Discuss the ways in which media products in your case study are advertised and marketed.

Advertising and marketing is used to attract. By advertising they are capturing the attentions of the public and reeling them in. Then, by marketing they can make a profit by selling merchandise, clothing, and DVD’s. All of this results in a company, like Disney, to make a greater profit. As most the world is modernising, media is always a step ahead. They keep creating new and creative ways to advertise and market so they can always keep their audience in the box. For example, Brave which was released in 2012 is still creating new apps, games and short films to keep their audience close and keep the profit still coming in, way after the movie release. Web 2.0 has enabled interactivity between the company and people. Disney has webpages, social media and apps. All of which anyone can get to with a phone. Social media is known to keep people connected, companies like Disney have taken advantage of this so they can keep people connected with them. They will post pictures, videos and news on the latest at Disney; people can like, share, comment and save this all. Disney earns a bit of money from this so, again, they are gaining a profit from this. Horizontal integration is owning different types of media, for example Disney owns ABC, ESPN, and Pixar. Disney can advertise a Pixar movie on both ABC and ESPN by having advertisements on the side as the people are watching those. For example, football games showed on ESPN could include ads on the side and bottom for the new Moana. Disney can profit from every aspect of making movies by using only Disney owned companies which can produce the, market them, distribute them around the world and produce the merchandise for them. This is vertical integration.

Web 2.0 is the current state of online technology, characterized by greater user interactivity and collaboration, more pervasive network, connectivity and enhanced communication channels. Almost 2.5 billion people have some sort of social media profile. This enables them to get anything across to anyone in the world. Since the vast growth of the internet across the world, sales for any company has risen by over 65%. It is now the main way of advertising and marketing. Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, are all movie streaming websites. They provide people with a legal way of watching a wide variety of films. These are now also the most common way most people watch movies. This gives companies like Disney a chance to further market their films. A YouTuber with the username ‘Paint’ released a Disney parody song, acapella style, called ‘After Ever After’. After receiving almost 70 million views he was noticed by Disney and was asked to do more parodies for them to advertise new Disney movies and Disney overall. His usual viewers were attracted by this and so took more notice of the advertised films. Disney also started to ask young viewers to send in videos of themselves singing, dancing, or acting to their new movie release. These videos were put on when the adverts came on Disney channel to advertise their new film. This attracted a lot of attention and so gained more viewers for their new product. Convergence is the merging of mass communication outlets. And Disney have proved to show this through Disneyfication. They have ‘Disneyfied’ the most common of things and put a twist to them. The artist Banksy has many great pieces of work. Disney took a few of them and put a Disney character in, for example the art work called ‘Rage’ was replaced with Mickey Mouse. This was then all over social media as people loved the idea of it.

Trailers are the main thing that will grab the attention of the audience and reel them in. However modernised the media gets, nothing will advertise the product better than having actual clips of the movie released. For example, Disney’s Frozen released a few clips of Olaf and the characters a year before. They kept releasing 30 – 60 second clips to keep gaining audience and keeping them in so more people watch the movie. Although, the reason Frozen got so big was because of Web 2.0. People shared the trailers and so more people were aware of the new film coming out. The annual Super Bowl is watched more than 114.4 million viewers in the US alone. This gives the perfect chance for anyone to advertise their brand/company and have it watched by millions. It costs around $100,000 per second to have their advertisement shown. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales was the advertised Disney Movie. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides was the 2011 advertised film and it received a total of 1.045 billion dollars. Trailers used to be at the end of a movie at the cinemas, hence the name ‘trailer’. However, everyone would just leave and so now that they show 20 minutes of trailers at the beginning, people are forced to sit and watch the trailers for the upcoming films. They then capture the attention of the audience and they then have a desire to watch that film. The shown trailer will usually be on the same genre or age restriction as the main movie. This way it is the same group of people that will enjoy it. This is called synergy, for example, at the Monsters University movie showing they were showing the complete trailer to Frozen. Both targeted at the younger audience who enjoy the supernatural. Also, magazines may not be read as much anymore but they are still a big part of society. And so, to be on the front cover would be a big deal. Empire has had many of the Star Wars movies on their front cover. This not only attracts the audience that read that magazine but any other person who walks down that aisle in a supermarket as they are all on display for anyone to see.

