The This Is it Movie Bonanza
This is It, the musical documentary chronicling Michael Jackson’s last tour will be in theatres in about a month, and popular opinion backed with substantial facts, seems to point to the fact that the Kenny Ortega-directed movie is going to be doing gangbusters.
Fan anticipation is at mild-fever pitch, sparked by the MTV VMA’s teaser trailer, and this video below which shows a segment from the movie, of Jackson, introducing a new dance, The Penguin.
Media outlets reported that tickets for the movie (which will be on a limited run, but which may possibly be extended) went beyond expectations, and has, as anticipated by many observers, broken sales records:
Among the cities with the strongest sales are Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston and New York. Records were also set in Japan, where more than $1 million in tickets were sold on the first day they were available. In London, fans bought more than 30,000 tickets on the first day, eclipsing the advance interest in the “Harry Potter” and “The Lord of the Rings” films, which were wildly popular in Britain. Record sales were also reported in Holland, Sweden, Belgium and New Zealand.
The poster is certainly eye-catching, with visual vignettes of Jackson at different stages of his career, encircled in one giant Michael.
The Los Angeles Time’s Pop and Hiss entertainment column reported that Sony, Jackson’s record label will be releasing a 2-disc CD of the same title in stores, starting Oct 26th on the international front, and in the United States and the rest of the Americas the following day.
MTV has confirmed that the single “This Is It” is going to be released on October 12.
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The Hollywood Reporter Ad That Got a Movie Marketing Company in Trouble
The Daniel Cobb-helmed Axiom Entertainment, a Michigan-based movie production and marketing company thought it would be novel to tout the state’s filmmaking incentive virtues in a creative manner.
So, they placed the ad above in a recent issue of The Hollywood Reporter displaying a Walk of Fame Star with the state of Michigan as the star in question.
The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce wasn’t amused, however, and slapped the prodco with a cease and desist letter. The Detroit Free Press reports:
Cobb, though, says the real motive was jealousy over Michigan’s lucrative film incentives, which are worth up to 42% of a film’s eligible production costs to filmmakers who shoot their films in the state.
Cobb has since turned to another Hollywood landmark, the Hollywood sign, and is planning on putting a new ad out based on the legendary sign, only it spells Michigan.
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