Is Online Marketing Ruining Movies?

You may have heard that studios and film-goers alike are voicing discontent and even petitioning Rotten Tomatoes for ruining the reception of films before they’ve been broadly seen. Now this has been shown to go both ways; many studios give VIP screenings to critics with the sole intent that they give a glowing review and boost the initial Rotten Tomatoes score before it inevitably plumets. Regardless, this is one of the many obvious symptoms of the internet on theater films. Online marketing has slowly been consuming our presuppositions of films to the extent that many prefer to watch only the reviews, a category that I regretfully fall in. Now, ignoring the caterwauling of studios complaining about Rotten Tomatoes ruining their flop, we still have to wonder: is online marketing ruining movies?

Or am I…

For the purposes of this post, online marketing refers to any sort of online coverage of a soon-to-be or recently released film. Regardless of affiliation, any sort of coverage of something online is in a form marketing said something; in this case a film. Now, when an anticipated film is set to be released everyone knows what to expect: a plethora of trailers that either say everything or nothing. Many try to avoid these, but most will succumb and end up watching these quickly cut jumbles of film-moments that we have come to know as trailers. People go crazy over these.

Yep that’s a light-saber.

When the Force Awakens trailer was released you found literally thousands of reaction videos on YouTube picking every detail apart, from characters to setting to wardrobe and everything in between. Now, I’m not passing judgment, people can enjoy things however they want. But the effect that this has had on our reception and anticipation of films is undeniable. The actual process of releasing a film is now almost the most exciting part; the tradition of anticipating, analyzing and sharing each new trailer has become an internet culture. Does this impact our perception of the actual film? Definitely. Is this a good thing? In some ways, in many ways though it can build such unrealistic expectations that the film simply collapses under its own weight; or even worse, sickens many to the point that they don’t even give it a chance in the first place.

Now comes the release of the film, the horses are out. Unfortunately your horse breaks every bone in its body in the first 5 meters and is then beaten to death by angry fans.

Take THAT Fant4stic!

This is the epidemic of online reactions. They can be very positive sometimes and boost a film into success, but more often they are a sea of negativity that seeps into bones of the film. From movie review channels on YouTube, of which I am subscribed to many, to online review sites such as Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb, we are now in an age where our interconnectedness allows us to spread hate faster than peanut butter. From this we get a double edged sword: we often save ourselves from seeing a rotten film, but also we often ruin all of the mystery of buying a ticket and seeing a film blind. Presuppositions have a great effect on how we perceive films, and whether we agree with the consensus of the mighty internet our mind is already tainted with expectations. If you’ve ever been blown away by a film that you knew nothing about than you know how much of an effect preconceptions, or lack there of, can have.

Now I don’t want to give the impression that film criticisms and reactions should not be a part of the film ethos, I’m only wondering aloud the effect that these practices have on the medium as a whole. So the next time you hear about a film that interests you, maybe try avoiding anything that gives you the likelihood of contracting preconceptions and see the film the old fashioned way. If you find it has no effect feel free to come back and leave a vitriolic comment letting me know what a kill-joy grump I am.

Superwhat?