Being one of the big six has the advantages of being extremely rich. And having vast amounts of money enables them to be creative with it. For example, Disney has 11 theme parks around the world that are visited by millions daily. This way they can create a buzz around a certain movie by having specific rides that are based on the movie and characters. For example, a ride that is suitable for families at Disneyland Paris where you sit in and its almost as if you’re flying around Neverland, just like in Peter Pan. It brings the hype around that film. That ride was out when Peter Pan came out. This way people were not only excited to see the film but go on the ride also. Disney has been very creative with guerrilla advertising. When up was released they had the character Russell on a bus stop looking like he’s flying away then with real balloons on the top. Someone then takes a picture of this then posts it online so it can go viral. Grabs attention, the movie makes millions. All like dominos.

When a new movie is being created, if they include an A list actor it automatically grabs the attention of the media. Their reputation is so high that anyone would want to specifically see a movie just due to the actor in it. For example, Tom Hanks, the voice of Woody in Toy Story. Many people wanted to see it because he was part of the film. In house characters also bring more of an audience. Idina Menzel is the real voice of Elsa in Frozen and she also sings Let it Go. However, she is not as known as Demi Lovato. And for this reason, Lovato did a cover of the song and now it has more views on YouTube than the original.

In conclusion, all they want is money. The CEO even said, ‘to make money is our only obligation’. So some may put thought into everything but everything leads to them getting richer and controlling what we view in the media.

US V UK

Compare the American and British websites for your case study film: two similarities and two differences

Dinsey.co.uk/Toystory – UK

Toystory.com/Disney – US

The first similarity with can see is that both websites have very large artwork, displaying the film characters as well as the movie title, making the older audience informed on the movie, whilst hyping up the younger audience through colorful and silly characters.

Both also have access to games, videos, holidays, movies etc. which are all great use of synergy which adds to Toy Story’s diegesis.

One difference which is easily identifiable is that the US website has a lot more content on the first page, being more informative about Toy Story and other related movies, toys etc that Disney/Pixar have to offer.

Another clear difference is the US website shows it is a lot more money orientated, as it has a lot more merchandise to purchase than the UK has to offer.

Compare the American and British Twitter: Identify two similarities and two differences

Twitter.com/Disney

As we can clearly see from Disney’s Twitter page, it is primarily about marketing, this is due to an older audience having access to social media such as Twitter instead of a younger audience, hence it is marketing, as it is informing parents to take their kids.

Another thing we can see is how much synergy is used, Disney’s twitter has 5.3m follows meaning every one of their timelines will get notified when the post new content, which helps get their film out there.

Compare the American and British Facebook two similarities and two differences

Facebook.com/Disney

Here again, like for Disney’s twitter, we see the main focus for their page is for advertising. Here we can find trailers, images and other things related to inform, and build hype on new releases, however for Disney’s Facebook page, they have over 50 million followers, meaning 50 million people will receive timeline update of new releases.

What were the U.S and U.K release dates

US: 18 June 2010

UK: 19 July 2010

Does your film feature any British actors?

All of the voice actors for Toy Story 3 are American, showing no regional diversity at all, such as Tom Hanks and Tim Allen who are the two main characters.

