It’s good to see more and more people getting clued in to the fact that any publicity is good publicity (especially if you’re starting out). USE the New Media – the way that NBC did when it saw that “Lazy Sunday” on YouTube was driving a ratings increase in the key 18-34 demo for SNL.
Apparently, the movie about the 80s coke wars in Miami was being sold by sidewalk vendors before the damn thing was even released – and it was a hit.
…Instead of contacting a lawyer, Corben and Spellman decided to
embrace the situation and interview the flea market vendors on-camera.The
video of the vendors can be found online, along with footage from a
barber shop that shows the movie all day for its customers and
interviews with hip-hop artists who have seen the film.“Yes,
it’s our copyrighted material, and people are bootlegging it and
selling it and making money, and we’re not,” said Corben, the director.
“So what are you going to do about that? How do you stop it? It’s like
a phenomenon.”
Now the AP is carrying a story about the fact that they’re taking such an innovative approach to marketing their movie. And why now? If you look at other movies in that space – like Scarface, obviously – what you see is that if you connect to the audience, you’re building a franchise that every hip-hopped and wanna-be will have on their shelves, as a game in theis PS3s, as a soundtrack, as a clothing line, etc. etc. So yeah, they weren’t making as much money up front but the long-term approach is worth the risk.
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