JoeChalupa
04-09-2012, 11:38 AM
Wasn't sure if this should be posted in the political forum but with so many movie enthusiasts I thought I'd post it here.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/09/movies/bad-timing-for-a-comedy-called-neighborhood-watch.html?hp
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/04/09/arts/watch/watch-popup.jpg
LOS ANGELES — In the normal course of things a Hollywood movie about space aliens wouldn’t be affected by newspaper headlines.
In recent weeks executives at 20th Century Fox have been quietly scrambling to distance a summer comedy, “Neighborhood Watch,” starring Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn and Jonah Hill, from the shooting of Trayvon Martin. Mr. Martin, an unarmed black teenager, was killed on Feb. 26 by George Zimmerman, a community watch participant in Sanford, Fla., who has said he acted in self-defense and has not been charged with a crime.
In a phased withdrawal that began late last month Fox pre-emptively withdrew its trailers and advertising materials for the movie, which was filmed in Georgia and features Mr. Stiller, Mr. Vaughn, Mr. Hill and Richard Ayoade as four suburban watch members who save their neighborhood, and the world, from an invasion by space aliens.
But the studio and its filmmaking team — including the movie’s producer, Shawn Levy, who directed “Real Steel” and “Night at the Museum”— are now left to wonder whether a news-media storm and a ferocious public debate over the shooting and its possible legal consequences have spoiled the fun of a movie that cost over $50 million to make and will cost tens of millions more to market.
That “Neighborhood Watch” should be tainted by even a whiff of the vigilantism at issue in the Martin shooting is attributable not just to the film’s name, but also to an unfortunate decision by Fox to release a brief initial teaser trailer that portrayed its stars as a band of dark-clad heavies cruising their suburban turf to a hip-hop theme. Mr. Hill points his fingers as if firing a gun. Yet the trailer, according to a person who was briefed on its background but spoke on condition of anonymity because of studio policy, relies heavily on scenes that were not actually in the film. These were shot separately by the director, Akiva Schaffer, who has been a writer and director for “Saturday Night Live,” as a gag that stepped up the mock tough-guy image of the stars without giving away the movie’s real point — the aliens.
In a statement following the cancellation of the trailer Fox extended sympathy to those touched by the Martin shooting, and said, “Our film is a broad alien invasion comedy and bears absolutely no relation to the tragic events in Florida.” A Fox spokesman late last week declined to elaborate on the studio’s plans for the film.
But it is clear that Fox is quickly replacing images that might keep viewers away should the Martin case claim the nation’s attention when “Neighborhood Watch” is released, on July 27.
The image of a bullet-riddled Neighborhood Watch sign — on which the caped figure of Boris the Burglar, a familiar trademark of the National Sheriffs’ Association, has almost imperceptibly turned into a lurking alien — has been pulled back where possible. On the film’s Facebook page, meanwhile, Fox is now featuring photographs of the four stars in a frontal shot that seems deliberately calculated to invoke the harmless lead characters in “Ghostbusters,” to which Fox marketers have been likening their film.
The next step, according to the person briefed on studio plans, will be to highlight the movie’s space aliens — a reveal that might have occurred late, if at all, in a normal marketing campaign.
Historically, studios have been inclined to hang tough when a movie collides with the news.
In 2006, for instance, Disney released “Apocalypto” just a little more than four months after its director, Mel Gibson, erupted in an anti-Semitic rant during a drunk-driving arrest. The studio played straight into the controversy, challenging viewers to distinguish between Mr. Gibson’s persona and his art and even retitling the film, as “Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto.”
But much has changed since.
“You err on the side of being very sensitive,” said Dennis Rice, a film marketing consultant who, when he was Disney’s chief film marketer, devised the “Apocalypto” strategy but now counsels caution.
“Literally every minute something online is going to support or take away from your picture,” Mr. Rice said of the myriad notions that sweep through contemporary social media and suddenly create a consensus where there was no opinion at all.
Still, an internal debate about timing continues at Fox: Is it better to accelerate the marketing plan with an immediate splash that brands “Neighborhood Watch” as an absurdist comedy about interplanetary threat? Or should the studio lie low for a while with its advance publicity, waiting for the passions around Mr. Martin’s death to cool, even if that means fewer weeks in which to sell a July picture?
If the Trayvon Martin controversy deepens, Fox could be pressed further, for instance to retitle or delay the film. But Hollywood’s conventional wisdom still says that such changes usually compound the problem.
“The change of dates hurt our picture, I think,” said David Foster, who was a producer of “Collateral Damage,” in which Arnold Schwarzenegger played a firefighter whose family was killed in a bombing. Originally set for release by Warner Brothers in October of 2001, the film was delayed for four months because of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, and it ultimately became one of Mr. Schwarzenegger’s weaker performers, with just $40 million in domestic box office receipts.
In 2002 Fox similarly rescheduled its release of the sniper suspense movie “Phone Booth” after the Beltway sniper attacks. But last year it went straight ahead with “We Bought a Zoo,” which opened just two months after dozens of lions, tigers and other wild animals were shot in Ohio after escaping from a private zoo much like the one in the film. Neither movie was a major hit, but whether timing was a factor remains unclear.
And Fox will definitely be watching for developments in the Sanford case that could further erode the fun in the film. Including, of course, what happens online. But the studio may not get much guidance from a public that appears to be of at least two minds about everything that touches the Martin case.
“I wouldn’t want to see a film like this right away,” said one post on the message boards at IMDb.com late last month.
