Hey guys,
I came across this "article" or blog entry on a screenwriting blog journal I read daily. It's written by John August who is an A-list screenwriter and has wrote Go, Charlie's Angels, The Nines, Charlie and the Chocolate and more. He's constantly being hired and brought in for weeks at a time on movie's which this year include Hancock and The Eye.
Anyway, this blog entry struck me as particularly applying to genre when August discusses the inability for his film The Nines to apply to a commercial genre of "Thriller," "Comedy," "Drama," etc. In this way, the studio and producer's had to debate and figure out where the movie would be placed on DVD shelves and where it would fair best as a result. Not only that, but John August discusses how the "one-sheet" and DVD front case has to be tweaked and look particularly "thriller-ish" or "comedic" depending upon where the marketing team decided to place it.
I figured with all the genre theory we are studying, it'd be good to get an example of how genre tangibly effects movie marketing, production, and post-production today. I'll post one more specifically from Variety later in the month.
Here's a link the article/blog entry:
(Try to ignore the self-promotion aspect of the entry and look directly at the dicussion over product placement etc.)
3 comments:
This was really interesting, and it made think back to the discussion on "Donnie Darko" in the first class. It seems that playing up a film's specific genre in a marketing campaign can be a make-or-break factor in its commercial success--both theatrically, and as August explains, on DVD.
One of the first Altman readings discussed the early studio days, when marketers used to play down specific genres and play up a film's appeal as a romance and an adventure, a western etc.--to lure as many people as possible. But in this day and age of short attention spans, marketers are extremely dependent upon the two and a half minute trailer or the thirty second TV spot, where it can sometimes be difficult or jarring to show multiple tones of a film. Then there's August's discussion of how a film's box must physically be placed in a category at the video store.
I can't help but think that new technology might be a bit of a positive factor in the long run. "In-Demand" services are becoming more popular, and as one scrolls through the film choices on a cable box, he/she may notice that one title appears under multiple distinct genres. This may be the direction that home film consumption is largely headed, and it eliminates the daunting and subjugating space of the video store. Having the words "Horror, Comedy, and Sci-Fi" ALL appear next to a title is not an end-all solution, but I think there's something to be said for it.
Definitely an interesting article, especially just hearing about how important it is for the title to be highly placed on the case -- something simple, but that you wouldn't normally think about.
Reading about August's struggle to stick his film into one genre reminds me of the struggle this film had during its theatrical release. Personally, after seeing the trailer, I struggled to define the film, to for an idea as to what it was "about." Perhaps this was the same problem that many audiences faced, and maybe the DVD release, with the DVD under a broader category - the "thriller - will help this film reach a wider audience, as was the case with DONNIE DARKO and other films. This is a good example of the important role genre can play in theatrical or home-video success.
The overlapping storyline of the Nines resolves itself nicely at the end... and although Reynolds is a versatile, it was Melissa McCarthy who did a particularly great job of adding color to the whole thing.
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