Snakes a perfectly awesome success
There have been a few reports that SoaP's release was disappointing...that the opening weekend fell $10M behind expectations, bringing the total (including Thursday's premiere night) in at $15.8M.
Let's take a look at some of the opening weekends over this summer:
Pirates of the Caribbean 2 - $135.6M
Cars - $60.1M
Superman Returns - $52.5M
Talladega Nights - $47M
Step Up - $20.7M
World Trade Center - $18.7M
Ouch. True. That SoaP can be beaten out by any of these stinkers (admittedly, I only saw a few of them) makes you wonder whether the 'blogosphere' really has any power at all.
My review of the movie?
Awesome. It didn't disappoint. In fact, I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would. It was extremely entertaining, but moreso because of the audience participation.
So, it didn't become a blockbuster overnight. The big bucks advertising and sequel boosting and 'perfectly normal titling' of the 'actual blockbusters' perservered. Big whoop.
Tell me that 25 years from now, people will be going to art house theatres and participating with Superman Returns. I doubt it.
And I maintain my #1 statement that this was never really about the movie anyway. And believe me, I didn't want this to be a proof of concept for Hollywood to see that involving the audience is the wave of the future. In fact, I'm glad that this wasn't as financially lucrative as they would have hoped because they can continue to dismiss the online banter.
Frankly...I'd like the Longtail to remain the Longtail and for small businesses and niche products to continue to be able to thrive just fine. The world, IMHO, has enough bloated giant corporations. I 'consume' some of their wares occasionally, but I would say a pie graph of my overall spending on general items goes to the smaller, more niche companies: corner stores, boutiques, various smaller online retailers who I know I can email personally. I'll bet if anyone took a look at their bank records at the end of the month, they would find a large portion of their spending going to non-blockbuster type products that serve their unique personalities.
So, SoaP isn't a mainstream movie. Duh. We knew that. And perhaps it would have done a little better if it changed it's name to Flight 121 or whatever and threw another couple of hundreds of thousands of dollars into advertising. But, dammit, with 85% of the audience giving SoaP a fresh rating, compared to the 66% of critics -- this is a movie about the audience...the comraderie, etc.
And there aren't many movies that can claim that.
Let's take a look at some of the opening weekends over this summer:
Pirates of the Caribbean 2 - $135.6M
Cars - $60.1M
Superman Returns - $52.5M
Talladega Nights - $47M
Step Up - $20.7M
World Trade Center - $18.7M
Ouch. True. That SoaP can be beaten out by any of these stinkers (admittedly, I only saw a few of them) makes you wonder whether the 'blogosphere' really has any power at all.
My review of the movie?
Awesome. It didn't disappoint. In fact, I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would. It was extremely entertaining, but moreso because of the audience participation.
So, it didn't become a blockbuster overnight. The big bucks advertising and sequel boosting and 'perfectly normal titling' of the 'actual blockbusters' perservered. Big whoop.
Tell me that 25 years from now, people will be going to art house theatres and participating with Superman Returns. I doubt it.
And I maintain my #1 statement that this was never really about the movie anyway. And believe me, I didn't want this to be a proof of concept for Hollywood to see that involving the audience is the wave of the future. In fact, I'm glad that this wasn't as financially lucrative as they would have hoped because they can continue to dismiss the online banter.
Frankly...I'd like the Longtail to remain the Longtail and for small businesses and niche products to continue to be able to thrive just fine. The world, IMHO, has enough bloated giant corporations. I 'consume' some of their wares occasionally, but I would say a pie graph of my overall spending on general items goes to the smaller, more niche companies: corner stores, boutiques, various smaller online retailers who I know I can email personally. I'll bet if anyone took a look at their bank records at the end of the month, they would find a large portion of their spending going to non-blockbuster type products that serve their unique personalities.
So, SoaP isn't a mainstream movie. Duh. We knew that. And perhaps it would have done a little better if it changed it's name to Flight 121 or whatever and threw another couple of hundreds of thousands of dollars into advertising. But, dammit, with 85% of the audience giving SoaP a fresh rating, compared to the 66% of critics -- this is a movie about the audience...the comraderie, etc.
And there aren't many movies that can claim that.
5 Comments:
*>_<*
I'm waiting for the sequel, snakes on a train.
Well said.
Jake
communityguy.com
I saw SoaP this weekend and loved it. One of the best parts of this movie was seeing how much the audience really got into it. These people were definetly early adopters who knew about the movie from the blogosphere. As a result, I think the small take this weekend is just the start of a much larger wave. Now that those early adopters have gone to see the movie they will be telling their friends how good SoaP really is.
I'm pretty sure SoaP will become a bona fide blockbuster this summer however the model that it will follow is more viral and will build over time. Up until now blockbusters have been preceeded by huge advertising campaigns which cause high demand on opening weekend, then they quickly dissapear. SoaP didnt do this. Instead they engaged fans early and basically created evangelists. My guess is that over time these SoaP evangelists will have quite alot of power when it comes to putting people in theatre seats to see this movie.
It's not about the opening weekend take for this movie anyway. It's not even about the theater run for this movie. I predict that as soon as the DVD comes out this movie will post record DVD sales and rentals. After all, you can't get totally smashed on cheap beer and yell lines along with Sammy J in a nice theater now can you? Cult classic in the making. They guaranteed that because they actually engaged their audience in the creative process. That's why this movie is a shining success, and I think we'll see in emulated.
SoaP is NOT LONG TAIL. NOT AT ALL.
It is MAINSTREAM media with a questionably successful guerrilla/viral campaign. In fact, as a "marketing 2.0" person, you should look at this with CONCERN, not PRIDE. Why? Because if these campaigns aren't deemed successful by those who pay for them, they won't pay for more.
Oh, by the way, it's "camaraderie"
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