The Summer of 2050 at the Cinema

Picture it. The summer of 2050 at the cinema. The studios probably already are. They've already got their sure thing tent poles already picked out and ready to grab the masses, pulling in ridiculous profits. Their market research has led to more 'sure things' than ever before.

Marvel Phase 14 is well under way with Avengers 14 out next summer. Star Wars Origins have seen spin offs of every major character in the original Star Wars trilogy from birth to puberty to retirement and episode 16 is due any day now. Spiderman is on his sixth reboot, Fast and Furious 50 promises to be a landmark in the franchise and vampire and zombie movies are still selling well.

J.J. Abrams and his two offspring will of course be directing most of these with Christopher Nolan producing from his death bed. Elderly stars like Tom Cruise and their increasingly important stunt doubles are mo-capping for digitally rendered versions of their younger, prettier selves and still making the studios a mint.

The summer schedules are filled with blockbusters and the trailers are now six minutes long and feature excerpts from every major set piece expertly edited together with juicy sound bites of increasingly ridiculous and repetitive dialogue. 

The cinemas all have bouncers who patrol the aisles with night vision goggles, looking for pirates at work. They watch you endlessly as you try to watch the film, trying even harder not to notice them. There are now nearly 10 minutes of messages warning you not to pirate movies or you will kill cinema.

The average length of a film is now just shy of 3 hours and cinemas have gotten wise, having an interval in most and sending staff in to sell you food and drink, scratch cards, merchandise...you name it. The second half is usually filled with kids waving light sabers excitedly in the air. Many people take the option of a three course meal for the duration of the film and wear bibs due to the difficulties of eating in the darkened cinema.

The norm will be to tweet, text and Facebook your friends during a film (even if they are in the seat next to you). Thankfully most phone batteries don't last as long as a film anymore, so by the second half most have died and all those bright white lights have disappeared (to be replaced by kids with replica plastic lightsabers).

Franchises rule, originality is dead, but at least audiences still love the movies. 

More moaning at I Love That Film:

The Cinema Experience

Is modern marketing ruining the movie experience?

The Many Methods of Movie Marketing: Part 3 Merchandise

This is the third part of my many posts on the different methods of movie marketing, this one covering merchandise. This is mainly for my film students who are looking at the relationship between film producers and audiences. First we looked at how producers get information from audiences and now we move on to how producers give information to audiences. You can find part one on posters and trailers here. Part 2 on TV, radio and print media advertising and using the internet and viral marketing is here.

 

Merchandising is another useful way to market a movie and has become increasingly important since the days of films like Star Wars and Jaws. Not only can merchandise help to spread the word about a movie, but it also can make the studio a lot of money. The audience are basically paying to help market the movie. Merchandising means putting an image or logo from the film on a range of products and selling them to the public. Merchandise can range from t-shirts, toys, lunchboxes and duvet covers to collectible items such as replica weapons and props from films. 

Blockbusters and high concept films that can be sold on the strength of a single image can be particularly beneficial for selling merchandise as the image or logo is easy to recognise and gives the film brand recognition. Spiderman, Batman, Jurassic Park and Jaws all have distinctive, easy to reproduce and recognisable logos or posters which can be put on any products the studio wishes to sell. Transformers was a toy range before becoming a film but now with the film versions begin released, Hasbro can make more toys that tie in with the films. George Lucas, the writer and director of Star Wars kept ownership of the licensing and merchandising rights  (which the studio did not realise could be so profitable) and made a fortune from selling Star Wars toys, collectibles and games based on the franchise.

Merchandise is often, but not always, aimed at children so family movies can often have a larger and more successful range. Disney, Pixar and Marvel will make huge amounts of money from selling toys of the characters and a huge range of products with images from the films on them. The idea is that once a child sees the movie, they will want a souvenir and then fortunately for the studio, that piece of merchandise will advertise the film to more children.