I get your point, and considering this is their 50th film they should probably make a bigger deal about and use another type of marketing, except that it wouldn't work. Let's face it, they need to reach the usual movigoer, not the die hard fans, because they don't need to convince the die hard fans they're still capable of making good quality movies, we already now that, we've been waiting 10 years for something like this to happen, but the usual moviegoer only wants a good movie, regardless of any sort of history the company has.merlinjones wrote:>>Unfortunately, there are a lot more people in this world other than Disney fans that do enjoy Dreamworks movies and they make quite a lot of money out of it.<<
>>What you have to understand is, you/we are not the consumer they are trying to target...<<
Clearly. And that message is coming across loud and clear. From the ad materials, it looks and sounds like a Dreamworks movie ...though we're supposed to read between the lines with the online PR sites that say it isn't like that at all, it's a Disney classic. Make up your minds, marketers!
There are a lot of folks who like traditional Walt Disney movies that are not Dreamworks fans (or even Disney fans necessarily). Why alienate a sure thing if they have the goods to deliver -- while reaching out to another demo that is notoriously fickle (little boys)?
Clearly, it's their risk to take, but the campaign (and title) does send an uneasy rebranding message.
Let's take two examples, "Kung Fu Panda" and "The Princess and the Frog". When "Kung Fu Panda" was about to come out everybody thought it was the typical silly Dreamworks movie with fart jokes, pop culture references and a great use of cellebrities to hide the lack of a real plot, then it turned out to be an entertaining heartfelt story beautifully animated, it was a great movie, and that's what people talked about after it came out, not the silly marketing campaign. Whereas PATF, well, the campaig Disney had for it was basically "Look! We made a 2D film again! Remember we were really good doing these movies 20 years ago? We're doing it again! So please, please watch our movie!", and my argument is not the quality of the movie itself, because PATF is a good film, but the fact that it have a very badly conceived marketing campaign... that and "Avatar" coming out one week later, seriously did they not see that one coming? So yeah, the usual movie goer doesn't care about Disney legacy, they care about having a good time watching a fun movie, I know it sounds harsh, but that's how the business is, and that's how they have to play it if they want people in the theaters on the release date.
And what's really so terrible about the marketing of "Tangled"? In all it makes it look like a really fun movie, and if it's as good as everybody is saying it is -which I really hope it is- then word of mouth will be the one that will end helping the movie.