with production investment from elsewhere. Over the past few years the British film industry has become increasingly one-dimensional, and this will not change unless a broader international perspective is taken. Confusing the ‘global film industry’ with the ‘American film industry’ is a foolish approach to film policy.

Perhaps most importantly, there is no mention of distribution in this speech. There is money for production, and Odeon cinemagoers will get a loyalty card so that takes care of exhibition; but the film industry is distribution-led and the UK does not have a distribution policy. It has not had one since the quota was (rightly) abolished in the 1985, and we have no prospect of one in the future. The section on the UK and Hollywood did not address the fundamental problem with making British films successful – the distribution market is dominated by global media empires (but which have as US bias) that put rubbish like The Bucket List and Rocky Balboa on hundreds of screens but have no incentive to distribute British films. Certainly there are a lot of very poor British films – the worst film ever made is 24 Hours in London – but there is way too much American crap backed powerful distributors clogging up too many multiplex screens that could be put to far better use. There is no point producing British films if they do not get an opportunity to earn any money through well-funded marketing campaigns and sufficiently wide releases. If the object of government policy is to create a sustainable, independent British film industry then this must include distribution.

Conclusion

So what did we learn on Monday?

• The government does not have any original ideas for film policy, and has simply implemented Labour’s plan from last year with a different name.
• There is a lack of detail about the justification for the reform of the UK’s film institutions.
• The UK Film Council and the BFI will not exist by this time next year. An institution called the ‘British Film Institute’ will exist, but it will be completely different to the one we have now.
• The savings to be made by reconstituting the BFI in the manner proposed are small (if any) and will not be passed on to the taxpayer, despite the fact that this was the ostensible purpose behind the abolition of the UK Film Council.
• The government is apparently abandoning film policy at the regional level.
• The English regions will probably end up with no dedicated film body, and will be subject to a general arts and creative industries funding body. Only London it seems will retain a dedicated film body, and this will serve the whole country even though the ‘new BFI’ will be the national body.
• The core-periphery model of the film industry is to be entrenched in favour of London (and to a lesser extent the south of England in general) at the expense of the rest of the country.
• There are no serious policies for getting British films onto British cinema screens.
• ‘International’ is apparently the same as ‘America,’ and other important global relationships are not mentioned.
• Film policy in the UK remains focussed on production in a distribution-led industry.

The goal of a sustainable, independent British film industry will remain as elusive as ever.

* In tribute to Leslie Nielsen, I should as this point ask that you don’t call me Shirley.

Some notes on cinemetrics IV

In the 1970s, Barry Salt proposed that the mean shot length could be used to describe and compare the style of motion pictures. Many other scholars have followed him, and we find now that average shot lengths are now commonly cited in film studies texts. Unfortunately, a worse choice of a statistic of film style could not have been made – the distribution of shot lengths is not normally distributed and the mean does not accurately locate the middle of the data. This means that a large part of film studies research is utterly useless because it is based on an elementary mistake in the methodology that could have been avoided with only a middle school maths education. Quite simply, the mean is not an appropriate measure of location for a skewed dataset with a number of outliers. It never has been; it never will be; and quoting this as a statistic of film style leads to fundamentally flawed inferences about film style, as can be seen here.

This does not mean tha Salt has decided to give up on the mean shot length. He has subsequently asserted – but not proven – that shot length distributions are lognormally distributed, and that the mean shot length should be retained because the ratio of the mean shot length to the median shot length can be used to derive the shape factor of a lognormal distribution that adequately describes the distribution of shot lengths in a motion picture. (Actually Salt refers to the median-to-mean ratio, but this is just a different way of writing the same information – each ratio is reciprocal of the other. For convenience in later calculations I refer only to the mean-to-median ratio). The ratio of the mean to the median is a measure of the skew of a dataset – symmetrical distributions have a ratio of approximately 1 – and is used widely in economics to represent imbalances in income. If a distribution is lognormal, there is a relation between the mean-to-median ratio and the shape factor of a lognormal distribution. As I have shown elsewhere on this blog, the assumption of lognormality is not justified – applying a normality test to the log-transformed data I have found that the null hypothesis of lognormality is rejected in between 50% and 80% of cases. The proportion of silent films for which this null hypothesis is rejected appears to be greater than the proportion of sound films.

Undeterred, Salt persists with the assertion that shot lengths are lognormally distributed and has cooked up a new scheme to justify this assertion by arguing that titles should be removed from the shot length data of silent films and then analysed as being lognormal. No suggestion is made regarding the seemingly large proportion of sound films that also do not appear to be lognormally distributed. As is typical in Salt’s work, this argument is simply asserted as being true without any methodological justification and – as we shall see – some dubious evidence.