Case Study Film

CASE STUDY FILM	Toy Story 3
BUDGET	200 million USD
BOX OFFICE	1.067 billion USD
TYPE OF ADVERTISING		ADVERT/LINK	ANALYSIS (advertising techniques, ‘reach’)
Posters		http://collider.com/3-new-toy-story-3-character-posters-woody-hamm-and-buzz/	The first teaser poster was debuted at Disney’s D23 expo in 2009 and, while it’s not much, it is the first to sport the “No toy gets left behind” copy, hinting that the plot of this movie would once again revolve around an adventure to rescue one of the characters we’ve come to know in the first two movies. A series of posters came out next, each featuring one of the main characters from the series interacting with the “3” logo. Rex, Oink, Buzz, Woody, Jessie, Slinky and Potato Head all get solo one-sheets with the same black background which creates a nice, uncluttered way to present the fact that all the favourites from the previous two movies are returning in this instalment. Later posters were designed to introduce some of the new characters in this instalment. Peas-in-a-Pod, Ken, Lots-o-Huggin’ Bear and all the other toys that populate the day care centre our main characters find themselves in. There was later a single image that brought all the new characters together with Buzz and Woody under the movie’s title. After that came a series of posters that featured the whole cast. Finally, a poster was released that placed the returning characters in front of a cardboard box that’s been tipped over. Everyone looks alternatively shocked and curious and this is obviously taken from the moment they’re first dropped off at Sunnyside day care.
The Trailers		https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcpWXaA2qeg   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZv1vki4ou4	The movie’s first teaser trailer basically parades the movie’s cast in front of the camera before everyone comes back with a title. There’s not much to it, but it is charming and achieves the main goal of letting the audience know that there’s a new movie coming out and that the whole cast is back. The first “real” trailer starts off basically where we last left these characters. Andy is playing with Buzz, Woody and the others in his bedroom and we then see a montage of clips that show he, unlike those toys, is growing up. That culminates with a now college-aged Andy looking at the toys of his childhood and then walking out of the room, clearly leaving his past behind. This teaser is effective at setting the mood of the movie and explaining its basic story points, but there’s still a ton going on that’s now shown and I’m guessing there’s little to nothing here from the last half of the film. Another trailer was then released, We start off once again with Andy preparing to go to college and selecting which toys are discarded, which are saved and which are brought with him. As his car drives down the street we see on the street, on signs along the road and in the car window that this movie comes from the studio that brought us Finding Nemo, WALL-E and Up. This one, though, doesn’t linger on the sentimental aspect but instead gets into the action. The toys find themselves at a local day care centre amid hundreds of others, an environment far different from Andy’s bedroom where they were treated with care and love. Here they are on unfamiliar ground and there may even be something sinister in the minds of the toys who are already there. This trailer is a little more action-packed and exciting and certainly seems to be designed more for the kids in the audience, where the previous one seemed to be geared more toward adults who would feel the nostalgia
Internet		http://toystory.disney.com/toy-story-3	The official website opens with a rotating stream of quotes from early reviews of the movie, all of which claims it an instant classic for the entire family, before giving way to one of the TV spots. At the bottom of the page there’s a button to enter the “Great Escape Giveaway” When you Enter the Site, the cast of characters is arrayed in front of you and, as you mouse over each of them, you’re prompted to “Visit” that character. Doing so takes you to information about that character as well as Games, a 360-degree view of its design as well as Video clips, a Gallery of images. The News section is filled with promotional videos, mostly from Disney, talking about the film, some go into how the Pixar animators used real dancers to help choreograph sequences in the movie and such. The Gallery has 30 stills from the movie and the Posters section has all 24 promotional one-sheets, including the ones that have Buzz and Woody surrounded by the new characters, which are filled in one-by-one on successive images. All of these items are fully downloadable. Moving on, the “Games” section collects all the character-specific games that are under their individual profiles and includes a number of others that involve the whole or parts of the whole gang. A series of online videos were made that were much better than the internet-only spots from earlier in the campaign. The first was made to look like a vintage commercial for Lots-o-Huggin’ Bear that had been converted from a disintegrating VHS tape. This provided some background on when the toy was created in the movie’s world and is basically funny and entertaining, which is a good thing. The retro kept coming with a “Groovin’ With Ken” video of an interview with Ken talking about what a great life he leads despite the fact that on his own box his name is so much smaller than Barbie’s. Ken was also the star of a series of “Ken’s Dating Tips” videos that showed all the doll’s secrets to remaining popular with the ladies.
Advertising and Synergy			The revival of the movie also brought with it a revival of the toy line, with lots of new additions – mainly in the form of new characters from this latest instalment – and variations on the classic characters hitting shelves. Those toys got the spotlight from Toys R Us, who created special Toy Story promotional spaces in their stores and setup a section of their website and put some of the aliens form the movie all over the site. Visitors who click three of them on the site will unlock exclusive content. Those who buy $25 of Toy Story merchandise in stores will receive a voucher for a movie ticket. Energizer batteries also wanted to give out free movie tickets to see Toy Story 3 or any other Disney movie to those who bought three packages of batteries. Kellogg also got involved with a promotion on boxes of their products that encouraged users to collect secret codes they could redeem for various movie-themed prizes. There’s also been plenty of traditional advertising done. A number of TV spots were created and have been running in the lead-up to the movie, most of which take the same basic idea of the trailers and created abridged variations on those themes. So some focus on the escape plot, some focus more on the day care centre and some on the emotional upheaval of Andy leaving for college and deciding the future of his toys. They all work in and of themselves. The character-specific posters also were repurposed as billboards and other outdoor ads.
Media and Publicity		http://www.comingsoon.net/movies/news/536915-comic-con-disneypixar-introduce-toy-story-1-2-3-beauty-and-the-beast-3d-and-more   http://collider.com/toy-story-3-cliffhanger-edition-screenings-on-college-campuses-two-months-before-release-and-toy-story-3-viral-videos/	The Pixar crew did make an appearance at Comic-Con 2009 to not only drop the news that Michael Keaton would be joining the cast as Ken but also to talk about the re-release of the first two Toy Story movies in 3D, a tactic being taken on in part to get people back to thinking about the franchise before this third instalment hits theatres. That re-release got its own trailer, with the characters all of a sudden discovering just how exciting it is that they’re now appearing in 3D, a trailer that’s pretty fun in its own right for how it plays with the concept of something being 2D. There was also an internet-only trailer and a TV spot that had similar fun with the idea of these characters appearing in three dimensions. . The full film was later screened at ShoWest 2010 for theatre owners and other exhibition executives The studio announced it would take the first 65 minutes – about half – of the movie to college campuses to screen what it was calling a “Cliffhanger Edition” of the film that was designed to get college kids, who were likely seven to 10 years old when the last movie came out, interested in this latest instalment. Hopefully, the strategy seemed to be thinking, giving them such an extended look at the new movie would get their interest up enough that they’d later buy tickets to the whole thing. That effort was promoted with flyers being up on college campuses asking if people would like to start working for Pizza Planet, the kiddie restaurant that’s been featured in previous movies. The movie got lots of other publicity, including high-profile looks at some of the new characters that would be featured in this instalment and more.

