designing a film magazine insert

Prior to designing, writing and creating my film magazine review, I researched into existing film magazines and the kind of articles that they include.

• Empire Magazine is a British film magazine published on a monthly basis by Bauer Consumer Mediam, first published in July 1989. It is the biggest selling film magazine in Britain and is also sold in America, Australia, Turkey, Russia and Portugal. In terms of coverage and approach, Empire is very popular and takes on a more 'irreverent' and less 'serious' approachre, like Sight & Sound. Empire caters for a wide audience as it reviews not only mainstream films, but also arthouse.
• Similar to Empire, Sight & Sound is published on a monthly basis in Britain by the British Film Institute (BFI). It was initially published quarterly when it began in 1932, until the early 1990s when it merged with the Monthly Film Bulletin, another BFI publication. Sight & Sound reviews all films released during the month - both arthouse and mainstrean feature films.
• Total Film is British film magazine published by Future Publishing every four weeks, 13 times a year. Its original launch was in 1997 and offers cinema, DVD and Blu-ray news, reviews and features. 'Each month, Total Film provides a range of features, from spotlight interviews with actors and directors, to making of and on-set pieces for new and future releases. Each issue always includes the Total Film Interview, which is a six-page in-depth chat with an actor or director, along with a critique of their body of work.'

When creating my film review, I constantly kept in the back of my mind that my film was a short and so if it were to be reviewed in a magazine then it would have to be a 'special occasion'. This was why I decided to make my insert a 'Spotlight' and so it was enabling the reader to witness, read about and potentially watch a short film. Empire Magazine don't really tend to do this kind of thing so initially this cast doubt in my mind, however, Total Film really encouraged me to do it because they often provide 'spotlight interviews' :).