What is the methodological justification for removing the titles from the shot length data? Possible reasons for removing this data are that the titles are not original and have been updated so that they no longer accurately reflect the original structure of the film. However, the fact that the titles may not be original does not automatically mean that the titles are inaccurate or that their time on screen is not an accurate reflection of the original tempo of the film. It may be that a conservator has meticulously restored the film and respected the way the film was originally put together. We should certainly feel free to include the titles in the data if they are or are known to be properly restored, are based directly on the original film, or are reasonable approximations based on documentary evidence for the film’s production, historical context, etc. Salt’s suggestion appears to be a blanket ban on all titles in shot length data for silent films, but this would rule out much otherwise useful data. A further appears in the memoir of the projectionist  Louis J Mannix (whom I discussed in an earlier post), who noted that it was a practice of projectionists to slow the film when a title came onto the screen for the ease of reading by the audience – there is nothing we can do as statisticians to control for this type of situation specific variability but it is very interesting as film history. The use of titles is certainly a methodological concern for analysts of film style, and it does need to be discussed as part of the methodology of the statistical analysis of film style. This would, however, mean going beyond mere assertion.

Salt’s method involves linking two shots that were previously separated by a title into a single shot, but again there is no methodological justification for this. The decision to put a title in the middle of a shot is itself an aesthetic decision by the filmmakers for the purposes of narrative communication, and should be respected as such. If we combine the shots in the manner Salt suggests can the data be said to reflect the film as it was made? The tempo of the film is changed, and we can no longer make any direct comparison between silent films, and between silent films and sound films. Salt also states the resulting analysis will provide very different results if the shots are not combined in this way, but he does not say why we should prefer his method over the alternative of not combining the shots.

Separating titles from the rest of the shot length data for a film is not in itself a bad idea – it would allow us to look more closely at how a film was put together, and to make inferences about how audiences understand silent films or text on screen in general. However, Salt appears to want to remove this data to make it fit a lognormal distribution, and that is a bad idea. It is back to front: the transformation of the data is suggested to make it fit a preconceived theoretical distribution, even though there is no evidence that this assumption is justified in general. If the method of combining shots is to be preferred to not combining them for the purpose of generating a better lognormal fit, then this is clearly problematic. In the absence of a proper methodological basis, this smacks of both desperation and data manipulation. Nonetheless, Salt has stated that this approach can be termed ‘experimental film analysis’ similar to experimental archaeology. The whole thing can be read here.

Little Annie Rooney has been held up of an example of how the fit to a lognormal distribution is improved after removing the titles. The data for this film (without titles) is here. However, closer examination of the data reveals that the mean-to-median ratio leads to a poor estimate of the shape factor and provides a substantially poorer fit than the maximum likelihood estimates (MLE). Recalling that a random variable X (such as the length of a shot) is lognormally distributed if its logarithm is normally distributed, Figure 1 presents the histogram of the shot length data transformed using the natural logarithm and three density estimates.

Figure 1 Density estimation of shot lengths for Little Annie Rooney (minus titles)

The red curve is the kernel density estimate, using an Epanechnikov kernel and a bandwidth of 0.5, and is a nonparametric density estimate that makes no assumption about the shape of the distribution and depends on the data alone. This is the empirical distribution of the log-transformed data, and is used as a part of exploratory data analysis. From the histogram and the kernel density estimate we can see that even after the data has been log-transformed there is still some skewness and a heavy upper tail. We should therefore be sceptical about the assertion that this data is lognormally distributed. (For a kernel density calculator see here).

The black curve is the normal distribution specified by the maximum likelihood estimators of the log-transformed shot lengths – i.e. the mean (μ) and standard deviation (σ) of the logarithms of the shot lengths. (Note that μ is the arithmetic mean of the log-transformed data and the geometric mean of the data in its original scale). For this data, μ = 1.2078 and σ = 0.7304. The probability plot correlation coefficient (PPCC) using a Blom plotting position is 0.9776 and the null hypothesis that the data (n = 1066) is lognormally distributed is rejected for α = 0.05. Figure 2 is the normal probability plot for this data with the parameters of the black curve. (Recall that if the lognormal distribution is a good fit, the data will lie along the red line).

