The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

Genre: Comedy

UK release date: 24/02/2012

Originally written by: Deborah Moggach

Screenplay written by: Ol Parker

Director: John Madden

Country: United Kingdom

Language: English

Distributor: Twentieth Century Fox Film Co

Filming Locations: India

"British comedy ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’ follows a group of retirees who relocate to an Indian hotel and what they think will be a life of opulent leisure, only to find reality doesn’t quite match the advertising. However, they soon fall for the hotel’s faded charms and discover newfound happiness through the people they are with, rather than the luxury they were expecting. From director John Madden (‘Shakespeare in Love’), ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’ features a stellar British cast including Judi Dench, Bill Nighy, Maggie Smith and Dev Patel."

PRODUCTION

Where did the finance come from?

Fox Searchlight Pictures has worldwide rights and they have co-financed the film with Participant Media and Imagenation Abu Dhabi.

What production companies have been involved? 

It will be produced by Graham Broadbent and Peter Czernin of Blueprint Pictures. Production Companies for the film include Fox Searchlight Pictures (presents), Participant Media (in association with), Imagenation Abu Dhabi FZ and Blueprint Pictures. 

What else have they produced?
Blueprint Pictures is a London-based film production company established in 2004 by Graham Broadbent and Pete Czernin. In addition to the aforementioned Blueprint titles, he has produced Danny Boyle's Millions, which won the 2005 British Independent Film Award for Best Screenplay (Frank Cottrell Boyce), and Pete Hewitt's Thunderpants.

Blueprint’s first two productions were both released in 2007. These were Julian Jarrold’s 'Becoming Jane' and Gregory Jacobs’ 'Wind Chill', starring Emily Blunt and executive-produced by George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh. 'In Bruges' is the company’s third production. 

Pete Czernin worked for eight years in Los Angeles, including a period as president of DiNovi Pictures. There, he worked on such movies as Luis Mandoki’s 'Message in a Bottle', starring Kevin Costner, and Griffin Dunne’s 'Practical Magic', starring Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock. Graham Broadbent is one of the UK’s most active independent producers, having made 10 films in the last 11 years. 

Fox Searchlight Pictures also play a part in the production as they present it. Fox Searchlight Pictures has helped produce films such as 'Black Swan', '127 Hours', 'Cyrus', 'Fantastic Mr Fox', '500 Days of Summer', 'Slumdog Millionaire', 'Juno', 'Little Miss Sunshine', 'The Wrestler', and it's most recent release, 'The Descendants' among many others. 

CAST AND CREW

Who features in the film?

There are many famous faces appearing in this new release. These include Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Judi Dench, Tom Wilkinson, Dev Patel, Penelope Wilton, Ramona Marquez, Celia Imrie, Ronals Pickup, Liza Tarbuck upon others. 

What else have they been involved in?

Some of these have been involved with Fox Searchlight Pictures before this film. For example, Dev Patel starred in 'Slumdog Millionaire' which was also produced by Fox. It is not only Dev Patel that is a famous face for being in Slumdog Millionaire, and before that, 'Skins' upon others. Maggie Smith is a very famous actress starring in many films such as the 'Harry Potter' saga, 'Nanny McPhee', 'Gosford Park', 'A Room with a View' and 'Hook'. Not only this but she is currently filming 'Skyfall', and has just finished filming 'Quartet'. Bill Nighy has also been in many films such as 'Love Actually', 'Wrath of the Titans', 'Rango', 'Chalet Girl', 'The Boat that Rocked', 'Hot Fuzz' and 'Pirates of the Caribbean' alongside a lot of other appearances. Judi Dench is arguably one of the most famous actresses in this film as she has starred in many different films and series' such as 'Casino Royale', 'Quantum of Solace', 'Notes on a Scandal', 'As Time Goes By', 'Jane Eyre', 'Chocolat', 'Tomorow Never Dies', 'Hamlet' and 'Shakespeare In Love'. She, along with Maggie Smith, is currently filming 'Skyfall'. Tom Wilkinson has starred in films such as 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' (alongside Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet), 'Batman Begins', 'Michael Clayton', 'The Green Hornet', 'Cassandra's Dream', 'Dedication', 'The Last Kiss', 'Rush Hour' and 'The Essex Boys'. 

Have they been UK based?

All of these actors were born and raised in England, and the vast majority of films they have been in represent this as they are all British releases. 

DISTRIBUTION

Who is the distribution company, who are they owned by, what else have they promoted?

The distribution company for this film is 20th Century Fox. There are three countries which will play a part in the distribution process; Singapore, USA and Russia. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation is one of the six major American film studios as of 2011. Located in the Century City area of LA, the studio is a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch's New Corporation. The company was founded on 31st May, 1935, as a result of the merger of Fox Film Corporation, founded by William Fox in 1915, and Twentieth Century Pictures, founded in 1933 by Darryl F. Zanuck, Joseph Schenck, Raymond Griffith and William Goetz. 20th Century Fox's most popular film franchises include 'Avatar', 'Star Wars', 'Ice Age', 'Garfield', 'X-Men', 'Die Hard', 'Alien', 'Speed', 'Revenge of the Nerds', 'Planet of the Apes', 'Home Alone', 'Dr. Dolittle', 'Night at the Museum', 'Predator', 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid', 'The Chronicles of Narnia' (which was previously distributed by Walt Disney Pictures), 'The Beach', and also famous TV shows such as 'The Simpsons', 'Family Guy' and 'American Dad'. 

