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.In practice, however, the actual effects of synergy inHollywood are quite limited, and the images of stars, although valuable,fail to fully stabilise the demand for films and other related goods.Case Study: Sony, Schwarzenegger and The Last Action HeroThe Last Action Hero (1993) occupies an infamous place in recentHollywood history.On paper, the project appeared a certain hit,employing Arnold Schwarzenegger, one the most popular stars of theperiod, in a role tailor-made to foreground his star image.The project wasdeveloped through Columbia Pictures, the feature film production divisionof the Sony Corporation.Since buying into the film industry four yearspreviously, Sony had struggled to secure major box office success.Development, production and marketing costs on The Last Action Herowere allowed to spiral as Columbia confidently predicted the projectwould give Sony a hit to equal any produced by the competing mediaconglomerates.When, in 1993, the film spectacularly failed at the summerbox office, The Last Action Hero raised many questions about the powerand value of the star in the era of conglomeration.Sony's purchase of Columbia Pictures in 1989 was motivated by adesire to secure 'software' to feed developments in the company's mainbusiness segment, electronics manufacturing.In 1974, the companyannounced the launch of the first video cassette recorder (VCR) for thedomestic market.Using the Beta format, the Betamax system saw Sonylead the way in home video entertainment.Two years later, however, JVC,a subsidiary of the Japanese electronics manufacturer Matsushita,launched a rival video recorder using the incompatible VHS format.JVChad struck several deals with the Hollywood studios to release films onTHE STAR SYSTEMVHS for rental and retail.This move proved the deciding factor in the VCRwars, for as sales of VHS quickly surpassed Betamax, Sony learned thatcontrol of software was essential to driving the introduction of newhardware innovations.The purchase of CBS Records in 1988 and Columbiaand TriStar Pictures the following year were therefore direct moves on thepart of Sony to acquire the interests that would give the company a shareof the global markets for music and filmed entertainment.Electronicsremained Sony's main area of business but the company gradually grewas a diversified media conglomerate.Originally a star of the international bodybuilding circuit, voted MrUniverse five times and Mr Olympic seven times, Arnold Schwarzenegger'sfilm career began as a cast member in the comedy Hercules Goes Bananas,later retitled Hercules in New York (1969).After the documentary PumpingIron (1976) provided a showcase for his bodybuilding talents, his first starappearance came with the title role in Conan the Barbarian (1981).In 1984Schwarzenegger began to break through as a film star, appearing in thesecond Conan film, Conan the Destroyer (1984), and his most notableperformance as the cyborg in Terminator (1984).These films establishedSchwarzenegger's action hero status.Through the second half of the1980s, Schwarzenegger appeared as the hero in a string of the key actionfilms of the period, including Red Sonja (1985), Commando (1985), RawDeal (1986), The Running Man (1987), Predator (1987), Red Heat (1988),and Total Recall (1990).Although other stars, such as Sylvester Stalloneand Bruce Willis, were also well known for their action performances,Schwarzenegger had a more consistent record at the box office.Alongside Schwarzenegger's action hero roles, the star had also begunto appear in comedies.Twins (1988) and Kindergarten Cop (1990) bothcreated humour by playing on Schwarzenegger's over-sized body andplacing him in situations that were antithetical to the adrenaline-rusheddynamics of action cinema.These comedies worked to soften the star'simage.Comedy was also a component of Schwarzenegger's action heroimage [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]