Figure 2 Normal probability plot for Little Annie Rooney (minus titles): LN[X]~N(1.2078, 0.7304)

The green curve in Figure 1 is the normal distribution defined if we take the median shot length and the estimate of σ derived from the mean-to-median ratio, as Salt recommends. According to Salt, the mean-to-median ratio for shot length data is equal to the exponentiate of half the variance (μ/med = exp (σ²/2)) and that from this we can estimate σ. As we know the value of σ is 0.7304, this can be tested for Little Annie Rooney. The ratio of the mean-to-median ratio for this film is 4.6/2.9 = 1.5862 and exp (0.7304²/2) = 1.3057. The mean-to-median ratio overestimates the true value by 21.5%. Inevitably, this leads to a poor estimate of σ: if μ/med = exp (σ*²/2) then σ* = √ (2 × LN (μ/med)), and for Little Annie Rooney (minus titles) this produces an estimate of σ* = 0.9606. (It is perhaps not clear from the font used here, but √ is ‘square root’). The estimated value of the shape factor is greater than its MLE value by 31.5%. Looking at the function of LN[X]~N(1.0647, 0.9606) in Figure 1, we can see that it provides a better fit to upper tail of the data and is very close to the kernel density estimate. At the same time, it provides a very poor fit below the median, and is actually worse than the MLE parameters. This can be seen more clearly by looking at Figure 3, which is the normal probability plot assuming LN[X]~N(1.0647, 0.9606). (This already poor fit can be made worse by substituting μ for the median).

Figure 3 Normal probability plot for Little Annie Rooney (minus titles) LN[X]~N(1.0647, 0.9606)

From this we can conclude that (1) the shot length data for Little Annie Rooney (minus titles) is not lognormally distributed; (2) that the mean-to-median ratio does not equal exp (σ²/2); and (3) that using the mean-to-median ratio to derive σ* provides a very poor estimate of the shape factor. (Conclusion 1 should also lead us to question the method by which Salt claims to measure goodness of fit).

This same process cannot be applied to shot length data available of the Cinemetrics website for Little Annie Rooney with titles, as this data includes a shot length (presumably rounded down) of 0.0 seconds. (The logarithm of X ≤ 0 does not exist). This shot length does not appear in the data after the titles have been removed, and I find it hard to believe that this film had a title card that was present on screen for less than 0.05 of a second. The accuracy of this data with or without titles is questionable.

If we examine the shot length distributions of the silent short films of Laurel and Hardy (both with and without titles) we again find that (1) the assumption of lognormality is not justified, (2) the mean-to-median ratio does not provide reasonable estimates of exp (σ²/2), and (3) σ* does not provide reasonable estimates of σ.

Calculating the probability plot correlation coefficient for these films with titles using a Blom plotting position and α = 0.05, the null hypothesis that the data is lognormally distributed is rejected for 10 of the 12 films. Repeating this process with the titles removed, the null hypothesis is rejected for 11 films. (Recall that a statistical hypothesis test is a test of plausibility of the null hypothesis for a given set of data – failure to reject the null hypothesis indicates only that there is insufficient evidence to reject [and does not prove] H₀). These results are presented in Table 1. The assumption of lognormality is not justified and removing the titles from the data does not affect this conclusion.

Table 1 Probability plot correlation coefficient for the silent films of Laurel and Hardy with and without titles

Table 2 includes the mean, median, and the standard deviation of the log-transformed data (σ). Using this information, we can test Salt’s other claims regarding the mean-to-median ratio. (Actually this is all rather redundant as we already know that lognormality is not a plausible model for this data). Early to Bed was excluded from this part of the study as the log-transformed data exhibits bimodality.

Table 2 Mean, median, and σ for the silent films of Laurel and Hardy with and without titles

First, let us ask if the mean-to-median ratio is equal to exp (σ²/2) for these films. The results are presented in Table 3, and it is immediately clear that for only two films – The Second Hundred Years and Angora Love – does μ/med provide a reasonable estimate of exp (σ²/2) when we include the titles in the data, and the PPCC test failed to reject the null hypothesis of lognormality for both these films. For every other film, μ/med overestimates the true value by ~10% or more. Once the titles are removed, we do not get the improvement Salt claims will be evident by censoring the data in this way. Generally, the change in the estimate once the titles are removed is small, although both The Second Hundred Years and Angora Love show much larger errors after the data has been censored due to an increase in the skew of the data.

Table 3 Mean-to-median ratio and exp (σ²/2) for the silent films of Laurel and Hardy with and without titles

Table 4 presents the maximum likelihood estimate of σ and the estimate derived by using σ* = √ (2 × LN (μ/med)) for the Laurel and Hardy films, both with and without titles. For the shot length data including titles σ* provides a poor estimate for those films that rejected the null hypothesis of lognormality in the PPCC test, and consistently overestimates σ by at least 12%. Again this is not surprising, as μ/med = exp (σ²/2) is only valid if the data are lognormal, which is not the case here. Turning to the shot length data after the titles have been excluded, we see that σ* is a poor estimate of σ for all the films in the sample.

Table 4 σ and σ* for the silent films of Laurel and Hardy with and without titles

From these results we can conclude that:

• The methodological justification for removing titles from the shot length data of silent films is obscure, and lacks a theoretical basis.
• There is no evidence to justify the assumption of that shot length data is lognormally distributed.
• There is no evidence that removing the titles from silent films will improve the fit to a lognormal distribution, and may in fact produce a poorer fit.
• The mean-to-median ratio does not provide a good estimate of exp (σ²/2).
• Using the mean-to-median ratio to estimate the shape factor does not provide relaible results.

