Film Institutions: The Six Major Companies

Film Institutions – The Six Major Film Companies

Paramount

Paramount pictures was founded on May 8 1912 in Los Angeles, California. It is famous for its production of family films with big titles including: Star Trek, War of the Worlds, the Mission Impossible series and Transformers – all of which have been incredibly successful.

One of paramount’s most famous films is Shrek the Third which, coincidently, is ranked 3^rd out of their top grossing films. The film was produced by DreamWorks Animation as a sequel to the ever popular first and second shrek films. With a budget of $160 million, they had a box office revenue of $799.

Warner Bros

Warner Bros Pictures is the biggest film institution in the industry, covering a huge 19.7% of the US/Canadian market share (2007 statistics). They were founded on April 4, 1923. They are most famous for their popular films including Harry Potter, Batman, The Matrix and Star Wars.

Twister was a film created by Warner Bros. Studios and had a budget of $92 million and had a box office income of $494.4 million. The film was also distributed by Universal Pictures, hence why a ride features at their amusement park.

Walt Disney

Walt Disney is one of the most well-known film institutions in the industry, creating films targeted at all the family, whether animation or not. They were founded on October 16, 1923. They hold 15.3% of the US market share, which demonstrates their sheer size and support.

Their fourth top grossing film was the world famous ‘Finding Nemo’ which has recently had its sequel – Finding Dory – released. The film had a budget of $94 million and returned an insane box office value of $940.3 million. They use celebrities in their films, such as Ellen DeGeneres, to attract audiences.

Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures is an institution owned by Sony. It was founded in June 19, 1918. With a 17 percent share of the entire US and Canadian markets, Sony is considered as the biggest studio these days. It has produced the widespread 007 Bond movies, as well as films such as Grown Ups and The Amazing Spider-Man.

One of columbias most known films is Ghostbusters, which was recently recreated. It was given a budget of $144 and returned a box office income of $228.9 million.

Universal Studios

Universal Studios are a highly popular film institution, which is demonstrated clearly by their famous theme park based in Florida. It was founded on April 30, 1912 at a similar time to paramount. They are known for some of their most famous films Jurassic Park (and more recently Jurassic World) followed by Fast and Furious 7 and other titles. In general, their films tend to be mainly aimed at families with large target audiences.

Their third highest grossing film was Minions – released in 2015 - which has created a box office grossing of an amazing $1,159,398,397. The film was created due to the popularity of the character ‘minion’ from their previous films Despicable Me and its sequel Despicable Me 2.

20^th Century Fox

20^th Century Fox is a classic film institution that has made all the favourites. Its recognisable tune has helped it to be one of the most well-known and memorable distribution companies. It was founded on May 31, 1935. It has made famous titles such as Avatar, The Sound of Music and of course Titanic (which was also distributed by Paramount Pictures.) They are known for their action, superhero films.

One of its most recent and successful titles is Deadpool. They used famous actor Ryan Reynolds as their lead role which helped to attract audience members. It was given a budget of $58 million (after pressure from fans to release the film) and returned $782.6 million.