Intellectual property which protects creativity and innovation could be in the form of copyright, trademark, industrial design, patent, and trade secret. Today's #IPSERIES is celebrating Star Wars hence the topic which focuses on movie franchises which are a form of IP commercialization.
Film and franchise are like 5 & 6 which means that franchise is the business side of the film industry whereby filmmakers can commercialize their movies. A franchise is synonymous with intellectual property (IP) and as we know IP protects creative and innovative work (s).
A franchise in the film industry is defined as a business plan for generating funds from branded films. The Cambridge dictionary defines it as a right to sell a company's product using the company's name however with regards to film, it defines it as a series of films with the same title and about the same character.
The following are terminology that is associated with the movie franchise- reboot, sequels, prequels, spinoffs and trilogy
Examples of famous movie franchises include
- Star Wars
- Marvel Cinematic Universe,
- James Bond,
- Mission Impossible
- Harry Potter
- Terminator
- Toy Story
- Batman
- Planet of Apes
- Spider-Man
- Ocean's Eleven
- Rocky
- The Muppets
- The Lord of the Rings
- The Hunger Games
Do we have a movie franchise in Nigeria?
I can not think of anyone other than the grade C or D movies that are made up to part (season) 1-8 however, the movies that come to my mind is Living in Bondage a 1992 two-part drama thriller film directed by Chris Obi Rapu, was written by Kenneth Nnebue and Okechukwu Ogunijiofor, produced by Ogunijior and sponsored by Jafac Wine, has a sequel released last year is currently on Netflix was produced by Charles Okpaleke and directed by Ramsey Nouah.
Another movie would be The Wedding Party 1 & 2 which I expended the producers to monetize/commercialize but never did so.
How a franchise is born.
When a movie is born and a script is written, no one ever envisions how it would be received by the consumers or whether it would be successful, it just happens organically. This can be likened to a family where the husband and wife initially want one (1) kid but end up having three(3) to four (4) kids.
In simple terms, a franchise is like having a kid; it is also a way for filmmakers to exploit their work by monetizing and commercializing the work in question. Another way could be by delving into merchandising, licensing, or even selling the movie rights.
Today, Star Wars is celebrating its 43rd anniversary and this is because it has built not only a brand but a franchise spanning 43rd years. Now you may ask when should a franchise know when to stop making its sequels or reboot? This would depend on a number of factors such as:
- If it's the same characters in the franchise, it may lose its flavor and audience
- the storyline may not be too good
So what is the key to maintaining and growing a franchise
- Change the script.
- Invest in your IP and build a brand of your movie.
- Create something your audience would love and enjoy when watching.
- Living through the character.
- Partnering stories for instance when Legendary Pictures bought the rights to Godzilla and in 2015 "Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures announced a cinematic franchise uniting Godzilla, King Kong, and other iconic giant monsters" thereby buying into a bigger audience.
- Audience response can also determine the success of a movie becoming a franchise.
- Consumers' sentiment to a particular role could also make or break a franchise.
- Allowing a movie to evolve organically.
- Switching directors to allow creativity.
The Star Wars franchise has made about $42 billion from its theme park attraction, video games, comic books, the film franchise is said to have made $12 billion from the sale of toys, etc. Do share with me what your favorite franchise is.
In conclusion, these are the ways the film industry in Nigeria can explore when considering a movie franchise:
- See IP as an asset
- Value their brand
- Build a brand and audience
- Have an IP strategy
- exploit, monetize and commercialize your IP through a right of publicity, licensing, merchandising, assigning or selling your IP
- Register your IP as soon as possible be it copyright, industrial design, trade dress or trademark
- have a good marketing strategy and also build the anticipation from consumers through teaser trailers
- explore character merchandising and finally
- invest in production value
With this, we have come to the end of #IPSERIES for today. Don't forget to like, share, comment and send in your questions to : ipseriesinfo@gmail.com or pardooprimelegal@gmail.com
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