In other words, the approach suggested by Salt is wrong in every possible way.

Do not take my word for it. Do not blindly accept what someone tells you with scientific sounding words no matter how confident they sound. Learn to do it for yourself – it really is not that difficult to pick up enough statistics to be able to properly evaluate a research paper. Get some data and do your own testing. If you still get stuck then ask a statistician.

If you want to repeat the Laurel and Hardy tests performed above, I have added a spreadsheet to the Laurel and Hardy post (here) that includes the data with titles indicated.

Hitchcock and shot scales

This week a look at shot scales and shot types in the films of Alfred Hitchcock. The pdf can be accessed here: Nick Redfern – Statistical analysis of shot types in the films of Alfred Hitchcock

Statistical analysis of shot types in the films of Alfred Hitchcock

Abstract

This paper analyses the changing use of shot scales and shot types in the films of Alfred Hitchcock from The Pleasure Garden (1925) to The Birds (1963) in the context of the introduction of sound technology to British cinema in 1929 and the director’s move from Britain to Hollywood in 1939. A sample of 42 films was divided into 3 subgroups (British silent films [𝑛 = 9]; British sound films [𝑛 = 14]; and Hollywood films [𝑛 = 19]); and was analysed using linear regression of rank-frequency plots and nonparametric analysis of variance. The results show that all three groups of films are well-fitted by a linear regression model, with no one shot scale dominating these films. Analysis of the different shot scales revealed that there are no significant differences in the use of shot scales between the two groups of British films, but that significant differences did occur between the British and American films for close-ups and medium close-ups, which increase in frequency, and medium long shots and long shots, which became less frequent. The proportion of reverse-angle cuts in the Hollywood films is much greater than in the British films, and this may be due to the use of shot-reverse shot editing patterns in Hollywood cinema. There is no evidence that the number of point-of-view shots or inserts changed, and this may be attributed to the fact that these types of shots are used in specific circumstances as required by the demands of narrative. Overall the results indicate that the introduction of sound technology did not have an impact on Hitchcock’s film style, but that the move to Hollywood did result in specific changes in the style of Hitchcock’s films.

This paper expands and imporoves on the methodology of using rank-frequency plots and ranks to analyse shot scales that I’ve used elsewhere. It also clarifies and updates and earlier discussion of shot scales in Hitchcock’s films, as well as tentatively exploring the relationship between reverse-angle cuts and POV shots. There is, however, much work to be done in this area – especially on Hitchcock’s use of shot-reverse shot editing.

Memory and experience

This week some papers on memory and experience in the cinema from a cognitive perspective.

One of the interesting things to note is that if you search Google scholar using the terms “viewer memory cinema” you get a lot of references to books and articles on the status of film as memory and cinema as cultural memory; whereas if you search for “viewer memory advertising” the results returned focus on how people experience and remember adverts (and the obvious economic consequences of this). Insights from research into advertising can be useful to film studies, and if we take a step beyond film studies we can find a good deal of empirical research that looks at how people organise and remember their experience of films. This is especially the case when we look at the research on cinema advertising, where we find many studies of how audiences respond to and recall what they have seen on the screen, but which is largely absent from work on cognitive film theory.

As ever, the version linked to may not be the final published version.

An interesting paper recently published by Frontiers in Human Neuroscience looks at how viewer’s organise their experience of a film by segmenting it into meaningful events by measuring brain activity. This research harks back to work in the 1970s by Carroll and Bever on segmentation in narrative cinema (Carroll JM and Bever TG 1976 Segmentation in narrative cinema, Science 191 (4231): 1053-1055).

Zacks JM, Speer NK, Swallow KM, and Maley CJ (2010) The brain’s cutting-room floor: segmentation of narrative cinema, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 4: 168. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2010.00168.

Observers segment ongoing activity into meaningful events. Segmentation is a core component of perception that helps determine memory and guide planning. The current study tested the hypotheses that event segmentation is an automatic component of the perception of extended naturalistic activity, and that the identification of event boundaries in such activities results in part from processing changes in the perceived situation. Observers may identify boundaries between events as a result of processing changes in the observed situation. To test this hypothesis and study this potential mechanism, we measured brain activity while participants viewed an extended narrative film. Large transient responses were observed when the activity was segmented, and these responses were mediated by changes in the observed activity, including characters and their interactions, interactions with objects, spatial location, goals, and causes. These results support accounts that propose event segmentation is automatic and depends on processing meaningful changes in the perceived situation; they are the first to show such effects for extended naturalistic human activity.

