British Films
AND THE KINGS SPEECH
What makes a British film?
According to the House of Commons
Culture, Media and Sport committee -2003
a ‘British film’ is :
A film with reference to obvious cultural
elements such as: a setting in the UK or focus
on British people abroad; a predominantly
British cast; a storyline about some aspect of
British life, or based on a work by, a British
author.
• Recent examples of this are –Billy Elliott
and Bend it Like Beckham
Cultural definition• The British Council runs ‘britfilms.com’ which
contains its directory of British films. The council
regards a British film as on where the film had a
minimum of three of the following six criteria:
1 . A British producer
2. A British production team
3. A British Director
4. A predominantly British cast
5. A subject matter that informs the British experience
6. A British identity as defined by the bfi in the release
review in sight and sound
What makes a British film?
Statutory definition
- According to the House of commons Culture,
Media and Sport Committee – 2oo3
• There are two ways that a film may qualify as
‘British’ – either under Schedule 1 to the
Films Act 1985, examples include the Bond
and Harry Potter films, or by satisfying the
terms of an international co-production
agreement to which the UK is a party. Under
the films Act, for a film to be certified as
‘British’ a number of tests must be met.
• The MakerTest is where the film must
be made by a company that is
registered and centrally managed and
controlled in the UK, in another state of
the European Union/European
Economic Area or in a country with the
European Community has signed an
Association Agreement.
1. THE MAKER TEST
2. THE PRODUCTION
COST TEST
• 70% of the production costs
of the film must be spent on
film-making activity in the
UK
3. THE LABOUR COST TEST
1. 70% of the total cost must have been paid
to citizens or ordinary residents of the
Commonwealth, EU/EEA or a country with
which the European Community has signed
an agreement
2. 75% of the total labour cost – after deducting
the necessary – must have been paid to citizens
or ordinary residents of the Commonwealth,
EU/EEA or a country with with a signed
agreement
4. PREVIOUSLY FILMED
MATERIAL
• No more than 10% of the
playing time of the film should
comprise a sequence of visual
images from a previously
certified film or from a film by a
different maker.
The King’s Speech
• ‘The Kings Speech’ is the story of King George VI of Britain,
his impromptu ascension to the throne and the speech
therapist who helped the unsure monarch become worthy of
it.
• It has done really well with 12 nominations for this year’s
Oscars, and 14 nominations for the Baftas 2011 and 7
Golden Globe nominations with a win for best performance.
The King’s Speech
• Production year: 2010
• Runtime: 118 minutes
• Directors: Tom Hooper
• Writer: David Seidler
• Release Date: 7 January 2011
• Production Companies: Weinstein Company, UK Film Council,
Momentum Pictures, Aegis Film Fund, Molinare Investment, Film Nation
Entertainment , See-Saw Films, Bedlem Productions
• Stars: Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter
UK Box Office
• Even distributor Momentum Pictures wildest expectations were exceeded with a
£3.52m opening weekend, including modest previews of £227,000.
• Grossing over £40,000 at London's Chelsea cinema, and breaking house records
at the capital's Curzon Renoir and Richmond!!
• The top six sites were all in London, led by Odeon Leicester Square (£106,000),
Vue Westfield (£51,000) and Vue Islington (£45,000). Top regional site was Odeon
Guildford, with £28,000.
The King’s Speech Reviews
• The film was a major achievement , with Colin Firth presenting us with a great profile in courage,
a portrait of the recurrent figure, the stammerer as a hero.
• This is a film of small, precise, perfectly judged moments: while the historical backdrop could
easily have made for epic overstatement and hand-wringing melodrama, Seidler and Hooper’s
decision to focus their attention on the characters and on their relationships and insecurities,
makes ‘The King’s Speech’ feel intimate and wholly convincing.
• For all its period trappings and occasionally heavy-handed Freudian psychodrama, ‘The King’s
Speech’ always comes back to the unlikely friendship between two superbly sketched,
immaculately played characters.
Criticisms on The King’s Speech
• It perpetrates a gross falsification of history.
• I found this movie to be formulaic in the worst way. There's no
deviating from your typical biopic machinations, and you can probably
figure out what's going to happen after the first 20 minutes
• It just felt like an over acted, staged, Oscar Hungry play, not a movie
Production
• The $15m project shot on a tight
schedule of 39 days in and around
London at the end of 2009. One tough
obstacle.
• Canning says, was the “mind-bending”
scheduling of the cast: Firth was doing
awards promotions for A Single Man,
while Helena Bonham Carter, playing his
wife Elizabeth, could only shoot on
weekends since she was making Harry
Potter And The Deathly Hallows.
Production
• Amy Merry, who worked on the
production design. "When we were
shooting exteriors we threw dirty water
over everything. We filmed in Harley
Street on a Sunday so we closed the
road in the early hours and a gritting
van came along at 5am and covered
the ground with dirt. Then we pumped
out so much smog that we set off the
fire alarms in John Lewis."
• The stands were filled with an inflatable crowd.
According to Amy Merry, these blow-up people
– actually only blow-up upper bodies – are
much more convincing than CGI
• Despite the royal settings, The King's Speech
is a remarkably brown film. The palaces are
intimidatingly, rather than comfortably,
luxurious. The production design plays into the
sense of Firth's character struggling to be a
king, which, for him, means struggling to be
himself.
Finance
• The Weinstein Co has received
most of the PR bonanza for
backing Oscar-touted The
King’s Speech. But it’s really a
British film financing
company aptly
named Prescience that first
recognized the film’s potential.
• The UK Film Council awarded The
King’s Speech £1,021,080 of Lottery
funding. The UK Film Council stands to
recoup 100% of its investment plus
significant net profits
• London’s Prescience Film Finance
stepped in to provide two-thirds of the
film’s £9 million ($14.5 million) budget
using its £25 million Aegis Film Fund.
Extra Facts
• Errors in geography: In the
Wembley Stadium scene we see
the famous twin towers on the far
side of the field. But they were
actually on the same side as the
royal box, and in the 1920s there
was just open terracing on that far
side.
• The script had to be posted
through Geoffrey Rush’s letter -
box
• The script had to be posted
through Geoffrey Rush’s letter -
box
• The script began as a stage
performance
Bibliography
• http://film-english.com/2011/02/19/the-kings-speech-lesson-plan/
• http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1504320/
• http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_words/2011/01/
churchill_didnt_say_that.html
• http://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-kings-speech
• http://www.screendaily.com/home/awards/the-kings-speech/5022661.article
• http://www.deadline.com/2011/01/the-uk-financier-behind-the-kings-speech/
• http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/jan/02/the-kings-speech-period-sets
• http://www.timeout.com/film/reviews/89059/the-kings-speech.html
• http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/jan/09/kings-speech-philip-french-review