BJBABY too British? Japan, Greece, US etc considered

IN THIS POST:

A nuanced view of WT's strategy.

Starting with Saunders' excellent Telegraph article I'll look at arguments that BJB is too British for the US market; non-English markets experience a radically different Bridget through culturally-weighted translations (eg Spain) - and even censorship (Japan). Japanese subtitles reposition Jones as closer to a traditional stereotypical female through certain formalities of grammar. Greeks were among many non-UK/US (Australia/NZ/Canada?) audiences to be left none the wiser when Aretha's Respect kicked in at a key point in the original movie - iconic tunes that 'everyone knows' don't necessarily cross Western, English-language borders.

Saunders cites a number of academic studies in doing so - this is a much-studied franchise and cultural phenomenon, so challenge yourself and look out for more in-depth reading!

One such example that I will re-read in due course, not least as it presents intriguing arguments on the tensions between WT and Richard Curtis' script between appealing to the domestic and US markets: Jones is at once Americanised and critical of American culture ... is the book Falling in Love Again: Romantic Comedy in Contemporary Cinema (Abbott, Jermyn eds. (2008)). 

I'll get to view the film in due course - but your own (or second hand) observations from this would be welcomed (post a comment).

TOO CULTURALLY ALIEN FOR THE US MARKET?

Headline for the Saunders piece.

Biggest cinema markets ranked by box office. UK in top 5

These will vary over time, but the UK and France are Europe's biggest markets, with Japan and China key Asian markets. China is expected to eventually exceed the US box office (perhaps towards the end of 2017?), but India's massive population is less likely to follow suit with ticket prices so much lower in the countryside.

The UK is dwarfed by the US and China, but it, France and Japan are closely matched and are ranked differently depending on the survey/year but is the 3rd, 4th or 5th biggest cinema market in the world, a definite top 5 market. Note how low its share from nationally produced films is - US films account for 4 times the box office of UK-produced films. No figure is given for the US but this would be in the high 90%+ range.

Table from Wiki. Note that China's figures are more recent than the rest, significant as they are growing every year.

DIGITISATION, GLOBALISATION, CONVERGENCE Superhero hegemony in brief

Another critic (Jason Wilson) rather irked at the hegemony of superhero tentpoles. If you use the superhero tag in particular you'll find several linked articles analysing the rise of these films and this me-too strategy.

A quick summary follows of key points you can utilise to show your understanding of how (British and global) cinema functions ...

Global, not US, market dominates Hollywood (Obst, 2013)

Look out for useful terminology/neologisms below: pre-awareness and tentpoles and tadpoles

$101m global box office, $21m budget (1993)

A few useful nuggests from this article by Phil Hoad, which highlights and critiques some of the points raised by one-time Hollywood hit producer Lynda Orbst in her bio (given an excoriating review by an unimpressed David Thomson, here), but the really important point concerns WHY Hollywood has turned to tentpole CGI/SFX spectaculars, usually within franchises and/or using 'pre-known' brands/books.

Her line of attack, that Hollywood has wrongly turned its back on medium budget concept movies, where the script, not CGI, is king, is a common one - especially from industry veterans...

If it wasn't startling enough when, in 2011, Universal president Ron Meyer commented on the amount of "shitty movies" on his own slate, founding fathers Steven Spielberg and George Lucas stepped up in the same week as Obst's book was published to denounce Hollywood's blockbuster dependency. ... The reckoning – led by baby boomers attacking the recent homogenisation drive in mainstream films – has exposed a generation gap in Hollywood.

Digitisation emerges as one key cause in this shift:

the shrinking of DVD revenue in the mid-noughties halved the studios' profit margins and reduced their appetite for risk