 

Disney’s Fairytale Ending

Walt Disney Studios is tipped to amass a record $7bn (£5.6bn) in cinemas around the world this year, having already passed $6bn thanks to Doctor Strange, Captain America: Civil Warand Finding Dory. It expects to set a new all-time high with the upcoming release of animated feature Moana and the all-but-guaranteed Christmas bonanza of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story – which sees the return of Darth Vader.

In 2006, Disney spent $7.4bn on Pixar, the hit factory behind Finding Nemo, its new sequel Finding Dory, Toy Story and The Incredibles. This helped Disney win its struggle to produce modern versions of the blockbuster animated movies on which it built its reputation.

Disney films have enjoyed a stellar year, with four blockbusters to date: Captain America, Zootopia and Finding Dory made more than $1bn each and The Jungle Book made $966m. But its film arm accounted for only 18% of the company’s total $42.5bn revenues in the nine months to the end of July

Disney’s billion-dollar blockbusters in 2016
1. Captain America: Civil War: $1.15bn
2. Zootopia: $1.023bn
3. Finding Dory: $1.022bn
4. The Jungle Book: $966m
5. Star Wars: The Force Awakens: $2.07bn ($736m in 2016)

Media Essay

Film industry began in the late 1800’s, with the creation of “motion toys” made to trick the eye into seeing an illusion of motion from a display of still frames in quick succession. The first film for motion photography was invented in 1885 by George Eastman and William H. Walker, which advanced motion photography. Shortly after, Auguste and Louis Lumiere created a machine called the cinematographer, which could both capture pictures and project still frames in quick succession. The 1900’s were a time of great advancement for film and motion picture technology. Exploration into editing, backdrops, and camera work. Also in the 1900’s the most powerful film industry in the world was founded – Hollywood Films, which has long dominated the film industry.

In 1983, 50 companies controlled 90% of media, now only 6 company’s control 90% – These are Disney, GE, News-corp, Viacom, Time Warner and CBS also nicknamed ‘The Big 6’. These are called media conglomerates that control what we read, hear and watch.

Disney is one of the Big 6 best known for bringing decades of fun to families through its amusement parks, television series, and many animated motion pictures. Beginning in 1984.

Disney acquired ABC in 1996, a $19 billion deal that increased the company’s reputation enormously. Adding to the theme parks, cruise ships, professional sports teams, and dozens of other businesses owned by the company, ABC gave Disney the power of broadcasting and the ability to meld entertainment content with programming. During the late 1990s, the company was growing on the Internet and approaching to international expansion.

