I’m going to offer what’s likely an unpopular opinion on the subject of why so many adult-oriented movies have been failing at the box-office over this summer and fall, a topic covered by both The New York Times and The Hollywood Reporter in recent days: It’s because the marketing isn’t working.
Specifically, the marketing is failing to make the case that the movies in question are worth the time and money of the target audience. And in some cases, who the target audience is remains unclear in an of itself.
Most of these movies, as many people have pointed out, are falling somewhere in the middle in terms of size and scale. They’re not quite pure-play “indie” movies that are scrappy little underdogs. And they’re not Hunger Games-size blockbusters. They’re movies being made for $50 million or so and featuring some great stars who are maybe eight years past their prime box-office draw years but who still turn in great performances time and time again.
But right now that describes both a theatrical release and an eight-episode Showtime mini-series. And with the latter you don’t have to leave, you’ve already paid for it and the story is probably more engaging because it has eight hours to breathe and expand as opposed to being squeezed into just two hours.
The marketing hasn’t changed, though, since the 1980s and 90s when these kind of movies could be made for $30 million and go on to gross $120mm. The trailers are pretty much the same, the posters aren’t all that different and they’re making generally the same appeal.
It’s not that people aren’t aware of these movies. Every movie I saw over the course of the last month had trailers for Secret In Their Eyes in front of it, but I’m guessing that won’t lead to all sorts of interest in the movie. Because as much as those trailers tell you where to connect with the movie on Facebook and such, there’s almost nothing that is actually going to encourage people to do so. And once their on Facebook or on the official website, there’s little for them to do.
With very few exceptions movies increasingly need to be an event. That doesn’t necessarily mean it needs to be huge like The Avengers of Spectre or something like that. Even Spotlight would qualify as an event because it built up in the course of the marketing the sense that it was a cultural moment. That, at least in part, proved to be part of why the movie has started on a successful box-office path. But these movies that just look like decent dramas aren’t providing a strong enough point of differentiation to draw people out.
It would be interesting to see one of these kinds of movies do something drastically different with their marketing to try and overcome that. I’ve kind of been hoping one of these original releases from Netflix or Amazon would do something truly innovative since they don’t rely nearly as much on traditional theatrical success.
Until and unless the marketing for these kind of “good” movies can provide a much better incentive for people to come out – and “something to talk about with my friends” is a good reason – we’re going to continue to see more and more films at this tier underperform at the box office.