Another advised, “The best time to release it is while it’s fresh in people’s minds.”
~~What say you?
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/09/movies/bad-timing-for-a-comedy-called-neighborhood-watch.html?hp
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/04/09/arts/watch/watch-popup.jpg
LOS ANGELES — In the normal course of things a Hollywood movie about space aliens wouldn’t be affected by newspaper headlines.
In recent weeks executives at 20th Century Fox have been quietly scrambling to distance a summer comedy, “Neighborhood Watch,” starring Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn and Jonah Hill, from the shooting of Trayvon Martin. Mr. Martin, an unarmed black teenager, was killed on Feb. 26 by George Zimmerman, a community watch participant in Sanford, Fla., who has said he acted in self-defense and has not been charged with a crime.
In a phased withdrawal that began late last month Fox pre-emptively withdrew its trailers and advertising materials for the movie, which was filmed in Georgia and features Mr. Stiller, Mr. Vaughn, Mr. Hill and Richard Ayoade as four suburban watch members who save their neighborhood, and the world, from an invasion by space aliens.
But the studio and its filmmaking team — including the movie’s producer, Shawn Levy, who directed “Real Steel” and “Night at the Museum”— are now left to wonder whether a news-media storm and a ferocious public debate over the shooting and its possible legal consequences have spoiled the fun of a movie that cost over $50 million to make and will cost tens of millions more to market.
That “Neighborhood Watch” should be tainted by even a whiff of the vigilantism at issue in the Martin shooting is attributable not just to the film’s name, but also to an unfortunate decision by Fox to release a brief initial teaser trailer that portrayed its stars as a band of dark-clad heavies cruising their suburban turf to a hip-hop theme. Mr. Hill points his fingers as if firing a gun. Yet the trailer, according to a person who was briefed on its background but spoke on condition of anonymity because of studio policy, relies heavily on scenes that were not actually in the film. These were shot separately by the director, Akiva Schaffer, who has been a writer and director for “Saturday Night Live,” as a gag that stepped up the mock tough-guy image of the stars without giving away the movie’s real point — the aliens.
In a statement following the cancellation of the trailer Fox extended sympathy to those touched by the Martin shooting, and said, “Our film is a broad alien invasion comedy and bears absolutely no relation to the tragic events in Florida.” A Fox spokesman late last week declined to elaborate on the studio’s plans for the film.
But it is clear that Fox is quickly replacing images that might keep viewers away should the Martin case claim the nation’s attention when “Neighborhood Watch” is released, on July 27.
The image of a bullet-riddled Neighborhood Watch sign — on which the caped figure of Boris the Burglar, a familiar trademark of the National Sheriffs’ Association, has almost imperceptibly turned into a lurking alien — has been pulled back where possible. On the film’s Facebook page, meanwhile, Fox is now featuring photographs of the four stars in a frontal shot that seems deliberately calculated to invoke the harmless lead characters in “Ghostbusters,” to which Fox marketers have been likening their film.
The next step, according to the person briefed on studio plans, will be to highlight the movie’s space aliens — a reveal that might have occurred late, if at all, in a normal marketing campaign.
Historically, studios have been inclined to hang tough when a movie collides with the news.
In 2006, for instance, Disney released “Apocalypto” just a little more than four months after its director, Mel Gibson, erupted in an anti-Semitic rant during a drunk-driving arrest. The studio played straight into the controversy, challenging viewers to distinguish between Mr. Gibson’s persona and his art and even retitling the film, as “Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto.”
But much has changed since.
“You err on the side of being very sensitive,” said Dennis Rice, a film marketing consultant who, when he was Disney’s chief film marketer, devised the “Apocalypto” strategy but now counsels caution.
“Literally every minute something online is going to support or take away from your picture,” Mr. Rice said of the myriad notions that sweep through contemporary social media and suddenly create a consensus where there was no opinion at all.
Still, an internal debate about timing continues at Fox: Is it better to accelerate the marketing plan with an immediate splash that brands “Neighborhood Watch” as an absurdist comedy about interplanetary threat? Or should the studio lie low for a while with its advance publicity, waiting for the passions around Mr. Martin’s death to cool, even if that means fewer weeks in which to sell a July picture?
If the Trayvon Martin controversy deepens, Fox could be pressed further, for instance to retitle or delay the film. But Hollywood’s conventional wisdom still says that such changes usually compound the problem.
“The change of dates hurt our picture, I think,” said David Foster, who was a producer of “Collateral Damage,” in which Arnold Schwarzenegger played a firefighter whose family was killed in a bombing. Originally set for release by Warner Brothers in October of 2001, the film was delayed for four months because of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, and it ultimately became one of Mr. Schwarzenegger’s weaker performers, with just $40 million in domestic box office receipts.
In 2002 Fox similarly rescheduled its release of the sniper suspense movie “Phone Booth” after the Beltway sniper attacks. But last year it went straight ahead with “We Bought a Zoo,” which opened just two months after dozens of lions, tigers and other wild animals were shot in Ohio after escaping from a private zoo much like the one in the film. Neither movie was a major hit, but whether timing was a factor remains unclear.
And Fox will definitely be watching for developments in the Sanford case that could further erode the fun in the film. Including, of course, what happens online. But the studio may not get much guidance from a public that appears to be of at least two minds about everything that touches the Martin case.
“I wouldn’t want to see a film like this right away,” said one post on the message boards at IMDb.com late last month.
Another advised, “The best time to release it is while it’s fresh in people’s minds.”
~~What say you?