Monthly Archives: December 2004

Quick Takes: 12/23/04

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Bewitched
Just to make sure no marketing opportunity is left unexplored, Sony appears ready to release the first two seasons of Bewitched just in time to tie in to the movie.

Cinderella Man
The official site now has a trailer (or at least the link to a trailer). I’m sure there is some sort of financial arrangement behind the video being on AOL Moviefone’s site and not the actual sites.

Miss Congeniality 2
Watch the trailer and try to decide for yourself whether:
1) This is a sign of the end-times
2) William Shatner has his own gravitational pull
3) Deidrich Bader is pining for a Drew Carey Show reunion special
4) All of the above

Constantine
JoBlo provides the link to a new international trailer.

Elektra
Various sites provide links to the new trailer and posters, both of which seem much cooler than the teaser versions. Note how all the promotional materials tie this to the team that brought us X-Men and don’t mention Daredevil.

Longest Yard
Adam Sandler destroys whatever goodwill he built up with Punch-Drunk Love and Spanglish in another dopey comedy. This doesn’t look quite as bad as Happy Gilmore, but not by much.

Pink Panther
MTV has the trailer, which doesn’t look as bad as I had feared.

Sahara
First trailer is up at Yahoo! On the down side, it doesn’t look like another Indiana Jones, but on the upside it also doesn’t look another National Treasure. This is due mostly to the presence of Steve Zahn and William H. Macy.

The New World
The official site has launched, complete with a trailer that is wonderfully stirring. Looks like Terrence Mallick has created another moving tone-poem of a movie.

Sin City
Moviefone has a new trailer and some posters up for viewing. This may move up on my “too-see” list as more material comes out.

Misc. Items

JoBlo has an excellent catch-all of new posters and trailers.

Rumors are running around about Joss Whedon taking on writing and directing duties for Wonder Woman.

Jeff Wells posted this the other day:

Notice to marketing guys and trailer editors: if you cut together 50 or 60 snips
from a film and shoot them out machine-gun style, like 90% of the trailers do
these days, you can make a film seem interesting or sexy or whatever. Except
this trick has used so often it’s not interesting any more. To me, rapid-fire
machine-gun cuts in trailers are a coded message that says, “Watch out, this
film may have something to hide.

See you all in January!

Movie Marketing Madness: 2004 Wrap-Up

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You can read my wrap up of the major movie marketing campaigns of 2004 at FilmThreat.

As we approach the end of the year, I thought I would jump on the bandwagon of those doing year end pieces. It’s a lazy writer’s tool, but at heart I too am a lazy writer. So I picked eight of my columns and decided to see how what I predicted compared to what the critical and box office receptions were.

Quick Takes: 12/17/04

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Elektra
Various outlets have posted a new super-sized version of the new poster.

XXX: State of the Union
An incredibly lame trailer is now online at the official site.

Hostage
FilmForce has a teaser trailer available for this new Bruce Willis flick.

Weatherman
The site for this new Nicholas Cage/Michael Caine comedy (?) is now active but doesn’t contain much.

The Ring Two
More good stuff from IGN’s FimForce as they have the new teaser poster for Ring Two.

War of the Worlds
Here’s a look at the second teaser poster for the Spielberg-helmed sci-fi remake. Does this remind anyone else of Monty Python’s Life of Brian’s poster?

TV networks and movie marketing

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I wanted to make special notice of this article by Joe Mandese at MediaPost.com.

Mr. Mandese researches how much “A” network time is given to movie marketing and what, if any, correlation exists between a movie studio and TV network who share corporate parents. It’s a wonderful read and I hope you all check it out.

Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events – Marketing Recap

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You can read my full recap of the marketing campaign for Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events at FilmThreat.

Carrey is arguably one of the biggest stars in the current age of cinema so the campaign for “Lemony Snicket” would be wise to put him upfront in any and all materials. To not do so would leave the strength of the books to fall back on. Considering the informal poll I took in my office showed people were aware of the books, but had no idea what they were about showed just how weak this approach would be and I don’t expect Carrey’s face to be off-screen for more than a couple seconds at a time.

View from the Rental Counter: 12/11/04

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Pick of the Week
Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Extended Edition)
Market: Folks, this is as close as we’re going to get to a full-scale epic in the digital age. There’s a reason for all the CGI in these movies: The story couldn’t be told any other way. Peter Jackson has strewn these movies with not only a wonderful and emotionally fulfilling plot (coming to a finish here) but with so many tiny grace notes that the movies bear up to as many repeated viewings as you can put them through. Everyone should enjoy this one and I’m looking forward to the 50 minutes of additional footage.

Mainstream
Collateral
MPAA: R (language and situations)
Budget: $65M
Gross: $100M
Market: Film lovers. Those people who pine not for the fjords but for more movies like Heat and Last of the Mohicans (both by Collateral director Michael Mann) and their stylized violence. Mann never accidentally points his camera anywhere. Each shot is always purposeful and meaningful.

I Robot
MPAA: PG-13 (violence and partial nudity)
Budget: $105M
Gross: $144M
Market: This is this week’s popcorn flick. Based on the marketing and reviews of this movie it’s not very heavy on the brain and is almost completely illogical. A good choice if you want to have movie on while you’re writing Christmas cards.

