> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1999 01:33:57 EST
> From: Mac Hume <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: SF-LIT Digest - 10 Nov 1999 to 11 Nov 1999
>
> In a message dated 11/12/99 4:14:37 AM Pacific Standard Time,
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> << Speaking of marketing, TSS would have been much more
> effective if you
> didn't
> see the preview. The kid's secret isn't revealed half way
> through the film,
> and shouldn't have been in the trailer. It doesn't ruin the
> film in any way,
> but like many films, the trailer gave away more than it had to. >>
>
> I have to disagree. It would have been incredible to
> have seen the movie
> without knowing about the supernatural element of the plot from the
> begininng, but then, if I hadn't known about it, I wouldn't
> have seen the
> movie. If the movie had been promoted as a straight drama,
> apparently of the
> "sick kid teaches adults how to love" genre (Bruce Willis,
> cute sick kid,
> single mom sounds toxic to me.)
Sounds toxic to me too.
two things would probably
> have happened: a)
> they would have missed most their target audience
> (sf/fantasy/horror fans,
> i.e. us) and b) the audience they would have attracted (the
> people who go in
> for this kind of melodrama) would have felt cheated that this
> movie wasn't
> the sort of thing they had paid between 5 and 9 dollars for
> and stayed away
> in droves. Without the "I see dead people" in the commercials, the
> filmmakers would have had to count on either a massivly successful
> word-of-mouth campaign (Like that which gave Blair Witch such
> unprecedented
> success, and how likely is that to happen twice in one summer?)
Well, apparently, one of the things that led to the success of the film is
"word of mouth", especially people telling their friends that film had a
really cool "surprise".
> or a
> relatively unknown director delivering a film so effective
> that it could
> attract a sizable cross-genre crowd. I think The Sixth Sense
> was good enough
> to do both, but I can't really blame the studio for hedging its bets.
> Hopefully, this sort of success will allow director Shyamalan
> even more
> freedom in his next movie.
> -Mac Hume
>
>
Well, I still think that the film could have been promoted without that
line. An atmospheric trailer could have been put together that told people
that something very odd was going on, but they would not be sure exactly
what it was. Like I said, it didn't ruin the film, and I understand your
point (studios would show you the last three minutes of a film as a preview
if they thought it would make them an extra $5), but I'm just always going
to be the one that thinks that some times less information is more.
Another good example of this is Terminator 2. If you never saw any sort of
preview for this film, it's structured in such a way that you don't know
who's side the Terminator is on until you're a bit into the film. I think
the film could have easily been marketed without revealing this information.
But then again, it seems like the idea these days is to not surprise the
audience in any way. I can't think of the number of films that pretty much
give away anything in their trailers. And some books are way out of hand in
the amount of information given up by the back cover or inside cover. I
guess I'm just one of those people that really likes to be surprised.
The Sixth Sense is now the 12th highest grossing film of all time. I don't
know if that will give the director more free reign or not, but lets hope
so, as he seems to have some talent for filmmaking.
Dave Thomas - Editor, Pixel Planet
Reviews of books, music, comics, movies, games, CG software, programming
tools and more!
http://www.pixelplanet.com
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