Grand Budapest hotel research

Task 1 research
What is Indian Paintbrush and who owns it? Indian Paintbrush production company is owned by Mr Steven M. Rales who is a US billionaire worth in excess of $3.2 billion dollars. Indian Paintbrush's main purpose is to provide financial support for films such as Fantastic Mr Fox, Moonrise Kingdom and The Grand Budapest Hotel. Wes Anderson films are often funded by Indian Paintbrush production company.
Which company is Fox Searchlight a subsiduary of? It is a subsidiary of 20th century fox.
Which type of films do Fox Searchlight distribute?   All independent British films.
Which two countries financed the film? It was mainly financed by English and German in an even split.
What did Anderson use instead of CGI (computer generated imagery)? Anderson used stop start modelling instead of CGI to offer a more realistic setting. This is why the clips often don't look as good as a CGI equivalent. 
Where did the inspiration for the Hotel come from? The inspiration came from the The Grand Budapest Hotel came from the writings of Stefan Zweig.
Which film festival opened with The Grand Budapest Hotel? The film was opened on the 64th Berlin International film festival in Berlin. 
Alexanre Desplat wrote the score, which major Hollywood films has he worked on? Major Hollywood films that he has worked for include Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (part 1 & 2) and Godzilla.
How many awards has the film won? 5 awards and 1 more pending.
Initially how many cinemas did the film open on in the US? The film was shown in 4 US cinema's.
How much did it average per cinema? It averaged $200,000 per cinema.
The film was released on Ultraviolet BluRay, what does this enable consumers to do? It enables viewers to watch on different consoles such as Blu-ray, Xbox, Playstation. 
Which companies do not support Ultraviolet? Apple and Amazon do not support support it and neither do Disney due to them having a rival product.
What complaints did Ultraviolet encounter when it launched? It encountered a problem that Apple users could not use it on their apple products such as iPads.

Task 2 comprehension
Edward Norton (Henckles)
Owen Wilson (M. Chuck)
Ralph Feinnes (M. Gustav H)
Tony Revolori (Zero)
Jeff Goldblum (Deputy Kovacs)
Tilda Swinton (Madame D)
Adrian Brody (Dimitri)
Saoirse Ronan (Agatha)
Jason Schwartzman (M.Jean)
Willem Dafoe (Jopling)
Harvey Keitel (Ludwig)
Bill Murray (M. Ivan)
Mathieu Amalric (Serge X)
F. Murray Abraham (Mr. Moustafa)
Lea Seydoux (Clotilde)
Tom Wilkinson (Author)
Bob Balaban (M. Martin)

Part 2

Where did scouting for a hotel take place? Central Europe.
Which location did the production team eventually use? Görlitz, Germany.
Did they film on location or on a sound stage? On location.
Where were the production offices located? Top floor of the hotel.
How did they film the 60's and 30's hotel? They built the 60's set first before peeling it away revealing the 30's set.
Where did inspiration for the hotel's interior come from? Library of congress and Eastern European hotels.
How many extras did it take to fill the lobby? Over 100 extras were used.

Task 3 - Summarise 5 secrets to the films sucess

• One feature of the films success was the selling online of film memrobilia to promote the films success.
• Another feature of the films success was their unique marketing strategy of bringing a large scale replica of the hotel budapest to theatres around the world.
• Furthermore another feature which contributed to the films success was including instructional videos on how to make cakes and pastries inspired by the Mendl's success.
• In addition the release of 'Moonrise Kingdom' in 2012 caused an influx of younger people viewing Wes Anderson films.
• Finally the final secret to the films success was its accessability from around the world and to many audiances. 

 How did Anderson use the QE2 to market the film? Anderson and members of the cast did a Q&A with members of the public whilst onboard the QE2. This promoted the film.

What connects Prada to the marketing of the film? Prada created the luggage bags to be used in the film.

Task 4 - Opinion

Why would a big Six company be interested in supporting a smaller distribution company like Fox Searchlight? 
Which audience category best describes The Grand Budapest Hotel (Mainstream, Mainstream plus, officianados, ) 
Why might the use of Ultraviolet alienate the film's audience?
Why might the use of secret cinema work as viral marketing for the film?