Although not directly related to the cinema (though films are mentioned), this paper also provides evidence for the way in which veiwer’s segment scenes:

Kurby CA and Zacks JM 2008 Segmentation in the perception and memory of events, Trends in Cognitive Science 12: 729-79.

People make sense of continuous streams of observed behavior in part by segmenting them into events. Event segmentation seems to be an ongoing component of everyday perception. Events are segmented simultaneously at multiple timescales, and are grouped hierarchically. Activity in brain regions including the posterior temporal and parietal cortex and lateral frontal cortex increases transiently at event boundaries. The parsing of ongoing activity into events is related to the updating of working memory, to the contents of long-term memory, and to the learning of new procedures. Event segmentation might arise as a side effect of an adaptive mechanism that integrates information over the recent past to improve predictions about the near future.

Both these papers come from Jeff Zack’s Dynamic Cognition Laboratory at Washington University, St. Louis, MO., and his webpage can be accessed here.

This next piece seems almost quaint now, with its tales of students who did not own a CD in the late-1980s, but provides some evidence for the way in which a viewer understands adverts in different ways.

Mick DG 1992 Levels of subjective comprehension in advertising processing and their relations to ad perceptions, attitudes and memories, Journal of Consumer Research 18 (4): 411-424.

Two fundamental orientations toward message comprehension have appeared un advertising research: the traditional objective view, which applies to the accuracy criterion to conceptualize and evaluate comprehension, and the subjective view, which applies other criteria related to the individual comprehender and the actual experience of the message. This article develops a framework for four levels of subjective comprehension on the basis of an elaboration criterion. Comprehension levels are hypothesized to differ in the relations to ad perceptions, attitudes, and memory. Results from an empirical study provide initial support for the framework, including new theoretical insights and explanatory ability beyond the objective orientation. Discussion focuses on implication for advertising theory and consumer research.

Lang A, Zhou S,Schwartz N, Bolls, PD, and Potter, RF 2000 The effects of edits on arousal, attention, and memory for television messages: when an edit is an edit can an edit be too much?, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 44 (1): 94-109.

This study examines the effect of the rate of edits (camera changes in the same visual scene) on viewers’ arousal and memory. The rate of edits varied from slow to very fast. Results show that as the rate of edits increases physiological arousal, self-reported arousal, and memory increase. It is suggested that edits can increase attention to and encoding of television message content without significantly increasing the cognitive load of the message.

An interesting paper looking at cinema advertsing is this piece from Hong Kong Baptist University, which focussed on how different groups experienced and recalled cinema advertising and what factors (screen size, stereo sound, etc.) affected those experiences. It reveals some interesting results: in Hong Kong, women are more likely to enter a theatre before the advertising than men, and so advertising directed at this group is likely to be more effective. I know of no similar study in the UK or the US, but I’m sure some data will exist somewhere – and if it doesn’t, then it should and there is a PhD here for someone.

Prendergast G and Chan LW 2003 Cinema Advertising in Hong Kong, BRC Working Papers, School of Business, Hong Kong Baptist University.

Cinema advertising offers a relatively less cluttered environment for advertisers to present their message to a captive audience. However, little is known about its effectiveness, especially in countries such as Hong Kong (a country that is relatively underdeveloped in terms of cinema adspend statistics). Building on the work of Ewing, Du Plessis and Foster (2001) and Dunnett and Hoek (1996), insights into perceptions of cinema advertising in Hong Kong were obtained from a survey of 150 interviewees. Different from previous studies which utilized dela yed recall, this study interviewed audience members immediately after they had viewed a particular movie. Results showed that cinema advertising exposure and recall rates were significantly related to various demographic variables, especially gender and age. Furthermore, the level of recall was found to be correlated with various situational stimuli in the cinema, such as the larger than life screen, Dolby stereo sound, the silent environment, comfortable seats, and audience members’ expectations to focus on the screen. Based on these findings, recommendations for cinema managers and advertisers are made.

One the major criticisms abelled at the recent Bond movies is that they are so stuffed with product placement that they often appear to be little more than glorified adverts. Recently, television programmes in the UK were given the go ahead to include more product placement as a way of increasing advertising revenues. Clearly, then it would be useful to ave some research int he effectvieness of product placement in films -and we have this research:

Bressoud E, Lehu, J-M, and Russel CA 2008 Integrating placement and audience characteristics to assess the recall of product placements in film: findings from a field study, 7th International Conference on Research in Advertising (ICORIA), 27-28 June 2008, Antwerp, Belgium.

This research incorporates into a single model characteristics of product placements in films and characteristics of the consumers and their viewing environment to assess the memorability of the placements. Eleven movies containing a total of 98 placements of varied characteristics were coded. 3,532 individuals who viewed a DVD rental of one of these movies at home completed a questionnaire on the following day. The questionnaire included audience viewing characteristics as well as a free recall measure of placements. The results reveal important insights into the variables thataffect, positively or negatively, the day after recall of products placed in movies.

