How Does Avengers: Infinity War Represent the Hollywood Production Model?

What makes Hollywood films lines can be blurred, especially when it comes to the nationality of actors, filmmakers and the countries in which the film is filmed, but less so than the definition of independent films. Avengers: Infinity War (A. Russo , J. Russo, 2018), is probably as close as it gets to the perfect example of a Hollywood film, made under the traditional Hollywood production model.

Avengers: Infinity War is one of the most recent films based around the group of superheors known as The Avengers. The movie was directed by the Russo Brothers, who have previously directed other avengers movies including, Captain America: The Winter Solider, Captain America: Civil War and the upcoming, Avengers: Endgame. Marvel Studios produced the film and it was distributed by Walt Disney Studios. That information alone solidifies its status as a Hollywood film.

The old Hollywood studio system, prolific during the Hollywood Golden Era, was dominated by the big 5 studios at the time and involved vertcial intergration, meaning everything from post-production to exhibiton and distribution was owned and controlled by the studios. The current system that Hollywood runs on isnt so different to the studio system. Disney distributed the movie using it distribution company, but also ultimatly owns the production company, Marvel as well as some of the other most prominent production companies today.

The films budget was $300 million and released globally, raking in a massive $2,048,803,724 worldwide. Being at the time only the newest of the films released by Disney and Marvel, with all of the other films before smashing box office records themselves, the film and the ones that follow are, at this point, guaranteed success. The formula that the production companies have created over the past decade seemingly works well for them and they stick to it throughout all of their films. The story told in the film is as simple as it gets, the good guys band together to beat the bad guy, the film is universal and easy to understand for anyone meaning its audience is as big as anys could be, helping in the process towards making billions of dollars.

The filmmaking and story techiniques used to make a film like this does not make the film lesser than those that focus on deeper storytelling and filmmaking techniques. They are simply two different types of movies, for different audiences.

The level of production on this film is monumental, the film was primarily shot in studios and on sets created for the film. A lot of the film was also shot against green screen, to allow the filmmakers to place the characters in unearthly and massive locations. Visually the films are made to the highest quality, with the use of special and visual effects the films are beyond any of their competitiors. There are over 2500 vfx shots in the film and 13 vfx houses worked on the film altogether including, Framestore and ILM. The YouTube video below shows Framestores breakdown on the work they did on the film, this gives an idea of the sheer amount of work that is put into a film like Infinity War.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5mS7BHmZJI

The other quality that the film has, that is arguably one of the biggest selling points of the films, is the stars. Some of Hollywoods best and most well known actors star in these movies, and Infinity War brings together almost all of these people into the same film. Some of the stars include, Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Mark Ruffalo, Benedict Cumberbatch and Chris Hemsworth, just to name a few. The characters are as much of a selling point as the actors who play them, the actors and the characters have blended in with each other in the eyes of superfans of the films.

Some of the stars of the movie attend the film premiere.

A film like Infinity War stretches the true capabilities of filmmaking, with the budget and the production companies behind the film, it is truly a recipe for success. If any film represents the Hollywood system of making films, Avengers: Infinity War is the one.