Starpedia

Sales Company
A company that arranges the distribution of film and television programming primarily by licensing to wholesaler distributors in local territories worldwide.

Satellite Company
A nominally independent production, distribution or other corporate entity that is predominantly funded by, and therefore, effectively under the control of a major studio or corporate family.

Satisfaction Ratings
Marquee Stars combines critical and popular responses to bellwether films into a single aggregated satisfaction rating for purposes of statistical analysis. First, a weighted-average numerical value is calculated separately for both critical and popular reaction, with slightly greater weight assigned to more influential critics or to more statistically reliable measures of popularity. The resultant values are combined into a single satisfaction rating, including: excellent, above average, average, below average and disappointing.

Science Fiction Genre
The film genre that explores the potential social impact of science. Stories feature characters in an alternate reality, often in the future, in space or in relationship with a new technology or extraterrestrial alien creatures or scientific exploration of unexpected natural phenomena; and frequently featuring cutting-edge visual effects. Stories may rely entirely on the speculative. The subject technology or natural phenomena may be fictional and fantastic provided they are underpinned by some pseudo scientific explanation. (See genre)

Seller's Market
A market condition characterized by a shortage of goods available for sale. Demand exceeds supply, thereby allowing the seller maximum leverage to dictate price and the terms of sale. The antithesis of buyer's market. (See bear market, bull market, buyer's market)

Sex Appeal
Hollywood term that refers to audience attraction owing to sexual allure or aura, especially of a specific star or stars.

Showrunner
The executive producer of a television series. (See executive producer)

Sideways Trend Or Horizontal Trend
The horizontal movement of market indicators or the actual value of a market or an asset(without a significant uptick or downtick), such as occurs when the forces of supply and demand are nearly equal. A sideways trend signals a period of consolidation, usually before the trend continues in the direction of the previous move.

Simulation
A financial planning tool that models some event, such as the cash flows from an investment project. Simulation is one technique used to assess risk.

Sleeper Hit
A film or television show that lacks pre-release buzz or critical praise, but later turns into a success usually owing to a positive word-of-mouth.

Smash Hit
A film that performs at the box office with dazzling, instant success. (See box office performance benchmarks)

Special Effects Or SFX
Cinematic illusions that simulate imagined objects or events in a story. Traditionally, special effects have included scenery effects, mechanical effects and visual effects. More recently, however, the term special effects has come to refer principally to on-set mechanical effects, and visual effects to post-production and optical effects. (See visual effects)

Spot Rate Or Spot Exchange Rate
The rate of exchange between two currencies being bought and sold for immediate (on the spot) delivery.

Straight Distribution Deal
A distribution arrangement in which a distributor or sales company finances the distribution of a motion picture for a negotiated commission, usually 25-35%, on gross revenues, plus expenses, plus a negotiated royalty on any further revenues. This deal structure works essentially the same way as the minimum guarantee deal, but without the advance payment of a minimum guarantee.

Suspense Genre
The film genre that emphasizes characters enmeshed in situations of distrust and uncertainty, usually in which anticipated dangers must be uncovered, countered, avoided, outwitted or defeated. These stories frequently follow a series of inherently exciting sequences – based on physical action, personal risk or psychological anxiety – that have been heightened by a visceral fear of a much larger pending catastrophe, often reflecting a dark or unsettling theme about society. (See genre)