Angelina Jolie
Has your star 'sold' a film?
Although it hasn't come out yet, 'Maleficent', based on the fairytale 'Sleeping Beauty', is set to be successful because of the casting involving Angelina Jolie as the main character and antagonist, Maleficent. Jolie normally does action based films, such as Salt, Tomb Raider and Wanted, which means that Maleficent, as a fantasy adventure film, wouldn't typically attract the same target audience as Jolie's usual films. However, emphasis has been placed on Angelina Jolie during the advertising process, particularly with the film posters and trailer, as opposed to the film's protagonist Aurora from the fairytale version, to highlight to everyone that she plays a big part in this film. This would encourage her fans to come and watch the film simply because she is in it, despite the fact it probably isn't their usual kind of film, and therefore this widens the market in therms of target audience for the film, making it more likely to be successful.
Are the star's fans loyal?
It is unclear whether Angelina Jolie's fanbase remains a loyal one, as she does not have an official Twitter or Facebook page for her fans to use, however she does have nearly 2 million fans who have 'liked' a fan-run Facebook page who continue to post positive comments about the star, and frequent users of the fan-site 'Team Jolie', which shows how people continue to support her. Furthermore, she is still talked about frequently in the media, which suggests that there are large amounts of people still interested in her. Many of her films have been successful as she continues to get fans coming to see her latest work, purely because she is the star, which further suggests how her fans are probably loyal ones.
Has your star had a 'film flop'?
'Life or Something Like It' was probably one of Jolie's worst films, in terms of ratings, reviews and finance. It was criticised as a 'shallow story' and only made $14.4 million back from its $40 million budget. Not many people saw the film and not many people have even heard of it, even though it had been released just one year after her popular 'Lara Croft: Tomb Raider'. However, Jolie was still fairly early into her career and still developing a fan-base.
"Beyond the curious miscasting of Jolie, who can't quite turn lazy flirtatiousness into existential longing, Life or Something Like It offers few diversions." -- Mark Holcomb, Village Voice
What is the star's most financially successful film?
Mr and Mrs Smith (2005) was Angelina Jolie's most successful film, grossing $183.6 million in the US and $478,336,279 worldwide - a box office hit. Here she stars alongside Brad Pitt, and this is where she fell in love with him and they have been in a relationship in real-life ever since. Despite its success though, it received mixed reviews both positive and negative.
Why was the film successful?
The reason why the film was so successful was initially down to the casting. Both Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are very famous actors, and so by targeting both of their large fan-bases, the target audience altogether would have been very large. The film also received many positive reviews from critics about both the plot and the performance of the characters before the film was even released, which further would have encouraged people to see it. Another point that could be used is the fact it is near to a hybrid genre of both romantic comedy and action film, which widens the market still because it attracts those who like action films, those who like 'rom-coms', and those who like both. In addition to this, a lot of violence and sex was cut from the film, in order to reduce the certificate rating to a PG-13, which means a wider variety of audiences, due to age, could go and see the film, and therefore more people in general may have gone to see the film.
Where was the film distributed?
The film was distributed widely across America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Australasia, which would open up a wider target audience and generate more money, although its popularity mostly came from its home place, the USA.
What are issues with 'stars'?
The issue with many stars is that they become known for starring in once genre of film, and so after a while all of their films seem to be repetitive and very similar, and so people would get very bored of the star. On the other hand, this could also be true of actors who can do a variety of genres, because after starring in all kinds of things, it is difficult to get any better at their work, and so their career would also come to an end. A good thing about Angelina Jolie is on the surface, she does a lot of action films that appeal to a certain audience to build her fan-base, but then instead of just continuing with this until people get bored of her, she branches out into other genres such as fantasy, love or drama, showing that she can do much more, and so her career has not reached the end yet.
Angelina Jolie (birthname: Angelina Jolie Voight) is an American actress, film director, screenwriter and author who has an Academy Award, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and three Golden Globe awards. She was named Hollywood's most highest paid actress in Forbes in 2009, 2011 and 2013. She is typically best known for her roles in 'Original Sin', 'Lara Croft: Tomb Raider', 'Mr and Mrs Smith', 'Salt', 'The Tourist', and upcoming film 'Maleficent'.