UK film production and the world

In this post I use data from the UK Film Council Research and Statistics Unit to look at the types of films produced in the UK from 2003 to 2009, and the connections between UK film production and other parts of the world. Data was collected for a total of 996 films. Documentaries were excluded from the sample. Note also that this data only includes films with a budget of £500,000 or greater, and so only provides a partial picture of UK film production.

The UK Film Council groups films into five categories: co-productions (COP), incoming co-productions (ICP), domestic features (DOM), inward productions (INW), and films that come to the UK to source visual effects (VFX). Here I only use the first four categories because data for VFX has only been collected since 2007; and I combine COP and ICP into a single category, as the frequency of the latter is low for 2003 to 2006 and zero for 2007 to 2009. The percentage of each category of film is presented in Figure 1, which also includes the data table.

Figure 1 Film production in the UK by type of film, 2003 to 2009

From Figure 1 we can see that there are two clear trends. First, the percentage of co-productions has fallen by two-thirds from 60% to 20%. Second, the percentage of domestic productions has increased by a factor of three, from approximately 20% to 60%. This change occurs in two steps, with an initial step occuring at 2005, with the final change in 2007. This coincides with the initial proposal of the cultural test for British films in 2005 and its final implementation in 2007, and cannot therefore be attributed to the global financial downturn that began in 2007/2008. The percentage of inward features appears to be immune from this change, with the notable exception of 2005 which shows a small increase.

From looking at the actual counts in Table 1 It is clear from this data that there has been an increase in domestic productions with the introduction of the cultural test, but that this has not replaced the number of films lost from the decline of co-productions, and that overall the number of films produced in the UK has decreased. This data does not of course tell us anything about the level of production spending in the UK, and this is obviously a crucial factor in considering the health of the film industry in the UK.

Table 1 Frequency of British films produced by category, 2003 to 2009

Nonetheless, this data should give cause for concern because it indicates that film production in the UK has become increasingly one-dimensional. A healthy film industry is one that can absorb shocks to the system as patterns of production in the global film industry change – but if film production becomes too concentrated into a single class of films this increases the vulnerability of the industry to a crisis. We might say that the cultural test has been successful in stimulating the British film industry, but that this has come at the expense of the film industry in the UK. (Here I make a distinction between all film production activity that takes place in the UK – the UK film industry – and that part of this production activity that is defined as culturally British – in other words, the ‘British national cinema’). A sudden drop in funding for culturally British films would plunge the UK film industry into a crisis of production, which would not be able to make up the short fall from productions originating in other parts of the world. The tax incentives available for film production in the UK are therefore of great importance, and without them we would likely return to the low numbers of production last seen in the 1980s.

It is perhaps instructive to think of the cultural industries in ecological terms: they are a system in which the companies are subject to forces of competition, predation, and extinction, and a change in one part of the system can have very significant consequences throughout the system as a whole. Biodiversity is one of the measures of the health of an ecological system, and economic diversity should also be thought of as a measure of the health of the cultural industries. The above data suggests that the economic diversity of the UK film industry has declined over the past seven years, as film production has become over-dependent on a single class of films. Disrupting the delicate equilibrium of this system could have significant consequences.

• If a government were to announce it was disbanding the government body responsible for developing and implementing film policy and for distributing funding for film production in the UK without announcing what would take its place, thereby reducing the ability of producers to attract funding because of the uncertainty such a decision would introduce, could also have a negative impact on the level of film production.
• A determination to reduce immigration from non-EU countries, for example, would not only reduce the number of scientists coming to the UK but could also have a negative impact on the film industry as filmmakers from outside the UK decide to make their films in more welcoming countries.

The first of these has already happened, and threatens to disrupt levels of investment in film production in the UK. The second will be introduced next year, and may further reduce the diversity of film production in the UK. Either one of these could create problems, but both together indicate a lack of foresight on the part of the coalition government.

Part of the drop in co-productions has been attributed to the fact that some films that would previously have been classed as co-productions are now able to qualify as ‘British’ under the terms of the cultural test, and thereby enjoy the full benefit of being a ‘qualifying British film.’ This argument has been put forward by John Graydon, who was involved in structuring the UK’s film tax credit system, and who notes that this represents the success of incentivising film production in the UK (Mansfield 2009). While this may certainly be a fair assessment of the status of some films, it cannot account for the full-scale of the decline in co-productions and does not explain why there has been an overall decline in the total number of productions for each year.

We can also evaluate the diversity of the UK film industry by looking at how the UK is connected to the rest of the world. In Table 2, we have the number of films that have a connection to one or more other countries that were produced in the UK, and we see the same pattern of decline noted above. This table includes films from all the UK Film Council categories.

