Netflix, the online DVD rental service, announced a new feature that enables their subscribers to watch a stream of movie trailers personalized to their movie tastes.
The feature, called “Previews,” consolidates all available movie trailers in one area on their site. Netflix's recommendation engine selects the appropriate trailers and calculates the order in which they are shown based on a subscriber’s rental and rating histories with the service. The previews run sequentially and without interruption. Subscribers can then add movies to their rental queues directly from the "Previews" page.
Netflix will launch with 1,000 trailers in the "Previews" section, but it plans on increasing that number to between 5,000 and 10,000 trailers by the end of the year.
Yesterday evening, Universal launched a newsreel-styled promo video on YouTube for their upcoming release ‘The Back Dahlia’', reports Adrants.
In addition to using recreated footage and archival crime scene clips, the four minute piece also utilizes vintage clips of other early twentieth century crimes to help set the tone. Exopolis, a creative shop specializing in design and development for broadcast, print and interactive, produced the promo.
This video furthers the vintage aesthetic of the film’s marketing campaign. Earlier this week, a special promotion with the Los Angles Times featured a special wraparound which included vintage clips. The Black Dahlia is an adaptation of James Ellroy's 1940s-set novel about two Los Angeles detectives heading the hunt for the killer of newbie actress Elizabeth Short. Directed by Brian De Palma and starring Josh Hartnett, Aaron Eckhart, Scarlett Johansson and Hillary Swank, the films hits theaters on Spetember 15th.
According to Variety, a new study released by Statistics Canada showed a substantial increase in theatrical revenue and attendance last year.
Canadian theatrical receipts rose 16.6% between the 2003-04 and 2004-05 periods to C$446.3 million, or $401.7 million, according to a survey of the film and video distribution businesses by the agency. Attendance figures were up as well, and according to the article the growth came predominantly from an over 20% rise in drive-in attendance. Per-family spending on theater-going averaged $101, up from $95 the prior year. Canadian DVD revenue growth was flat, with sales of $1.6 billion.
Anyone with any insight as to why Canadians are in love with the drive-in experience, let us know. Here’s a list of Canadian Drive-ins if you’re curious.
Update: Here's a link to the full report. It has a wealth of interesting facts and data that Canadian movie marketers might want to note, including a growth in market share of Canadian-produced content.
The Starz Network will be broadcasting highlights from the Hollywood Reporter's 35th Annual Key Art awards tonight - you can check local times here. It looks like there will be encore presentations as well.
For those not in the know, the Key Art Awards are held annually to recognize movie marketing achievement for all forms of film ad collateral including posters, trailers, print ads and TV commercials. This year's event was hosted by comedian and Saturday Night Live alumnus Kevin Nealon.
If you never had a chance to review the winners, the full listing is available here. VNU Media also sells illustrated programs highlighting the best of the print work.
PixelPlay and New Line Cinema have partnered to offer a 'How to Eat Fried Worms' game on PixelPlay's DishGAMES service, available via the DISH Network, according to a joint press release.
Gamers will have the chance to win 10 different prizes, and the top three scorers will win a "Worms Prize Package" featuring a Samsung portable DVD player, 10 movie tickets from Fandango, a New Line DVD Pack, a ‘Fried Worms’ movie poster and a 17 piece stainless steel cookware set, ostensibly to cook up homemade worm delicacies. The game went live on the service last Friday in tandem with the film’s theatrical release.
The game is available free to all DISH Network subscribers, which currently number over 12.4 million throughout the U.S. The promotion will be available on the service for the remainder of the summer.
According to Zap2it, CBS has partnered with Warner Brothers for the premiere of the new crime drama ‘Smith.’ The pilot will be solely sponsored by the upcoming Scorsese film The Departed, with “limited commercial interruptions.”
The Warner Brothers sponsorship of the ‘Smith’ pilot takes care of a tricky scheduling dilemma faced by CBS. With the premiere running over an hour before commercial breaks, CBS would have had to trim down the episode, limit commercials, or run an extended premiere.
'The Departed,' a hard-boiled crime drama in the vein of Scorsese’s past work, is a natural fit for 'Smith.' The series also stars Ray Liotta, who had his big breakout role in the Scorsese classic Mafia hit 'Goodfellas.'
‘The Departed’ features an ensemble cast including Leonardo DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon and Martin Sheen, among others, and will premiere in theaters on October 6th.
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