the list of 9 for april 13, 2005:
NINE TACKY FILM MARKETING TRENDS
Marketing. We all know it's what really makes a hit. If a bad movie succeeds, thank the studio'smarketing department for hyping it well. If a good movie fails, blame said studio for marketing itpoorly. Most people reading this already know about the surprise that was pulled on my filmClaustrophobia, when Lions Gate decided the title Serial Slayer - along with acheesy cover photo that had little relation to the film itself - would be an easier "sell" totheir target audience, much to the disappointment of yours truly. But in the end, it's just asimple reminder that marketers have one goal in mind: Play to the lowest commondenominator. Below is a list of some of the lamest ideas that studios - and even independentfilmmakers - have glommed onto recently, in valiant attempts to shift as many units of theirproduct as possible.

  1. THE "T2" PHENOMENON. When Terminator 2 wasreleased, somebody got the bright idea to officially nickname it T2, apparently fearingthat few Americans would be able to pronounce "Terminator" when buying a ticket. It caught on, sosoon Mission: Impossible 2 became M:i-2, Men In Black 2 became MIB2,and so forth. At the nadir of this fad, Fox came up with the inexplicable ID4 for theirIndependence Day. I guess the "4" came from July 4th... but please.

  2. "ONLY IN THEATERS." I believe this started when theX-Files movie was released. Fox felt they had to inform audiences that this is notsomething they should be looking for on television. Fair enough, as it's somewhat unusual to makea movie out of a TV show while the show is still airing. But now it's become standard practice tomarket theatrical features with this reminder. And you know it's because nervous studioheads want to make sure they have their asses covered, because, after all, those moviegoers areD-U-M-B.

  3. DON'T LOOK INTO THE CAMERA, LADY. I first noticed thiswhen A Few Good Men was released. On the poster there was Tom Cruise, looking sternly intothe camera. There was Jack Nicholson, looking sternly into the camera. And there was Demi Moore,looking sternly off into outer space. I soon saw it on posters everywhere: The male lead isstaring right at you, while the female lead is either coyly looking off to the side or at hercostar, lovingly. Is this due to insecure actresses preferring their more demure poses whenapproving their publicity photos? Or insecure studios fearing that audiences would get turned offby in-your-face women? Though apparently it's okay for chick flick stars to face forward, thetrend persists in action films and dramas. I leave this matter for a women's studies major toinvestigate.

  4. "FAST-FORWARDING" IN TRAILERS. Inspired no doubt by couchpotatoes who skip through the boring parts of movies with their remotes, it's been hip for awhile to artificially speed through numerous shots in movie trailers, making the advertisedfeature look zippier than it actually is. (P.S. Would you be surprised to learn that the average studiotrailer costs more to produce than most independent features?)

  5. RELEASING A "SPECIAL EDITION" DVD - WHEN IT'S THE ONLYEDITION. This is such an old-fashioned marketing ploy that it's almost cute. But notwhen self-distributing indie filmmakers label their homemade DVDs with this pretentious claim.

  6. "MAKING OF" DOCS THAT ARE LONGER THAN THE FILMS THEMELVES.As the DVD market has grown so big, it's become common for producers to include documentarians ontheir film crews, in order to create a "making of" featurette to include on the main film's DVDrelease. But these days, no-name indies are doing it too, unaware that nobody really wantsto see how their little movie was put together. (For the record, we had a guy do this forClaustrophobia but I couldn't bring myself to edit together the footage for the DVD.) Ifthat weren't bad enough, I've actually seen "making of" docs attached to short films - and yes,the docs are usually longer than the shorts themselves! Those filmmakers need to get over themselves.

  7. CLASSIC BOOKS REPRINTED WITH ACTORS ON THE COVER. This haslong been a pet peeve of mine: When a film adaptation of a classic or popular novel is released,the book is reprinted with, essentially, the movie poster on the cover. Who buys thesethings? I mean, would you proudly display on your bookshelf a copy of Isaac Asimov's I,Robot with Will Smith on the cover?

  8. MUSIC VIDEOS WITH FILM CLIPS. This has been around sincenearly the dawn of MTV: Some band records a song that is used in a major motion picture. A videois made of that song. That video invariably consists of footage of the band in performance,awkwardly interspersed with clips from the film. I suppose there's nothing wrong with this, butit's pretty cheeseball.

  9. I'LL KICK YOUR - ! How many movie trailers have you seenthat try to get a cheap laugh by cutting to a clip of a (usually African American) charactersaying "I'm gonna kick your -" only to cut away to another shot (usually another character actingsilly) before the "ass" comes out. Does anybody find this funny? Anybody?

Copyright © Mark Tapio Kines 2011