How to enter U.S films into Brazil

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Category: Business Term Papers

Title: How to enter U.S films into Brazil

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From The Washington Post, May 27, 2006, article entitled “Hollywood Caters to a Ravenous Global Appetite”… “Everything about the movie business today is about the global market” and “…..fast growing film scenes of China and India and Russia, and the entire niche and barely tapped markets such as Vietnam, Egypt, Brazil and Eastern Europe…” Assume you work for a medium sized Hollywood film production company with a global strategy to sell films in one of the above identified countries. You have been charged to conduct the preliminary country research to determine if the country is a viable market for specific genres of film.

What essential information to you requires constructing the country’s competitiveness profile?

What are your best indirect sources of information?

Choose one country from China, Ukraine, Turkey or Brazil, research its potential as a market for US made films. Construct an economic/political/social-cultural/ethical country competitiveness analysis for the country and write a report to present to your boss that identifies the opportunities and challenges of the country as a potential market. Include in your report a preliminary entry strategy and any further information that may be needed before a final decision should be made. The country I want to write about is Brazil. Please only books sources. Thank you

Term Papers on How to enter U.S films into Brazil

Recent surveys in the profit areas of Hollywood have shown that movies now sell more of their product overseas than they do at home. Movies made for the local audiences seem to attract people of cultures totally align to the US customs and traditions against which reflected in them. This has led to the emphasis in some quarters of the suggestion that certain types of movies should be scheduled to launch in certain countries to create maximum business dividends. Given the wide spectra of themes that the Hollywood moves try to cover, the international market presents some exciting business opportunities for Hollywood producers. The task has been rendered very easy to manage with the wonderful advancements in the technology. It is now far easier to stage-manage a mega event of movie’s premier in a remote island than it was a decade ago. The proliferation of internet and World Wide Web has made the task of information dissemination very much easy. It is astonishing that when it comes to viewing movies, people leave aside their social, political and religious prejudices. This phenomenon transcends many obstacles in doing good business. For example, in some countries where there was a high degree of anti-Americanism, the movies were greeted with high receptivity. This is particularly true when it comes to some hostile countries (read China) and closer home states, e.g. Brazil. After this brief description of potential favorable response in the international market, let now zero in on our attention to a particular country i.e. Brazil. One thing is obvious that when there is some common ground in the values and patterns of thinking, people can relate and identify with one another more easily. If this connection can be created in the international arena, this should not be so difficult to generate and nurture such good conditions near our backyard. Brazil’s diverse population and its literary and cultural taste make it an ideal place for the Hollywood movies to be distributed in the country. Generally speaking, any country which believes in the general liberal and freedom-oriented values of United States can be a good market for the movies made here. A country which is living under strict government control, e.g., North Korea and some Arab countries like can never be an ideal place for the marketing of our movies. In such societies, the basic freedoms of people are suppressed in the name of collective good. As a result; people know nothing or little about what is happening in the outside world.    

Besides, the arts and film industry is such a field where people look to after their basic needs are met. In addition to a totalitarian state, a theocracy is no place for our movies. In most of the Hollywood movies today, mild display of sex and liberal ideas form the central idea. A theocracy , like Iran and Saudi Arabia, imposes such religious shackles around the people that they are afraid or feel guilty about watching half-naked people from a country they are given to see demonized day in and day out in the state media-the only media they have access to. They think it is a religious sin to watch the movies made in the Hollywood. The makers of these movies in their view are infidels with no sense of right and wrong and influenced by a very materialistic mindset. Some of us might say at this point that the internet has destroyed those restrictions but in these countries free access to the Web is a Herculean task and those most fortunate to get it face blocks and strict access policies. The situation is contrary to the above in Brazil today. People of Brazil are open, gregarious and accommodating. The society, at large, is liberal globalized.They like to socialize and identify themselves with the freethinking from wherever it might be coming. A case in point is the fact that more than half of the people who registered on Orkut,an online community for people to socialize and stay connected with their friends hail from Brazil. A vast majority of people knows the English language and they are very much receptive to the ideas of American thinkers.

The ground is thus prepared for any sort of entrepreneurship in the field of export of Hollywood movies into this country. In the first place, Brazil comes in our own continent. Many of the people have a first hand experience of people from America. Their social values allow make it easy for us to sell our movies to them. At this stage, we can say that a mix of social and religious factors determine the proper candidacy of any country for the Hollywood business. In case of Brazil, both social and religious environment make a relatively better country to do business in movies. Next we will look at how the ethnic, economic and cultural influences of the country interplay to make it suitable for Hollywood movies to be screened there. Today Brazil is a truly multiracial country. Over the years, its culture has absorbed other influences. A brief look at its history shows that the Amerindian peoples had a huge influence on the Brazil's language and cuisine. The Africans, introduced to Brazil as slaves, had their fair share of influence not only on Brazil’s music and dance but also in the areas such as cuisine, religion and language. European immigrants, for their part, came into Brazil in large numbers and their influences are felt closer to the Southeast and South of the country. This goes without saying that more or less the same population diversity exists in Brazil as it does in America.

