The Horror Seesaw Continues -- The Reaping Will Screen For Critics, Hills 2 Won't
Filed under: Horror, New Releases, Warner Brothers, RumorMonger, Exhibition, 20th Century Fox, Movie Marketing
.jpg)
When you sign up to review a horror movie these days, you're very often signing up to spend your own money, unless you work for an outlet that will reimburse your ticket and popcorn expenses. Since today's critical community tends to greet most horror fare with a universal 'boo,' even the biggest studio horror films are beginning to drop directly into theaters without so much as an introduction to the press. Actually, that's not quite correct -- introductions are now often being made in ways other than just sitting your average overweight critic down in a seat and showing him something on a screen for two hours.
We recently reported on a special NYComicCon event for Wes Craven's The Hills Have Eyes II, attended by Craven and the stars of the film. Turns out that, even after that kind of outreach, Fox will not be screening the film for the press. It strikes me as an odd move -- can't we, the ones who took the time to go to the breakfast, at least be trusted to give the film a fair shake? If the studio is so completely sure that newspaper critics will scorch the film, why not screen it for the online press only? Would it be better to offer targeted screenings than simply institute a 'no screenings' policy? Maybe. The big studios haven't lost all faith in their horror products yet -- Warner's is soon to release Hilary Swank's religious-horror film The Reaping and won't be holding it from critics. It will arrive with a press junket and screening slate.
Peter Jackson Says Spielberg's 'Tintin' is Done Filming, but...
Interracial Harmony: 'Ninja Assassin' vs. 'Blind Side'
Spin-ematical: New on DVD for 11/24_thumbnail.jpg)
Exclusive 'Nine' Poster Premiere!
Exclusive: Title Track for 'The Road' Soundtrack
_thumbnail.jpg)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
3-09-2007 @ 11:13PM
Tiffany Leigh said...
Not that this applies to all non-critic'd screenings of movies (and this also presupposes the idea that "the movie must suck out loud"), but in the horror genre it's definitely something that would make sense: no critics' pre-screenings to preserve the spoilers that a movie may have.
In horror movies, there doesn't need to be an AHA! plot twist for the movie to be spoiled (like Sixth Sense). Take the Saw franchise -- most of that fun is just finding out what twisted gory nasty new ways people will get maimed and killed. The Hills 2 "mutant birth" footage shown at NYCC is definitely an example. Sometimes the movies will suck, but a first glimpse at a boogeyman, or the new nasty envelope that is pushed with each new release banks on this expectation, and the idea that no one knows how the movie will top its forebears.
In the wide-open media world of internet movie fansites and blogs in addition to the traditional avenues of television and print, there's too huge a sample size where it's too easy for just one person to let a tidbit slip -- either accidentially or on purpose.
And I've read countless reviews where the reviewer, out of hubris, or revenge, or just cos they can't keep secrets, prints spoilers -- either overtly, or couched in a winking pun or reference, where you can figure it out anyway. Which I HATE.
It's funny -- I don't think in this day and age of all the info, all the time, early and often, that a movie like The Crying Game -- which had Miramax asking critics not to divulge the "twist" -- could possibly keep any secrets or have done as well at the box office.
Keeping Hills 2 away from critics' reviews opening weekend (especially since there's been some footage shown to people already) isn't as disparaging or desperate a move than, say, Sandra Bullock's Miss Congeniality 3.
Reply