The Hollywood Reporter

Dwayne Johnson’s ‘Skyscraper’ Sells Itself as an Action Throwback: Dwayne Johnson is back for more big-screen adventures in this week’s Skyscraper. The Legendary and Universal movie, budgeted at $129 million, casts Johnson as a wounded veteran-turned-building safety expert brought to Hong Kong to evaluate a massive new building. He and his family are there at the same time the building is targeted by a group of criminals. (more here)

Cinematic Slant

Could Shoppable Movies Be Far Off?: Given Amazon’s tendency to dominate most any market or category it enters, it’s easy to speculate along these lines a bit and see a point where it uses its retail power (in fashion on other areas) to create a system where movies are positioned as long-form showcases for other products it sells.

Eighth Grade – Marketing Recap: A24 has put together its usual very solid effort for a movie that has a lot of good word of mouth accompanying it as it finally opens for the public. The trailer and poster both present Fisher as a bright young talent who looks like she captures all the conflicting emotions of her character. Her efforts on the publicity circuit, combined with Burnham’s help to make the movie look pretty attractive, assuming the audience can find it.

All The Times Serenity Proved It Was Full of Life Lessons: It’s a movie I quote often, despite knowing few of the people I talk to have seen it, because it’s filled with more lines containing valuable life lessons than just about anything else out there. Here are just a few that hopefully make you go check it out and see what you might have missed.

Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation – Marketing Recap: OK, cool. I like it. There’s something here for all audiences and it certainly sells the same tone and vibe as the previous two efforts. I don’t know if the love story with Drac is going to be a big incentive for younger crowds, but it also likely won’t hurt things. The main value proposition the movie has to offer, it seems, is that it’s not a super hero movie and could give people a little bit of a break while still offering a familiar property for them to enjoy relatively worry free.

Disney’s 2018 Box-Office Domination: In all those cases, the studio was offering something *more* of what the audience had previously enjoyed or something wholly *unique* that they hadn’t seen before. Let’s contrast that with the marketing pitches for the top five grossing 2018 releases from the other studios.

Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far On Foot – Marketing Recap: I don’t have anything objective to point to about the campaign that doesn’t work or which shouldn’t bring in audiences who are fans of Phoenix, Van Sant and the rest of the cast. That doesn’t mean I don’t have some bones to pick, though.

Two and Out: When Directors Abandon Trilogies Before They’re Over: Because these are almost always designed to be series and not just one-off films, directors are often asked – or contractually obligated – to return for the sequel. There are quite a few instances, though, where after two installments a big-name director who attached the reputation they’d earned up to that point walks away for one reason or another, turning the reigns of the franchise over to someone else to close out or continue.

Chris Thilk is a freelance writer and content strategist who lives in the Chicago suburbs.