Tom Parkin AS Media

1. What is Film4's remit (its reason and purpose for being)?

It is to help and support the UK film industry; channel four also provides long term support and funds British film projects. Its aims are to products high quality films that are different and promote the UK film industry. Also to provide a viewing platform when the films are released such as online services and TV channels.  

2. What types of films are green-lighted by Film4? Give examples of films and genres.

A wide variety of genres are covered this is so that a large audience is covered. Primarily the preferred genre used is Drama. Such examples of films that have been given the ‘green light’ are ‘slum dog millionaire’ a romantic drama. ‘This is England’, trainspotting and east to east. Some films are also given the go ahead because they represent a side of British culture such as ‘This is England which is set in the 80’s.

3. Why is Tessa Ross regarded as "the mother of British film-making" and therefore instrumental for Film4's success?
She has been responsible for finding new talent and following the projects through all of the stages of production. She has been described to have the ‘vision’ and ‘image’ to make the projects happen in the first place. So she has been responsible for a lot of the success that film four has had.  

4. How much is Film4's yearly budget and how much of it did "Slum dog Millionaire take up? ( Be careful with this one as co-productions, UK Lottery money and deals with Pathe, etc. helps make Film4's budget stretch further!)
Primarily the funding for film four is given to them by channel 4 and the budget is £15 million year. £8 million of the budget was used to fund ‘Slum Dog Millionaire’, the rest of the funding was provided by other partners such as Pathe.

5. Why does Film4 form partnerships with other companies/individuals?
So that funding for the projects can be found and that the projects can go ahead as planned. Also to reach other deals such as distribution.

6. What is the future for Film4 - budget and film-wise?
The budget has been increased dramatically this year by 50% in regards to funding from channel 4, this means that 15 million pounds of funding will enable more film projects to go forward.

7. What problems did Film Four face in the naughties?
Due to the UK film council being scrapped film four has been struggling to function with a smaller budget, it faced an future that was uncertain so this could have meant that film four would have been no more.
Also in 2001 film four made a loss of £5.7 million as a result of one of their most exspensive films ‘Charlotte Gray’ and was a flop at the box office. In 2006 it was also shown that their TV subscription service business model wasn’t working contributing to more financial difficulty.