This essay will explore if American conglomerates are damaging the film industry, what the consequences of their ability to supply the advertising, dominate multiplexes, and if independent films can survive.

 

Horizontal integration consists of companies that acquire a similar company in the same industry, while a vertical integration consists of companies that acquire a company that operates either before or after the acquiring company in the production process. This gives Disney such an advantage as there is hardly any competition between other companies as Disney own the majority of them. Owning ABC (vertical) has many benefits for Disney, Rival television producers may find that they have fewer outlets for their programmes, other entertainment companies may find themselves outmuscled as they seek consumers’ attention, which is an advantage for

Disney as it limits competition, as well as free advertising on TV as they own ABC network. Its useful for Disney to own film production, marketing and distribution as it is cheaper for them anything to market, distribution etc.

Globalisation is a process of interaction among the people, companies, and governments of different nations, a process driven by international trade and investment and aided by information technology. This process has effects on the environment, on culture, on economic development and prosperity, and on human physical well-being in societies around the world. Disney-fication is the transformation (as of something real or unsettling) into carefully controlled and safe entertainment or an environment with similar qualities, which takes away key and disturbing elements, damaging children’s way of thinking.

Conglomerates are mainly creating action/adventure, comedy, fantasy ect. Leaving out smaller genres such as romance and documentries. This means it is less vaired. Some audiences may enjoy the fact that a few genres are produced by these conglomerates, as they may enjoy comedy or action/adventure. However the rest of the people who enjoy documentries etc. May dislike the fact that these large conglomerates aren’t creating films of their favoured genre.

Disney doesnt normally make their films challenging as their man target audience is children. This means that their films are easy to understand and makes the experience alot better for them. They normally stick to tried and tested money making formulas such as sing-a-longs, cute animals/species and princesses. The CEO of Disney said ‘We have no obligation to make history, we have no obligation to make art. We have no obligation to make a statement. To make money is our only objective.’ I belive that Disney are still about making money as none of their plots to their films have a statement that could affect real lives.

There are many successful independant films, for example ‘Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’ making $213.5 million world wide, with a budget of $15million. Independant films have problems with budgets, marketing and distributing. Independant films dont tend to make much moeny (in comparrison to comglometerates) so they have a much lower budget. Cinemas also know that comglomerates are sucessful in comparrison to independant flims, so independant films have a tough time getting themselves out there. They also cannot afford to distribute their film themselves and rely on other bigger compaines to distribute it. Aardman Animatino is a british film company creating Wallice and Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and other successful animations. Dreamworks distributes their films, as they are a much larger company and part of the conglomerate to Disney.

There are so many other indie film makers struggling as it is a tough compitioin to be apart of, as it isnt very often that an indie film becomes sucessful. The internet has helped advertise indie films much more easily, through websites and social medias. This can also be much more cheap and can get feedback, reviews and shares more.

I think that the future of film will expand more on different, niche genres, however this will be done by conglomerates, as I feel that there isn’t a way of independent films becoming any more powerful than they already are. Conglomerates are crushing diversity and variety as such a small number of companies control such much media, we can digest what they feed us making them take away variety. I stream films on Netflix and go to multiplex cinemas, however I prefer to watch conglomerate made films as I know that they will be enjoyable, maybe because of who it’s by or if its a sequel etc.

Independent Film

An independent film or indie film is a feature film that is produced mostly or completely outside of the major film studio system, in addition to being produced and distributed by independent entertainment agencies. These make far fewer profit compared to a conglomerate and also have a much lower budget, meaning they need other, bigger companies to distribute their films.

Donnie Darko (2001)

Budget:

$4,500,000  (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

$110,494 (USA) (26 October 2001)

Gross:

$727,883  (USA) (1 October 2004)

Toy Story 3

 Budget:

$200,000,000  (estimated) ($195,500,000 more)

Opening Weekend:

$109,000,000 (USA) (18 June 2010) ($108,899,506 more)

Gross:

$414,984,497  (USA) (26 November 2010) ($414,256,614 more)

The Dark Knight – Distribution – Marketing – Profits

Budget

$185,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend

$158,411,483 (USA)
£11,191,824 (UK)
BRL 7,102,500 (Brazil)
€1,969,100 (Italy)
PHP 61,603,157 (Philippines)
RUR 85,019,263 (Russia)