Stars as Capital Value
Angelina Jolie is worth $145 million, as one of the most highest paid Hollywood Actresses, which particularly came to light after the release of 'The Cradle of Life', the sequel to the major success 'Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.'
What Angelina Jolie brings to the studio which is beneficial to the films includes mostly her looks. By many media outlets she has been named the world's most 'beautiful woman', which would therefore attract the audience to the film, if the character role she is playing requires a 'good looking woman' to play the part, particularly reinforcing Mulvey's theory of the Male Gaze. This is related to the idea that a lot of the films she has worked on are action films with a typically male audience, and so she does well at attracting these viewers to watch the films. In addition to this, her martial arts abilities and her physical strength and fitness mean she is well equipped to play many of the protagonist roles in the action films, and continue to appeal to the same audience. Her large fan base allows many of her films to be predicted as successful before they are even released.
Star as a construct
Gledhill wrote that audiences want to know the ‘real’ person, but also the ‘reel’ star.
Angelina Jolie's life is not particularly private, as she always seems to be confronted with paparazzi, particularly because she is engaged to famous actor Brad Pitt also. This means it would be extremely hard for her personally to present her real self, because the media is constantly constructing her persona in a way which is mediated for us to see in magazines that we would be interested in. However, it would also mean we can get more of an insight into her real life compared to other actors that are not in the media as much, and so we could get a glimpse of what she really might be like. For example, her character's tend to be sexy, independent women with action-packed secret lives, but we know from all of the media attention she is a family woman and caring mother, who lives with Brad and also her 3 biological children and 3 adopted children. Overall, due to media distortions, and her busy life, it is difficult to determine what exactly her real life is like, but what we see is probably not constructed by herself, but constructed by the paparazzi.
Stars as deviant
Angelina Jolie was particularly quiet about any deviance in her life on her way to popularity, but then in interviews she started to reveal about dark parts of her life. She has never been in prison, but she spoke of a time when she was a heavy drug-taker, particularly of cocaine and ecstasy, and also of her 'bad girl' past, such as using knives during sex and wearing a vial of her ex-husband's blood around her neck. Although she spoke to the media about these, these were things that had happened in the past and not the present, so it was concluded that she was not acting deviant as a film star persona construct, but merely because of personal issues. Her actions could be justified by the idea that now she is a successful and happy, caring family woman who does a lot of charity work and is more or less over her deviant times, which could be shown as inspirational to her fans.
Stars as Cultural Value
In some ways, Angelina Jolie goes against ideological social values in her roles in films. In a lot of her action films, such as Tomb Raider, Salt, Mr and Mrs Smith, Wanted, and The Tourist, she always seems to carry guns, act violently, or is escaping from something or someone, which is not the way the film would expect its audience to behave. The purpose of this would be to make the film a form of enjoyment and escapism because it is thrilling for the audience, as it deviates the social norms. However these roles could also portray values about being yourself and how not allowing yourself to be controlled to a certain extent is sometimes a good thing. These are the values portrayed by the producer though, and not the actress herself. Her personal life in the present, which involves charity work and family life, expresses many cultural values of love, compassion, morals and happiness, which are virtues that would inspire her own fans, and not just the fans of her films, which therefore would make her a positive role model.
The benefits of stars for audiences and producers
Using Angelina Jolie as an example, the benefit of her as a star for producers is her popularity. As she becomes more popular through more and more films as the lead role, she creates more of a fan base, and therefore more people will be wanting to see her films. This is useful for producers because it means the films will make more money with more people wanting to see them, if they are interested in the actress in them. In terms of audience, as she becomes more popular the audience will want to see more films of hers, and thus are more likely to watch a wider range of genres and styles from different directors, just because she is cast in them. Also, by watching more and more films with Angelina in them, the more an audience will be inspired by her and use her as a role model to instil values and aspirations into themselves. Ultimately, she is used as a prop to fulfil the needs of producers and audiences for money.
