There is a very good indepth article about movie marketing in the New Yorker here that also provides an interesting insight into the minds & behaviour of Hollywood studios… heres a few excerpts:
“It is often said in Hollywood that no one sets out to make a bad movie, but the truth is that people cheerfully set out to make bad movies all the time. It is more accurate to say that no one sets out to make a movie without having a particular audience in mind. Many studio executives argue that films can’t objectively be categorized as “good” or “bad”: either they appeal to a given demographic — and make the studio at least a ten-per-cent profit — or they don’t”
And this classic: “Publicity is selling what you have: the film’s stars and sometimes its director. Marketing, very often, is selling what you don’t have; it’s the art of the tease.”
In recent history the most obvious example of stealth marketing was when the film Crash won an Oscar for best film in 2006. How did a small film win against so many big budget, massively promoted films? It certainly had to be a good film to be a contender, but it turns out Lionsgate “the studio behind Crash, the surprise best picture winner at Sunday night’s Oscar ceremony, spent a total of $4m promoting the film ahead of the ceremony with a targeted campaign to woo academy members. The film itself only cost $6.5m to make.”
Amazing huh? Imagine spending three quarters of the total budget of any project just to promote it for an award… But I guess the thing with that award is that its one of the best marketing devices you can have – for the film & for the people who made it.
