I, Daniel Blake - Extension task

 Q. ‘Films need large production and marketing budgets to be successful.’ How far do you agree with this statement? 

Whilst most may choose to link success with money made in the world of film, depending on the goals and expectations of the director and production staff working on a project, success can be measured via many other metrics. We see this in ‘I, Daniel Blake’, where rather than success being defined through purely financial means, a large part of their success can be measured through the commotion and conversation that arose in response to their clever marketing and management techniques. Specifically we saw Ken Loach and the marketing department choose to promote their film, centred around the mistreatment from the government of working class individuals, by projecting it on the side of the houses of parliament. This reinforces Loach’s preference for films centred around social realism, whilst plainly targeting those he believes to be responsible for the issues that he calls out in his film. Success in this case may be measured via the buzz created by this stunt with newspapers across the country making headlines and articles centred around the incident, raising awareness not only for the film itself but also awareness of a key social issue that Loach created ‘I, Daniel Blake’ with the goal of aiding.

Contrastingly, though "I, Daniel Blake" spread awareness on the matter of the film quite victoriously , in terms of profit made from both films, "Black Widow" made hundreds of million more dollars. From the box office alone, "Black Widow" made $379 million , whilst "I, Daniel Blake" made £11 million. However, though Marvel made $368 million more than "I, Daniel Blake", compared to the many other globally successful marvel produced films, "Black Widow" was considered a failure amongst the other successes.