Question 2

Research how Ill Manors (2012) was marketed and promoted.

Ill Manors is a British crime drama film written, co-scored and directed by Plan B. The movie revolves around the life of eight characters and features six of Plan B's original songs to encourage the promotion of his album. The movie is set in Forest Gate, east London, where director Plan B grew up. Ill Manors was budgeted for around £100,000 and released on June 6th 2012, box office proceeds reaching approximately £256,000 on its opening weekend, which was 2 and half times the amount, it cost to produce it. Domestically, the film has earned a total gross of £453, 570 after eight weeks at the box office. In order for this thrilling movie to be as successful as it was, it relied extremely on the promotion and marketing campaign from Revolver Entertainment.

Firstly, Plan B made the album Ill Manors originally before the movie, for his fanbase. This meant that he already had strong committed supporters who would most likely go and watch his movie. "Ill Manors" was released as the album's lead single on 25 March 2012. Zane Lowe on BBC Radio 1 premiered the track on 27 February 2012, and the music video was made available on 4 March 2012. The single was officially made available on 25 March 2012. Little teasers were often released for his target audience as a run up for the release of him album. This meant that his fanbase would consistently be interested and entertained. Those that enjoyed the album were intrigued to go and view the movie created around it, and considering his album was number one for a short period of time it supports the assumption of his movie being a hit too. It's very unusual that a CD soundtrack from a rapper could help publicise the film, however it was a massive help to the publicity and advertising strategy - crucial for it to do well.

Secondly, The first film poster advertising the movie was first unveiled by Empire magazine's website on 8 May 2012. Digital Spy then also unveiled two further promotional posters on 18 May and 7 June 2012. There was 8 posters released to advertise Ill Manors, however the most popular one is the one where Riz Ahmed, who plays the drug dealer Aaron, is front and centre on the artwork, which carries the tagline "We are all products of our environment... Some environments are just harder to survive in". This poster encourages people to go and watch the film because it has 6 positive reviews printed symmetrical on each side of the poster. Someone calling it a five star is also evident on the poster which is a key feature that automatically influences someone into going to see the movie. The poster consists of reduced saturation in the colour, which implies that the movie is perhaps dark and mysterious, attracting that kind of audience. Riz Ahmed holding a gun means that this movie could also attract those that are interested in action movies, so this poster attracts many people interested in a variety of film genres.

Furthermore, The trailer for Ill Manors was first aired on The Guardian's website on 3rd May 2012 after the posters, which is the main contributor to the promotion of the movie that attracts an audience. Trailers tell the story of a film in a highly condensed fashion to have maximum appeal. In the decades since film marketing has become a large industry, trailers have become highly polished pieces of advertising, able to present even poor movies in an attractive light. They are typically made up of scenes from the film that they are promoting, which Revolver Entertainment done successfully. This marketing feature coming after the posters was ideal in attracting the audience as it meant they had a general idea of the movie, but were left clueless in the sense of what occurred throughout the 121 minutes of is run time. The film trailer was posted onto YouTube, which would often pop up as an advertisement at the beginning of certain YouTube videos. This would increase the advertisement of the movie as people on this social networking site would unintentionally stumble across the Ill Manors film trailer, and perhaps be eager to go and view it in cinema on it's release date. The film trailer received 736,820 views on YouTube, which isn't many when compared to Skyfall's 9 million and more. 

Moreover, following the poster releases, the premiere took place on 30 May 2012 at the Empire cinema in Leicester Square, London. Several British recording artists such as Alesha Dixon, Alexandra Burke, Professor Green, Tinie Tempah, Wretch 32, Example and Ed Sheeran also attended this screening. These famous celebrities attending this premiere also means that the fanbase of all of these individuals will most likely be aware of the premiere they are attending. This could encourage their fanbases to watch the movie also, not just Plan B's fan base. 

Additionally, Ill Manors has its own website as a helpful resource of advertisement. On the website there's a link to the trailer, a synopsis, stills which are images of characters from the shoot, videos where the audience can meet the cast along with see the footage from Plan B's tour. This is a positive method of advertisement because this film had only £100,000 budget and therefore couldn't stretch to vast amounts of advertisement and promotion.  Another link on the Ill Manors website is the "buy now' which sends the viewer straight to an amazon link of the blu ray dvd and normal dvd. This influences people to buy the movie because it's easily accessible. Links to its Twitter and Facebook account is also found on their website to encourage advertisements. Talking of social media, this encourages the film to make a profit as its Facebook account received 31,615 likes. In the 'about' section on Facebook, it educated the audience on the blu-ray and DVD copy, the debut film and the actors starring. It's Twitter account also encourages film and album purchases, however has only 3,000 followers which isn't many at all. But Ill Manors done itself proud with it's low budget anyhow. 

Finally, Ill Manors was released in US on Sundance Film Festival and shown at the Greater Manchester film festival which are non traditional routes that independent films have to take to create awareness, unlike Skyfall. The film was given a wide release to 191 cinemas in both Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom by Revolver Entertainment on 6 June 2012. Ill Manors was released in the Netherlands on 30 August 2012 by Benelux Film Distributors and was also screened at the Toronto International Film Festival and the Festival do Rio in September 2012. Ill Manors was released on DVD on 8 October 2012 and contains footage that was not broadcasted at the cinemas, which is an extra selling point as those that enjoy the movie will most likely purchase the hard disk to see the film again, along with its new additional scenes.