Looked at from another perspective, Brazil is very different from some of the big cinema countries like India and China. The movies from India and China are making inroads into the areas formerly warm recipients of Hollywood. India’s film industry, known as Hollywood, is the largest film producer in the world today. Emboldened by the spread of satellite and increasing wealthy Indian Diasporas, the movies are giving a tough time to those Hollywood producers who distributed their movies in the past without facing any sort of competition. Today Indian movies are released simultaneously Mumbai (formerly Bombay) and other international big cities like London and Dubai. The award ceremonies of these movies are conducted abroad. Almost the same is true for the Chinese movies which find easy audiences in the Korean peninsula and to some extent in Japan. Under these circumstances, it is very difficult to challenge the local market and accrue business in these big countries. The situation in Brazil is quite different. The Brazilian cinema has been in doldrums for quite some time now and people are looking for good entertainment no matter where it comes from. It is where the Hollywood marketing people can enter a earn profits. If the people can watch, appreciate and relate to a movie purely reflecting the American culture, then it goes without saying that a little mixture of their own culture in the movie is a sure way to attract them. So the Hollywood producers should try to focus on the cultural peculiarities of Brazil and give a smack of that in their movies. This will surely go down well the intended audience. On the economic, though the population of people living below the poverty line is higher, the Brazilian economy is the 4th largest in the world. Some of its cities, e.g., Sao Paulo are industrial hubs and present very good business prospects for the screening of Hollywood movies. On the political front, throughout its history, Brazil has tried hard to lay the foundation of a democratic and egalitarian society. This is despite the fact that it originated as a plantation colony and the strong influence of slavery. It has successfully emerged from the curse of military rule and now is a free and democratic country. The reform measures taken by the governments have resulted in the significant improvements in the economy. According to the World Bank Survey of Brazil’s economic sector, there are very good opportunities for people to do business. Given the vast cultural diversity that exists in the country today, it will be pertinent to keep in mind no single category of movies can be distributed with success. It has to be a mixture of various phenomena to strike the right chord with the people. First of all, an assessment of the taste of Brazilian people in terms of movies is necessary. The producers in Hollywood must be cognizant of the fact that Brazil is South America's biggest media market and is home to thousands of radio stations and hundreds of TV channels. As no foreign direct investment is allowed in Brazil, media ownership is highly concentrated. This has resulted in indigenous conglomerates such as Globo which is Brazil’s most-successful broadcaster. The Hollywood movie makers would have to consider that fact. A better strategy is not to try to dominate Brazil’s existing media companies. It is better to enter into partnership with them. At the risk of repeating it over and over again, there will be no ethical and/or social problem in promoting US made movies in the country, as the customs of the population together with the constitution guarantee free press and rigorous debate on social and political issues. The open mindednesses with which most of the Hollywood movies are made today are sure to cut ice with the Brazilian people. This much about the opportunities in the country for a flamboyant Hollywood market. As far as the challenges are concerned, we must not underestimate them as well. The recent upsurge in the wave of anti-Americanism due to some of our faulty policies may impact the way we do business today. Most of the Central American leaders are not happy with our policies around the world in general and in the financial matters of those countries in particular. With many of the heavy weights of Hollywood openly taking up firm partisan approaches, it may impact how the movies fare abroad. Unlike the American people who feel satisfied with their own country and don’t concern themselves with the rest of the world, people of Third World countries like Brazil take interest in politics. Hence the political policies may have an impact on the success of Hollywood market in Brazil. Nonetheless, we can make a difference with the content of our movies. Recent protests against the portrayal of Brazil in Hollywood as a country which threatens foreign tourists show the country is conscious about its image and we must do everything to portray it in the positive light if we want to establish a viable market for our movies there.

Work Cited - Book Resources or References:

• Hollywood caters to Global Market.
  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/26/AR2006052602034.html
• Hollywood abroad
  http://www.ucpress.edu/books/bfi/pages/PROD0478.html
• Brazil Threatening Hollywood
  http://k.lenz.name/LB/archives/001127.html
• Brazil’s Hollywood concerns
  http://www.guardian.co.uk/brazil/story/0,,1963335,00.html

References:

• Free Movie Downloads www.veoh.com
• Market Research Video www.voxpops.com

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