Movie Marketing Watch: Obsessed
Movie Tagline
The movie’s tag line All’s Fair When Love is War effectively plays on the oft-quoted Shakespearan maxim for the purpose of the movie, which is a thriller about a deranged woman obsessed with a married lawyer at a firm starring singer Beyoncé, Ali Larter, and Idris Elba.
Movie’s Web Marketing
Wanting to capitalize on the fact that many of Beyonce’s fans are twenty-somethings and teens, Sony set up a MySpace page for the movie that features a forum where movie fans can start discussion threads about the movie, Beyonce herself.
MySpace Features
There’s also a standard MySpace comments section. The forum doesn’t have too much activity, and most of the posts were actually initiated by Sony International not fans (oh, the trouble with forums). Days before the movie’s release, the page had already garnered 3736 friends.
The Facebook page, where presumably, there’s less phantom identities, the friend count was a little higher with 4,326 fans. The movie’s Facebook wall is put to good use, with periodic annnouncements placed, beginning in late March about the movie, and about the pop star’s musical activities.
Marketing Partnerships
Sony Pictures, the studio behind the movie, chose to team up with Yahoo’s OMG, and create a Celebrity Obsession page, linked in from the Obsessed movie Facebook page, featuring a slideshow of celebrities and their obsessions.
Glam.com, one of the most highly women-perused web portals on the Internet, also has a banner on the Facebook page, which leads to a 15-question quiz for a fan to determine whether she (or he) is obsessed with Beyoncé.
Viral Video
Another site set up by Sony called Get Obsessed with Ali (http://www.getobsessedwithali.com/) gives fans the chance to become the subject of Lisa Sheridan’s (her character in the movie) displaced affections. From there movie fans can send their own viral Ali Larter video to a friend.
Movie Marketing and PR, Movie Premieres: State of Play
Russell Crowe courts the press during the premiere of State of Play.
Crowe posed with Dame Helen Mirren.
Photo Credit: Getty Images/Dave Hogan
Movie Marketing and PR Movie Premiere Photos: Hannah Montana
Miley Cyrus and Billy Ray Cyrus attended the premiere of Miley’s movie Hannah Montana.
Photo Credit: Carlos Alvarez/Getty Images
Movie Marketing and PR Notebook
DVD Rental
Nearly four years since its September 2009, Crash is still the #1 movie rental. This is news to some, but perfectly logical to others. Crash the movie has such an array of timeless and universal themes, its appeal will certainly not wane in decades to come.
Is Netflix coming to PS3 and Wii? Wouldn’t surprise me.
DVD rental stores are raising their fees, inducing a boom in DVD kiosks.
Movie Packaging
The DVD and Blu-ray release of Fox Searchlight’s Notorious Big biopic Notorious will feature previously unrelease footage.
Movie Piracy
Think about bootlegging, dear old boon docks dweller? Think again. The FBI is cracking down on DVD piracy even in the most obscure small towns.
Technology
In California, the energy-conscious state, some are concerned that the advent of flat planet television is sucking up energy resources. The television set industry begs to differ.
Doesn’t that Puppy Chow Commercial Make You Want to Grab a Marley and Me DVD?
It does, doesn’t it? How can you resist that Owen Wilson look- alike…A flash of that Owen Wilson-like bouncy bowl cut gives the absorbed and captivated viewer the illusion that it is indeed the star who’s plugging the puppy food. And the puppy is mischievous and accident prone, just like the real Marley.
An ingenious tie-in, wouldn’t you say?
Oh, and it does help too that first dog Bo was national and international news this week.
Movie Marketing and PR News: Are Movie Marketers Liars?
Don’t read their lips. Movie marketers are known to tell a fib or two.
Is it time to call an end to the stigma faced by videogames-turned-movies?
Suddenly everything Jesus is new again. How many of these top Jesus films have you seen?
The Wolverine’s game has an M-rating…could this be sales suicide?
Movie Marketing and PR: Movie Premiere Pictures—Star Trek in New Zealand
From left to right, Karl Urban, Zachary Quinto, Chris Pine and John Cho pose for a group photo at the New Zealand premiere of the Star Trek movie.
Photo: Sandra Mu/Getty Images AsiaPac
Movie Marketing and PR Notebook: Blockbuster Money Troubles? + French Movie Audiences + University Students Screen Porn + and More
Movie Rental News
Is Blockbuster experiencing money troubles? According to the Wall Street Journal, the movie rental retail chain’s auditing firm PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP evaluation expressed some concern about its financial situation:
“Blockbuster’s financial situation raises “substantial doubt about the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern” or viable business. The company had warned investors last month that auditors were likely to raise those concerns.”
Observers like the NY Daily News, are predicting the demise of Blockbuster, while others are asserting that there is cause for alarm, but are no doubt waiting on further developments.
