We all have our troubles to overcome in life. Some people might be incredibly shy and have problems interacting with others. Some people might have some crippling emotional issues that impact everything they do. We all have some sort of hurdle to clear before we can work and play well with others.

Me? Being incredibly handsome haunts me every day.

Britain’s King George VI had more than that which he needed to work on and it’s that story that’s told in The King’s Speech. As the country he (Colin Firth) governed moved more and more quickly toward World War II he found himself needing to address his citizens over the radio. But the man suffered from a terrible stutter when speaking in public that wasn’t going to help inspire confidence in anyone. So his wife Queen Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter) helped him seek out the help of a specialist to help him get around that problem and found Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush). The relationship between the king and his therapist provides the driving force for the movie as Logue helps the king help his country through that traumatic period.

The Posters

The movie’s poster is a nice one even if it is pretty basic. Firth, Rush and Bonham-Carter all are there in big-non-floating head form, with Firth looking grim and serious while Bonham-Carter has a more entertained look on her face and Rush looks more than a little mischievous. The copy lays out most of their roles in the movie by declaring “When God couldn’t save the King, The Queen turned to someone who could.” That’s a nice little play on the popular British anthem and, while just a little bit offensive, is also a nice enough turn of a phrase that it doesn’t really matter. The overall design, though, particularly the look of the actor’s faces, has rightly been much-derided as being the worst kind of BFH syndrome.

While the poster makes it clear this is based on an “incredible” true story it oddly doesn’t include any of the endorsements the movie has racked up to date, either in the form of showing off its festival appearance badges or by using some of the press quotes that have praised the movie based on those screenings. Not sure if that’s because they were deemed not important or if the marketers are going for a more mainstream audience and so are wary of all that critical acclaim turning off the general public. It’s not likely, though, that that general public is going to rush to a British historical drama in the first place, so the absence of those achievements remains puzzling.

The Trailers

The first trailer released for the movie begins by setting the stage for the drama, with Bonham-Carter seeking help for her husband, the king. We then get a bunch of funny scenes with Firth getting to know Rush and trying to get over his stammering through various lessons and tricks. But then the tone shifts from comedy to drama as we see the stakes – World War II – and see what it is that King George is trying to accomplish not only for himself but for his country.

The trailer certainly shows off the performances of Firth and Rush and they seem formidable here. It’s well put together and will certainly appeal to audiences who enjoy period dramas such as this. It’s not incredibly inventive but it hits all the right notes and certainly exposes the film in a positive way to an audience that’s been primed to some extent by the positive word of mouth that came before it, which I’ll go into more below.

Online

The movie’s official website is pretty sparse. The trailer plays when the site loads and there’s an “About” section that has a synopsis of the film’s story.

The film didn’t have its own Facebook or Twitter profiles, instead being promoted through the studio’s pages and feeds. Those had plenty of updates about the movie including the usual notes about the movie’s marketing and publicity.

Advertising and Cross-Promotions

There may have been some online advertising done that used the poster’s key art but that’s about it.

Media and Publicity

Word of mouth buzz for the movie really came out strong after its debut at the 2010 Telluride Film Festival. There it racked up some serious positive press not only for the movie as a whole but also for Firth’s performance as the man who would be king. It became an almost immediate awards contender (Los Angeles Times, 9/11/10) and was even labeled (Hollywood Reporter, 9/13/10) as the movie that might bring The Weinstein Co. back to the glory the brothers enjoyed during the heyday of Miramax.

Still, it was Firth who was singled (Reuters, 9/11/10) out (New York Times, 9/12/10) most often, though the actor played down (THR, 9/12/10) the early speculation that he would wind up an awards front-runner. The first of those was the Audience Award at Toronto.

More intriguing was the story behind the creation of the film and its source stage play, as it turns out the writer suffered from a stammer himself (Los Angeles Times, 10/31/10) and is of British birth, having lived through some of World War II there and hearing for himself what King George IV sounded like after he’d already made progress with his own impediment. So the project is very personal for him.

There were also those stories that pointed out just how perfect the movie seems to be for awards consideration (Time, 11/29/10) with its combination of a British historic setting, a physical impediment to overcome and other factors all going for it.

Overall

The reality of this campaign seems to be that the word-of-mouth that’s been generated in the press, particularly that coming out of the festival appearances, is going to be the make-or-break factor in determining the movie’s success, both at the box-office and in terms of eventual awards. The other marketing materials have served to keep those conversations going but my sense is here that those assets are going to have minimal impact, particularly since I’m assuming the movie won’t get a release (at least not at first) that will bring it to a general audience.

Those marketing materials are alright – the trailer is the strongest component for a number of reasons – but are unlikely to actually bring in any new converts who aren’t already fans of period British films that have more character development and wordplay than broad physical humor. Basically, though, every bit of energy TWC hasn’t put in to fostering and encouraging word of mouth has been mis-directed.

PICKING UP THE SPARE

  • 12/06/10: A second and much better poster was released less than a week after the film was released that simply featured a close up of Firth’s mouth coming up to the microphone.
  • 02/17/11: The movie continues to garner positive word-of-mouth as it expands into more and more theaters in Middle America.
  • 03/31/11: The poster for the edited and newly PG-13 rated version of the film is all sorts of awful as it tries to shoehorn a demographic into the audience that doesn’t really belong there. More to the point, the movie will likely attract a family audience already even without this pandering so this winds up being just a horrible example of marketing to the lowest common denominator.