Table 2 Films produced int he UK connected to at least one other country, 2003 to 2009

These 642 films account for a total of 870 connections to 49 different countries. The number of connections exceeds the number of films because a film may have connections to more than one country. (No film has more than five non-UK co-production partners listed, and most films are productions that involve a UK producer and a producer from one other country). A year by year breakdown by country is presented in Table 3 (NB: this table is quite large).

Table 3 Number of connections to co-producing countries for films produced in the UK, 2003 to 2009

The USA is consistently the most important source of connections to the UK with France a distant second, but where the US has remained at the top of the pile the frequency of connections to France has fallen sharply. Interestingly, India is listed as the third largest source of connections beating Germany into fourth place. ike France, Germany has gone from being a major production to partner to an occasional source of connections after 2004. This is also true of Canada, which has no connections listed for 2009 at all, as well as Spain, Italy, Ireland, Luxembourg, and Denmark. The category ‘Europe’ is not defined by the UK Film Council.

If we look at the diversity of countries connected to the UK in this way and the number of connections, we find that European countries are the most numerous at 33, accounting for a total of 528 connections (I include Turkey as a European country here). North america accounts for only 3 countries but the USA accounts for 173 connections and Canada 60 so clearly. Next comes ASia, which accounts for only four countries but a total of 75 connections. It should be noted, however, that almost all of these are accounted for by India. Notable absentees from the list of co-production partners in Table 3 are China, Japan, and South Korea. Africa is represented by four countries totalling 15 connections, of which South Africa account for two-thirds. Oceania is represented by Australia and New Zealand, providing a total of 15 connections; while the only South American countries included are Argentina and Brazil, accounting for only 3 films. Figures 2 and 3 make this information somewhat easier to appreciate.

Figure 2 Countries with connections to UK film production by region, 2003 to 2009

Figure 3 Number of connections to countries sorted by region, 2003 to 2009

Often when we talk about globalisation in the film industry we imply something that happens all over the world, but this is clearly not the case for connections between the UK film industry and elsewhere. The places to which film production in the UK is connected can be sorted into three major groups: first, there are the countries geographically closest to the UK – i.e. Europe; second, there are the countries that are historically closest to the UK – i.e. former colonies such as India, Canada, Australia, and South Africa; and, third, there is the United States, which is the dominant global power in the film industry. We can therefore say that some of the ways in which the UK film industry is globalised are through proximity, legacy, and domination by a superior market. When we turn our attention to countries that are far from the UK, that do not have a close historical/cultural relationship, and which are not major world cinema powers – in other words South America and the Far East – we find there are very few connections, if any. In this respect the UK is not that different from Poland, Malaysia, Chile, or Morocco that I have looked at elsewhere on this blog (see here and here).

Given that it is countries such as Brazil, Russia, India, and China that are tipped to become major global economies in the 21st century, it is imperative that the diversity of feature film production in the UK can be expanded to include links to these countries. India aside, one of the greatest challenges facing policy makers in the UK is how to go about establishing connections to these distant places in the absence of a strong historical relationship. It is difficult to see how this will be achieved whilst restricting immigration from non-EU countries.

The proposed reduction in immigration will hit Indian and American filmmakers hardest, and yet beyond Europe these are the only significant sources of inward investment and co-production partnerships for the UK film industry. Without them, the UK will become increasingly more dependent upon the EU. And yet, as I made clear above, the introduction of the cultural test for British films has dramatically reduced the number of co-productions between UK producers and their European counterparts. A further loss of diversity will only increase the vulnerability of the UK film industry to crises it has been historically ill-prepared to deal with.

References

Mansfield M 2009 A Report on the British Film Industry for Shadow DCMS. This report can be accessed here.

Location and spread II

Following on from last week’s post on shot length distributions in the short films of Laurel and Hardy (here) and a piece on shot length distributions in German cinema (here) from last month, this week I add to a post from last year that looked at the relationship between different measures of location and spread (see here).

This post uses different methods from the earlier one: the measure of scale used is Qn, Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient is used to describe the linear relationship, and the trendline in the graphs is fitted using RMA regression rather than OLS.

In Table 1 we see that there is a strong correlation between the median shot length and Qn in each year for the German films, and this can be seen more easily in the graphs below. The correlation is less strong for the films produced in 1929, and these are the silent films in this sample. As we are using different statistics the results to the Hollywood films are not directly comparable, but the same difference between the silent and sound films is apparent in both samples.

Table 1 Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient for German films produced between 1929 and 1933, inclusive

Figure 1 Median shot length v.Qn for German films produced in 1929 (n = 12).

Figure 2 Median shot length v.Qn for German films produced in 1930 (n = 11).

Figure 3 Median shot length v.Qn for German films produced in 1931 (n = 14).

Figure 4 Median shot length v.Qn for German films produced in 1932 (n = 17).