Production Companies

• Warner Bros.(presentation)
• Legendary Pictures(in association with)
• Syncopy
• DC Comics

Distributors

• Warner Bros.(2008) (USA) (theatrical)
• 20th Century Fox(2008) (Malaysia) (theatrical)
• Fox-Warner(2008) (Switzerland) (theatrical)
• InterComFilm(2008) (Romania) (theatrical)
• Karo Premier(2008) (Russia) (theatrical)
• Sandrew Metronome Distribution Sverige AB (2008) (Sweden) (theatrical)
• Sandrew Metronome Distribution(2008) (Finland) (theatrical)
• Village Films(2008) (Greece) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros. Entertainment(2008) (Canada) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros. Pictures(2008) (Chile) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros. Pictures(2008) (Hong Kong) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros. Pictures(2008) (Thailand) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros. Pictures(2008) (Taiwan) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros.(2008) (Argentina) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros.(2008) (Australia) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros.(2008) (Germany) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros.(2008) (UK) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros.(2008) (Japan) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros.(2008) (Netherlands) (theatrical)
• (2008) (Singapore) (theatrical)
• Argentina Video Home(2008) (Argentina) (DVD) (Double feature with ‘Batman Begins’)
• Argentina Video Home(2008) (Argentina) (DVD) (special edition)
• Argentina Video Home(2009) (Argentina) (Blu-ray) (DVD) (2-disc edition)
• Argentina Video Home(2012) (Argentina) (DVD) (3-disc Trilogía Batman: El caballero de la noche)
• Argentina Video Home(2012) (Argentina) (DVD) (Warner Home Video Colección Premium)
• Argentina Video Home(2012) (Argentina) (Blu-ray) (video) (5-disc The Dark Knight Trilogy)
• Film1(2009) (Netherlands) (TV) (limited)
• Home Box Office (HBO)(2009) (USA) (TV)
• ITV 1(2015) (UK) (TV)
• SBS6(2011) (Netherlands) (TV)
• Turner Network Television (TNT)(2010) (USA) (TV)
• VT4(2010) (Belgium) (TV)
• Warner Bros. Entertainment Finland Oy(2008) (Finland) (Blu-ray) (DVD)
• Warner Bros. Entertainment(2008) (Spain) (all media)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (Canada) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2009) (Switzerland) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (Germany) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (Netherlands) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (Netherlands) (Blu-ray) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (Sweden) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (Sweden) (Blu-ray) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (USA) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video(2008) (USA) (Blu-ray) (DVD)
• Warner Home Vídeo(2008) (Brazil) (DVD)
• Warner Home Vídeo(2009) (Brazil) (Blu-ray) (DVD)

Marketing

The campaign won a Cannes Lions Cyber Grand Prix Award and a Cannes Lions Silver Cyber Award and has proven to be the gold standard in immersive participation campaigns.

In the 15 months leading up to the movie’s release, over 11 million unique participants in over 70 countries joined in the transmedia experience. Fans were given the chance to directly involve themselves in the world of Gotham — from helping Harvey Dent become District Attorney to serving as henchmen in the Joker’s army to joining “Citizens for Batman.”

And the campaign spilled over into the real world as fans called phone numbers written in the sky, found phones the Joker left for them inside birthday cakes, and helped project the Batman signal on buildings in New York City and Chicago.

The Dark Knight campaign lasted over a year. Many of the big things that we accomplished began with little things that fans happened to find. Like the Joker cards that we left at comic book stores. The cards led to the Harvey Dent for District Attorney website — in an election that only existed in Gotham City.

Soon, the website was defaced by a maniacal hand. And some crafty fans discovered that they could erase pixels on the site. The final result was the “Joker reveal” — the first public image of Heath Ledger as the Joker. It got people very excited.

The same sort of thing happened at Comic Con in San Diego. First, “Jokerized” dollars were discovered. Follow the clues on the dollar bill, and you wind up at a great vantage point to watch a plane skywrite a phone number. Call the phone number, and be lured into Joker’s criminal conspiracy.