Mary Poppins
Market: Those of you who (like me) long for the days when Disney made sugary sweet movies but at least wasn’t actively pandering to the entire population like they are now. This 40th Anniversary release isn’t so much to present the movie in a new way but to look nice next to…

Princess Diaries 2 – Royal Engagement
MPAA: G
Budget: $40M
Gross: $95M
Market: Teenage girls and their parents who are looking to placate them. This rides the same wave the original started and which then spawned the Freaky Friday remake and such.

Meet the Parents: Special Edition
Market: Is anyone (aside from his accountant) really enjoying this phase of Robert DeNiro’s career? I can see the occasional dabble in comedy but when he said “yes” to Rocky and Bullwinkle then it was time for Scorsese to give him a call. Then again they both were in Shark Tale, so that may not have been the right person to talk DeNiro off the ledge. Anyway, this “Special Edition” is timed to tie into the theatrical release of Meet the Fockers.

Off the Beaten Path
Door in the Floor
MPAA: R (sexuality and language)
Budget: N/A
Gross: $3.8M
Market: Jeff Bridges hasn’t achieved nearly the kind of success or stardom that his acting ability warrants. If you enjoy Bridges, LA Confidential-era Kim Basinger or just emotional dramas as a genre then this may be worth a rent. I know I will be.

We Don’t Live Here Anymore
MPAA: R (language and sexual content)
Budget: $3M
Gross: $2M
Market: I haven’t been able to catch Six Feet Under but enormously enjoyed Peter Krause on Sports Night. This movie seems like it would appeal to anyone who also enjoys Neil LaBute’s or David Mamet’s movies.

Television & Box Sets
Ben Stiller Collection
Just a boxing of four of Stiller’s movies by Universal.

Family Guy – Freakin’ Sweet Collection
This collection contains the unedited versions of some episodes which wound up being cut on the full-season sets. Also is billed as creator Seth McFarlane’s “favorites”. Basically it’s a new package to put out now that the seasons are done.

Newlyweds: Nick & Jessica – Complete 1st Season
Take one blonde who realized she could make a lot of money playing brain-dead. Add one guy who is going to ride that train as long as he can until someone more famous comes along. Mix together in front of MTV’s cameras. Result is an inexplicable cultural phenomenon.

Quantum Leap: Complete 2nd Season
Great show while it was still great, before there started to be weird supernatural overtones to the whole leaping thing.

Rocky Anthology
The second attempt by MGM to package the Rocky series. This one, I believe does include anamorphic transfers on all five movies, unlike the previous release.

Quick Takes: 12/10/04

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Batman Begins
The title of this post refers to the teaser poster now available for viewing at the above-linked official site. I shorted out three keyboards drooling over this one. I then went through two more over this international version.

Mr. & Mrs. Smith
JoBlo has two new posters for this Angelina Jolie/Brad Pitt caper.

Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events
The product tie-ins continue as Papa John’s Pizza announces it will deliver a demo CD-ROM with movie content with order of a special pizza.

Constantine
MTV has an exclusive trailer which runs slightly longer than the official one on their site. Both look, well, lame.

Assault on Precinct 13
JoBlo obtained the perfectly awful poster for this remake.

War of the Worlds
The official site has a teaser trailer on it now. I can’t comment since I don’t have QuickTime installed on this PC. Why only one version?

Son of the Mask
This one is just now flying onto my radar. If you want to see what might be the worst film idea of the year, surf on over as the website is filling up with content.

Be Cool
Yahoo! has a teaser trailer for the Get Shorty sequel. It’s not bad, but what’s obviously lacking is Barry Sonnenfeld’s sense of humor. How come no one is making more of the fact that this reunites Travolta, Thurman and Keitel from Pulp Fiction?

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Yahoo! also has the first teaser for this one. It looks like Tim Burton has his fastball back after the almost career-destroying Planet of the Apes and then the minor-league rehab-stint that was Big Fish.

Fantastic Four
There’s a great group shot of the team on SuperHeroHype!. Also, word is Disney has moved its Chicken Little release away from FF’s.

Elektra
The official site of the movie’s soundtrack has opened up.

Ocean’s Twelve – Marketing Recap

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You can read my full recap of the marketing campaign for Ocean’s Twelve at Film Threat.

I just recently watched the first installment, having never seen it before but figuring I should before diving into the campaign for its sequel. “Eleven” is a fast-paced quick witted movie with a loose, jazzy feel that, quite frankly, felt like a breath of fresh air to me. The second picks up the story of Danny Ocean and his band of merry men and reunites them after Andy Garcia’s Teri Benedict (who was the casino head they robbed) finds out who it was that got his money.

Quick Takes: 12/03/04

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Fantastic Four
The official site has launched (click link above) but to date contains no actual FF material. According to IGN, the first teaser trailer should be attached to Elektra, another Fox/Marvel collaboration.

Bewitched
The site now contains a brief teaser trailer.

War of the Worlds
The second collaboration between Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise now has a teaser site with a great image.

King Kong
The Peter Jackson helmed remake provided Newsweek a production sketch of the big monkey.

The Aviator
CNN has sold itself out by teaming with Miramax to provide historical (read: promotional) information on the real Howard Hughes. Can’t tell you how many notches down this takes my respect for CNN.

Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events
A cameo by the AFLEC duck? What the…?

Million Dollar Baby
Surf over to JoBlo.com for the trailer for the movie Jeffrey Wells calls a “knockout punch” to all other Oscar contenders.

Closer – Marketing Recap

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You can read my full recap of the marketing for Closer at Film Threat.

The central theme presented in all the marketing materials for this new Mike Nichols movie is one of love, lust, intimacy and the quest for understanding as well as the consequences that result from each goal.