In a financial crunch environment where every industry—including the movie indsutry—is experiencing financial hardships, maybe there’s hope that Blockbuster will pull through.
International Movie Marketing
International films are gaining a streaming edge on the Internet. A string of Korean short films are now available on Rapid Share.
And if you’re talking movie marketing and PR, do think of one Edison Chen, please. Mr. Chen, a major movie star in Hong Kong was involved in a sexual scandal…or merely an awkward candid photo moment in a string of photos that leaked on the Internet (according to U.S. standards).
The actor ignored death threats from moral purists to get on the promotion trail for his latest movie The Sniper. Now that’s some really zealous movie marketing fervor.
French movie audiences are not apt to go watch a musical, according to a major French film director Christophe Barratier who tells the Boston Globe,
“French people are nervous about musicals. They say, ‘Oh no, will there be singing?’ ” He points out that Baz Luhrmann’s “Moulin Rouge,” while being something of a worldwide phenomenon in 2001, wasn’t a big deal in France. And “Les Miz?” Un flop.
So why is he slapping them with the movie Paris 36?
Movie Business
Peter Bart, the longtime editorial helmer for trade paper Variety, has stepped down.
Veteran movie publicist William McLeod passed away at 50. During his lifetime McLeod orchestrated many successful publicity campaigns for Terry Hines and Associates, Strand Releasing, before starting his own firm. Condolences to his family.
Marketing Movies, Collegiate Style
While some studios are having meetings about how to develop a sure-fire plan to consistently grab college students’ attention, certain developments in collegiate movie screening land would lead one to note that the best method is to have some sexy content and let the students come to you. University of Maryland students screened a pornographic flick on campus in spite of warnings from campus censorship administrators. The UM students are claiming that they’re screening the porn flick not for their viewing pleasure but for the gratification of first amendment rights.
Movie Marketing and Publicity
So is that X Men Origins: Wolverine full movie 100,000 illegal downloads going to be detrimental to the movie’s scheduled May release? Probably not if you give credence to Mark Colvin’s post about the leak doing more good than harm.
So the cult classic Toxic Avenger is getting new life on Broadway.
Cable
Will cable become a relic of the past in years to come?
Still Credit: AMP
Movie Marketing and PR Watch: X-Men Origins: Wolverine Leak
Online Movie Marketing/Piracy
The X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie leaked online last week to measured jubilation in some circles and to dismay in others and Twentieth Century Fox is not playing with the parties involved wittingly or unwittingly, or remotely.
Roger Friedman, a seasoned journalist for the Fox News online website has parted ways with the company where he worked for a decade for posting a review of the leaked movie online. Friedman wasn’t responsible for the movie’s leaking online but by actually writing a review of the illegally-leaked (and writing a rather endorsing review), he didn’t endear himself to the irate Twentieth Century Fox. According to a statement issued by his now-former employees at Fox News,
“…Friedman’s behaviour was “reprehensible” and that it “condemned this act categorically”.
Meanwhile, the FBI is on the case. According to CNET’s Greg Sandoval, tracking down the perpetrator(s) will be elementary, my dear:
“Studios embed identification marks on prints and film copies and that’s how authorities tracked down Kerry Gonzalez. He was the New Jersey man who uploaded the superhero film Hulk to the Web weeks before its 2003 theatrical release.”
Like everyone else, Sandoval asks whether the movie’s illegal dowloading will actually have an effect on its box office performance. He points out the tremendous box office success of Michael Moore’s movie Fahrenheit 9/11, which as opposed to suffering on its opening weekend, pulled in $119.1 million dollars, nearly half of the money brought in by the biggest theatrical movie from that year The Passion of Christ, a few years ago.
What needs to be taken into account though, is that Fahrenheit 9/11’s base audience (college to middle-age, politically conscious) was surely not the same as the ones for X-Men Origins Wolverine (young, estrogen-powered 18-39 males (not to say politically unsconscious)). The audience for X-Men Origins are mostly web-savvy, who will more likely than not already have been exposed to the online leak. Plus the leak occured nearly five years ago, and illegal movie downloading has grown more sophisticated.
Movie Marketing and PR: Movie Premiere Photos
Anne Hathaway and the designer Valentino were present at the premiere of Valentino: The Last Emperor.
Dwayne Johnson, the actor formerly known as The Rock, was in Germany at the Berlin premiere of Race to Witch Mountain.
Speaking of action film actors, Jackie Chan was in Malaysia treating fans there with a promotional appearance for his movie Shinjuku Incident.
Zac Efron attended the London premiere of 17 Again at the Odeon.
Photo Credit: Lai Seng Sin, Cattermole, Jason Merritt/Getty and AP