My wife and I noticed something a night or two ago about the way that they are promoting the video/DVD release of the film “Erin Brocovich”.
When the film was release to theaters the film was promoted a more of a story about a woman who uses her body to advance herself in her career. (Not something that made either my wife or me terribly interested in seeing that film.)
However, for its DVD/video release its being presented as a much more serious story about a woman who fights some injustice or other in her capacity as a legal assistant. More of a John Grisham type thing.
My question is did they change the emphasis of the ads as a result of how the film did at the box office or is it because the producers believe there is a difference between people who to to see films in the theater and those who mostly rent or buy videos or DVD’s?
My remembrance is (but Cervaise can probably give you more info) that there were a lot of complaints about the way that the studio handled the Erin Brokovich marketing campaign. I know that Jeffrey Wells of Reel.com complained vociferiously about it.
The way it normally goes, AFAIK, is like this:
Studio gets ready to release move.
Ad wizard in studio marketing department thinks a movie should be marketed in a certain way.
Everyone gets turned off, as you were, about the marketing, and the movie makes no money.
Word-of-mouth gets around, and people see what the movie’s really about. Movie makes money.
Studio realized what clueless schmucks they were, does an about face on the campaign, and you see what you’re seeing now.
The problem is basically that good movies are reasonably complex. For instance, EB is a movie about some chick who uses her body to advance her career. But it’s also about the struggle of a single woman to rise above what people see in her body. And it’s a legal thriller a la John Grisham. And it’s an environmental movie. And it’s a movie about the common man overcoming big business. And it’s a based-on-a-true story thing. So a marketing person can play the campaign in lots of different ways, and sometimes they totally blow it.
Most of the time, you see an about-face, and a repromotion of the movie as what the audiences saw in it, and why people went to see it. Sometimes, unfortunately, they don’t do that, and a worthwhile movie gets tossed on the scrap heap because the studios think no one wants to see it.
I can tell you that when the movie came out in the theater, I had no interest in seeing it because neither the story, nor Julia Roberts did anything for me. But, in the interest of martimonial bliss, I let my wife drag me and it was actually a decent film.
Until you mentioned it, I hadn’t noticed the difference in advertising of the movie, but now that I think about it, you are right. I recall the gist of the theater advertising being “See Julia Roberts dress like a slut with big tits…and oh by the way…there’s a lawyer story in there somewhere”. Now the advertising is more Grisham like. My personal WAG is that Julia Roberts has been out of the limelight lately so the video release may not have a lot of pull-through business based on the fact she’s the star, hence…advertise the story.
Plus, I am personally turned off by regular movies that sell themselves on the “check out the tits” premise. If I want hot looking half-naked (or fully naked) women, I’ll rent a porno, but if I’m renting Erin Brochovich, I would hope there’s more to it than looking at Julia Roberts as a slut, so they had better do something to make it stand out in my mind when it’s sitting on the video shelf next to every other new release and direct-to-video trash film that is next to it so that I’ll consider it. Telling me the story is the way to do that.