this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2024
97 points (98.0% liked)

movies

1697 readers
91 users here now

Warning: If the community is empty, make sure you have "English" selected in your languages in your account settings.

🔎 Find discussion threads

A community focused on discussions on movies. Besides usual movie news, the following threads are welcome

Related communities:

Show communities:

Discussion communities:

RULES

Spoilers are strictly forbidden in post titles.

Posts soliciting spoilers (endings, plot elements, twists, etc.) should contain [spoilers] in their title. Comments in these posts do not need to be hidden in spoiler MarkDown if they pertain to the title’s subject matter.

Otherwise, spoilers but must be contained in MarkDown.

2024 discussion threads

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

If you grew up in the early 2000s, you probably saw a trailer for Kangaroo Jack. The trailer gives the impression that the movie is a screwball road trip comedy about two friends and their wacky, talking Kangaroo sidekick. Except it’s not that. It’s an extremely unfunny movie about two idiots escaping the mob. There’s a random kangaroo in it for like 5 minutes and he only talks during a hallucination scene that lasts less than a minute. Turns out, the producers knew that they had a stinker on their hands so they cut the movie to be PG and focus the marketing on the one positive aspect that test audiences responded to, the talking kangaroo, tricking a bunch of families into buying tickets.

What other movies had similar, deceitfully malicious marketing campaigns?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] UKFilmNerd@feddit.uk 10 points 3 weeks ago

OK, call me naive, but I had no idea that Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street was a famous musical. The trailer for the film, starring Johnny Depp and directed by Tim Burton. So I was very surprised when they all started singing and dancing in the film. This was never mentioned or shown in the film's trailer! I just double-checked on Wiki and people in the UK logged official complaints with the Advertising Standards Authority and Trading Standards agency.

The only other example that comes to mind is the trailer for The Amazing Spider-Man. Can't remember if it's the first or second. The shot in the trailer features what looks like the start of an epic fight between Spider-Man and Rhino. Unfortunately, what you see in the trailer is the very last shot in the film. It's a tease for a fight that you never get to see.