Here is a LINK to a slideshow on the history of 20th Century Fox including details about it founders. 

How much money have they spent?
On its opening weekend, the box office total for the film around Britain was £4,000,000.


MARKETING

There are lots of marketing techniques used to promote 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel'. The questions under marketing included "What techniques have been used to promote the film?", "To what extent has digital technology been used?" and "What audiences have they targeted?" The following links, images and comments should explain the answers to these questions. 

This is the extended trailer for the new movie out on 24th February. It is on 'YouTube' and therefore is accessible worldwide. This trailer is now also shown on television making it accessible around Britain which will widen the amount of people who know about it.  

This is the World Premiere for The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel which interviews a number of members from the cast. This video can also be found on 'YouTube' and therefore is accessible worldwide.   

The following video is an extract from The Graham Norton Show which is on BBC1 on Friday nights at 10.35pm. This time narrows its Friday audience as it could be deemed as late at night for the younger generations, but is still very a popular show on websites such as BBC iPlayer. This episode invited both Judi Dench and Dev Patel (both actors in this film) to have a light discussion on the show, but is also an opportunity for them to promote the release of this film which would be out 2 weeks after the episode. 

This video is of behind the scenes at the shooting of Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. It has not featured on TV, but is worldly accessible. It was uploaded to YouTube on 8th of February, and after just 9 days, it already has 243 views. It is therefore potentially being watched by different people interested in the film who have found it by looking up the film's title.

The image above is a print screen of the Facebook page for 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel'. It has a range of features such as photos and info pages to make information about the film accessible to a wide public. The Facebook page is a very good technique of marketing as Facebook has over 845 million active users, of which, on average, 600million log in every single day. With this amount of people accessing Facebook, it is a very popular choice of advertising. The Facebook page was cleverly constructed as when somebody 'likes' a page, it appears on the news feed of that person's friends, letting them know that not only there is a new film with this name, but also that their friend has liked it, which could encourage them to look at it too, as if their friend likes it, it is more likely to be to their interest as well.

This print-screen is of a tab of the Facebook page called 'Win A Trip To India'. It is clear to anyone that a chance to win a holiday is enough incentive for somebody to look at a page even if they are not interested in the film. However, the designers of Facebook have made it so that you have to 'like' the page and 'invite friends' to the page first before you can enter the competition to win. This means that even if somebody has no interest in the film, they are still sharing the link to their news feed by 'liking' it making it available for others to see - who may be interested in the film.

  Another good point about having a Facebook page for the film is that it is permanent unless it's deleted. Other popular marketing strategies such as posters and billboards are very effective, but only until the day of the film's release when after a couple of weeks, the advertisement will be taken down or replaced with other posters. But by using Facebook to advertise the film, it can only get more and more known by the public as only more people can 'like' the page, despite how old the film may get. The Facebook page can last forever as a form of marketing for the film.

EXCHANGE 

Where is this film being screened, what kind of cinemas will it be screened at, and what does this tell us about the audience?

The film is going to be screened at many different cinemas around the UK, including Odeon, Vue, Empire, Cineworld and Picture House for example. It is a blanketed release meaning that the release date is the same for the whole of the UK. The film is not released in Americca until 2nd May. This tells us that the audiences would probably not be from a certain type of area as cinemas all over Britain have decided to screen it.

The image above shows how many cinemas in the UK 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel' will be showing at on its opening weekend (Friday 24th - Sunday 26th February 2012). The film will be shown in 338 cinemas across Britain.

Is it exhibited in digital or film format, why might this be, and can you find a budget for this?

What makes this a UK film?

*The film has got an all-English cast. 

*It is released on 24th February in the UK, but not until 2nd May in the US.
*On 'imdb', it says "Country: England"...not America
*The book "These Foolish Things"  (which the film is based on) was written by Deborah Moggach, who is English.

What attracted you to it and did you enjoy it? 

Even though the film was about the older generation, the trailer for it made it look very appealing to me as I have an interest in travel - especially places such as India. I have been to places such as Thailand, Vietnam and Marrakesh and it was interesting and funny to see what kind of features of these type of places were included in the film, such as the children that follow you around because you're English, and the fast and risky driving that is completely normal in these kind of places. The film also had a very good cast list which always appear in good and successful films. The trailer for it also encouraged me to watch it as the film looked meaningful as well as funny. I really enjoyed the film because it included typical English wit and subtle sarcasm as well as portraying an exciting and busy India.

When you watched it, how does it represent the UK?
The film is based on 7 different people who move from England to India as they are in very different circumstances. Five of the characters got to India and loved everything about it compared to living in England. One of the women that went (married to Bill Nighy's character) tried to persuade herself that she liked it, but in the end all she wanted was to move back to the British life away from the noise and busyness of Jaipur. The other character (played by Maggie Smith) was the opposite. She was undeniably racist and unwilling to come to India as she liked being around English people; her sole purpose was to get a fast car and cheap hip replacement. However, as she has to spend time recovering from her operation in India, she began to take to the area and ended up staying. For these reasons, the film represents the UK in many different ways depending on people's view points, interests and lifestyle. There was not one set representation of the UK as it depends on how the audience feels about a completely different way of life.