Research: Institutions Lucy-Anne Richardson

Sam Raimi • Sam Raimi is an American director, producer, actor and writer.• He worked on films such as The Possession and The Evil Dead which

are both within my genre of horror/thriller.• He started making horror films in college with his roommate. As the

USA did not accept it very well, he aimed some of his films to Europe in order to gain a status. Once he had created a reputation, he started getting involved with action films such as The Spider-Man series. He has recently moved back to horror/thriller films such as The Possession in 2012.

• This shows he is a very versatile creator – not only because he is an actor/writer/director and producer – but because he can adapt/apply his skills across different genres.

Director Producer ActorDrag Me To Hell (2009)

The Possession (2012) The Shining (1997)

Spider-Man 1, 2, 3 Drag Me To Hell (2009)

Innocent Blood (1992)

Army Of Darkness (1992)

The Grudge 3 (2009) Intruder (1989)

Within The Woods (1978)

Evil Dead (2013) The Stand (1994)

Universal Pictures/Studios

Universal Pictures is an American motion picture companies. It was founded in 1912 by numerous members such as Mark Dintenfass, Cark Laemmle and Charles Baumann and is the oldest known film studios in the USA and ranks third throughout the world. It is located in Hollywood, California and is owned by ‘Comcast’.In 2004, a stake in the company was sold to ‘General Electric’ which is linked with NBC. This created a media super conglomerate so the company was then renamed ‘NBC Universal’ – even though Universal Studios (Inc.) stayed the same. It also has its links in TV programmes resulting in ‘NBC Universal Television Distribution’.

Universal Pictures has released thousands of films from 1914 starting with ‘By The Suns Rays’ all the way until the present 2013 and onwards. An example of a film they have distributed – which is in keeping with my genre – is The Skeleton Key 2005. This distribution company does not focus on a certain genre, it holds many different films from horror to romance and comedy. It has approximately released 3,500 films.

Dark Castle Entertainment

Dark Castle Entertainment is a production house linked with Warner Bros. and Silver Pictures. It was formed by Joel Silver, Gilbert Adler and Robert Zemeckis in 1999.The name of the company comes from William Castle who was a horror filmmaker between the 50’s and 60’s as they wanted to remake his horror movies. After this, it went on to create other horror/thriller films including: Orphan, Unknown, Thir13en Ghosts, House of Wax and the upcoming The Apparition 2013 which I have previously looked at for inspiration with regard to logistics (makeup used etc.) and trailer techniques.

This production company is obviously smaller and less well known than huge names such as Universal Pictures. However, I wanted to do research into this production company as it focuses on a certain genre including horror/thriller as well as supernatural. This fits my genre perfectly and allows me to look at other similar films.

I would look at Dark Castle Entertainment to distribute my film rather than Universal Studios – even though it would gain more recognition and advertisement. This is due to the specific genre interest. This company would already have a wide knowledge of marketing techniques and a set specific audience due to previous films. By doing extra research, I was able to look at every film they have been linked with, to see if was successful – which it was, in my opinion.