That was sort of how it went, for the next 18 months. Every media possible was used.
But everything came out of one mission — to bring people into the world of Gotham City. To make Gotham City real. Like this newspaper we published and mailed out. It was bursting with info and clues and hidden messages and lots of fun stuff.

people actually came out into the street in support of Harvey Dent — a fictional candidate running for a fictional position in a fictional place. When election time came, we sent out voter registration cards in the mail — and ran our own election.

A city news site for the official version of stories was created. And a place to get gossip, rumors, and maybe even a little truth. We opened up a “Clown Travel Agency” that sent fans to bowling alleys across the world. The first ones to get there opened up a locker to get a Joker package — a cell phone, a bowling ball, and a Joker card.

The Dark Knight marketing costed the Warner Bros.  over $100 million in advertisements such as commercials, billboards, posters, buses,  Formula One racecars. Factor in toys, games, and other promotional materials. Factor in the Six Flags Dark Knight Coaster. Warner Bros. held nothing back in promoting The Dark Knight

The Dark Knight Narrative

Action code – Roland Barthes

Action Code can be applied in several different scenes in dark knight rises for example: In the final action scene the Joker has rigged two ferries carrying people out of Gotham to explode. One ferry carries civilians. The other ferry contains large numbers of prison inmates and some guards. The Joker has rigged both to explode, and he has given the crew on each boat the detonators, only they have the detonator for the other boat. He announces the rules of the game to the crew and passengers of each boat. This makes the audience think what is going to happen next therefore the action code is present.

Semantic code

In the movie dark knight, batman wears black to conceal himself in the darkness, give himself a surprise advantage, concealment, and an escape option. It’s the same reason that ninjas and common robbers dress in dark clothing therefore connotation shows that semantic (symbolic) codes are crucial as the audience explores the hidden meaning behind certain codes within a film.

Symbolic codes

The Dark Knight, becomes a powerful force in very much the same way the Joker was. He becomes hunted by Gotham, making people believe that he cannot be controlled, that he has lost all respect for the rule of law. As Gordon realizes he needs to blame the murders on Batman, he acknowledges not only the need for society to push their fears onto something, but their hopes as well (which he allows them to do by preserving Dent’s good name). Therefore batman symbolized as the saviour of Gotham city.

Cultural code

The movie batman is a trilogy where the story of each chapter is linked to one another for example after the murder of Harvey Dent batman was blamed for his death thus he decided to leave Gotham and give up crime fighting and saving the city, where he will return in The Dark Knight rises.

Enigma codes

We first see The Joker in the opening scene, which leads the audience into questioning ‘Who is he?’ ‘Why is he stealing from the mobs in a bank’ ect. The Jokers plans are not explained until the very end of the film, throughout the movie it is referenced that members of the mob have gone missing and most importantly why the Joker himself is interested in a large sum of money. It leads us to the idea he is interested in making a profit from killing the Batman, however this is not the case when he burns his earnings and reveals how he is simply conducting his actions to display how self-obsessed humans are.

Propp Theory

1. Villain – The Joker– Deformed

2. The Hero – Batman – Centre of the Jokers plans

3. The Donor – Lucious Fox – Gives Batman a utility belt, Bat mobile

4. The Helper and Dispatcher – Gordon – Aids Batman, Sends Batman after the Joker

5. The princess – Racheal Dawes – Targeted by the Joker

6. The False Hero – Harvey Dent/Two-Face- Seen as the real hero of Gotham but after Racheal’s death he becomes Two-Face, a Villain.

7. The Father – Alfred – Took in the Batman after the death of his parents.

Binary opposition – Claude Levi-Stauss

The Batman and The Joker being binary opposed – “This is what happens when an unstoppable forces meets an immoveable object.”

The Joker plans for chaos and destruction, The Batman wants Justice and order.

The Joker is ill-dressed, unclean, whereas The Batman is Debonair and well dressed

Todorov Equilibrium

Equilibrium – Bruce Wayne helps Commissioner Gordon to clean up crime in Gotham.

Disruption of Equilibrium – The Joker offers to kill the Batman in order to get half crime to proceed in gangs.

Realisation of Equilibrium – Commissioner Gordon realises that he needs to team with The Batman to stop The Joker.

Attempt to repair Equilibrium – Throughout the film Batman is trying to introduce order, however Harvey Dent becomes corrupt.

New Equilibrium – The Joker and Harvey Dent have been stopped and Justice and Order have been saved.