Figure 5 Median shot length v.Qn for German films produced in 1933 (n = 13).

We see the same patterns when we look at the relationship between the same two statistics for the Laurel and Hardy movies. For the silent films produced between 1927 and 1929 inclusive (n = 12), we find that Spearman’s r = 0.7702, p = 0.0034. For the sound films produced from 1929 to 1933 inclusive (n = 20), Spearman’s r = 0.9525, p = <0.0001. Again we see that there is a relationship between the median as a measure of location and Qn as a measure of scale, and again this relationship is stronger for the sound films than for the silent films.

Figure 6 Median shot length v.Qn for silent short films of Laurel and Hardy, 1927 to 1929 (n = 12).

Figure 7 Median shot length v.Qn for sound short films of Laurel and Hardy, 1929 to 1933 (n = 20).

Although I have only looked at three samples of films, the relationship between location and spread noted here does appear to be relative consistent. This is useful for comparing . In ‘Some Notes on Cinemetrics III’ (here), I pointed out that using non-robust statistics can lead to false conclusions about the differences in style between two films: using the standard deviation, the lognormal shape factor, or the median/mean ratio all indicated that shot lengths in Lights of New York (1929) were more widely dispersed than shot lengths in Scarlett Empress (1934), when this was not in fact the case. Robust statistics clearly indicated than the opposite is true – namely, that shot lengths in Scarlett Empress showed greater variation. By looking at the median shot lengths of these films we would not only have been able compare their measures of location, we would have been able to make an intuitive assessment about the usefulness of measures of spread: as the median of Lights of New York (5.1s) is lower than that of Scarlett Empress (6.5s) – and possessing the knowledge that there appears to be a strong correlation between location and spread – then we could have immediately seen that there was a problem when the measures of spread indicated that shot lengths in the former were more widely dispersed than in the latter when we should have (rightly) suspected the opposite. Using the medians in this way provides us with a simple check to see if we are going to make a fundamental error in our use of statistics to describe film style, and will allow us to be more careful in making decisions about how to go about the statistical analysis of film style and how to interpret those results.

Year	n	Spearman’s r	p
1929	12	0.8733	0.0021
1930	11	0.9816	<0.0001
1931	14	0.9504	<0.0001
1932	17	0.9093	<0.0001
1933	13	0.9848	<0.0001

Shot length distributions in the films of Laurel and Hardy

UPDATE: 28 June 2012 – this article has now been published as Shot length distributions in the short films of Laurel and Hardy, 1927 to 1933, Cine Forum 14 2012: 37-71.

This week I put up the first draft of my analysis of the impact of sound technology on the distribution of shot lengths in the short films of Laurel and Hardy from 1927 to 1933. The pdf file can be accessed here: Nick Redfern – Shot length distributions in the short films of Laurel and Hardy.

Abstract

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy were one of the few comedy acts to successfully make the transition from the silent era to sound cinema in the late-1920s. The impact of sound technology on Laurel and Hardy films is analysed by comparing the median shot lengths and the dispersion of shot lengths of silent shorts (n = 12) produced from 1927 to 1929 inclusive, and sound shorts (n = 20) produced from 1929 to 1933, inclusive. The results show that there is a significant difference (U = 56.0, p = 0.0128, PS = 0.2333) between the median shot lengths of the silent films (median = 3.5s [95% CI: 3.2, 3.7]) and those of the sound films (median = 3.9s [95% CI: 3.5, 4.3]); and this represents an increase in shot lengths in the sound films by HLΔ = 0.5s (95% CI: 0.1, 1.1). The comparison of Q_n for the silent films (median = 2.4s [95% CI: 2.1, 2.7]) with the sound films (median = 3.0s [95% CI: 2.6, 3.4]) reveals a statistically significant increase is the dispersion of shot lengths (U = 54.5, p = 0.0109, PS = 0.2271) estimated to be HLΔ = 0.6s (95% CI: 0.1, 1.1). Although statistically significant, these differences are smaller than those reported in other quantitative analyses of film style and sound technology, and this may be attributed to Hal Roach’s commitment to pantomime, the working methods of Laurel, Hardy, and their writing/producing team, and the continuity of personnel in Roach’s unit mode of production which did not change substantially with the introduction of sound.

UPDATE: 25 November 2010. WordPress have now very helpfully made it possible to upload Excel spreadsheets to blogs, and so I have replaced the Word file with an Excel file that is much easier to use. This data also now includes information of which shots are titles (as idicated by a T in an adjacent column). I accept no libaility for any problems you may have when downloading and using Excel spreadsheets on you computer. The data used in this study can be accessed in the form of an Excel .xls file here: Nick Redfern Laurel and Hardy shot lengh data. The methodology behind the sources and collection of this data is described in the above paper.