In my last post, I blogged about my NEED to see the Oscar nominated film, The King’s Speech. After seeing the movie, I can happily say I got my money’s worth. Not only did the Oscar nomination give the movie an increased profit and publicity, but the distributing movie studio, the Weinstein Company, is now planning on marketing the film to an entirely new demographic, moving from a concentrated targeting strategy to differentiated. And who is this new segment that the studio believes will be itching to see a period piece about a stuttering middle-aged man? Teenagers and children of course!
Currently the movie is rated R, due to some strong, but necessary for the plot, language. The Weinstein Company plans to cut the bad language to give the film a new rating of PG and capture the 17 and under crowd. To appeal to this segment, further plans are to reposition the film as a classic, rather than simply critically acclaimed. It’s even getting a new tagline: “Some things never go out of style: Friendship; Courage; Loyalty,” which differs from the current tagline of, “It takes leadership to confront a nation’s fear. It takes friendship to conquer your own.”
While I think it’s clever to target a new segment, I’m not so sure the segment targeted is attractive in this case, or worth the marketing effort. While I loved the movie, three or four years ago I probably would not have jumped up to see this film. Teenagers tend to be more interested in fast-paced action and slapstick, in-your-face comedy. This film unfortunately has neither. While it is inspiring and well-made, I think the studio should do a bit more research on what teenagers find entertaining before investing in a new ad campaign.