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Surrogate
marketing in Kollywood? |
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Bagpiper advertises club soda, we
know that they are trying to sell
something else. Same with Kingfisher
or Director's Special or any other
brand that sells alcoholic products.
In advertising parlance, this technique
is called surrogate advertising. In
simple terms, it means marketing some
other product with the same brand
name because one is not allowed to
market the original product. Well,
breweries do this because the law
does not permit them to advertise
their original products. But why do
movies have to resort to this technique?
Many Kollywood movies have started
to supplant the original content with
extraneous elements in their marketing
strategies. The movies are not being
marketed as what they are, but as
something totally different. Take
the instance of the recently released
Dindigul Sarathi. The first promo
of the movie on air was a raunchy
and raucous item number with lots
of rap thrown in, absolutely irrelevant
to the movie. Though one hears that
this song appears full length at some
point in the film, it is hard to understand
the circumstances that made the marketing
team think of using this song to promote
the movie. As far as one has heard,
Dindigul Sarathi is a movie that is
very far removed from Kollywood stereotypes
and regular commercial fares and it
is disappointing to see that even
in spite of so many merits, the movie
is being marketed on the basis of
one totally irrelevant dance number.
Though later trailers and stills have
painted some sort of a more original
picture, the impressions created by
the initial promos still resound around
the movie.
If you think that this is a rant about
a one off movie, then think again.
Rewind through 2008 and think of the
many movies that have resorted to
such strategies. One can make a huge
list of such films, but many of them
were so small and inconsequential
that good marketing or not, they would
never have made much of an impact.
But there are some average and big
budget movies that have been guilty
of using such regressive marketing
tactics. Think of Dhanam. The movie
was definitely different from the
regular lot, the director had made
an attempt to highlight some pertinent
social issues and succeeded to an
extent and Sangeetha had put in some
effort to get into the role. Yet,
all that the marketing department
seemed keen on highlighting were the
few skin show stills that appeared
for about a minute and a half in the
movie. The picture ultimately painted
was that of a high on glamour, low
on substance skin flick which was
far removed from the real picture.
Same holds true for Sathyam. It had
Vishal in the lead role, lots of high
voltage action and other elements.
Yet,
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the only highlighted portions were
Nayanthara's titillating stills and
to an extent Vishal's six pack abs.
Undeniably, there seems to be a fetish
to concentrate marketing on the glamour
quotient and nothing else.
The biggest example of faulty marketing
is also the biggest debacle of the
year – Kuselan. This film must
serve as a case study on how not to
market a movie. The only thing that
was highlighted about Kuselan was
Rajinikanth. 90% of poster areas were
filled with Superstar's face when
he was not even there for 5% of the
entire running length, even with two
songs thrown for the benefit of fans.
Most of his 20 odd get ups in one
song were set up as the USP of the
movie when you could hardly catch
a glimpse of each as they flashed
past in a hurry. The next biggest
highlight of the movie had to be Nayanthara,
again for her glamour. It would seem
insane to think that a movie carrying
Rajini's label needed such under the
belt marketing, but the above mentioned
fetish seems to have a strong hold
on marketing.
The point is, why do movies have to
pursue such distracting and misleading
marketing tactics. The single largest
factor of Kuselan's failure was the
huge wave of expectations generated
because the movie was marketed as
a Superstar film, when it was actually
not. Posters, trailers, promotional
videos and all marketing tactics create
ideas and expectations in the audiences'
mind about the movie and it is with
those expectations that they come
into theaters. Naturally, when they
see that what has been so pompously
marketed is some insignificant corner
and that the actual movie is something
far away from the promos, they feel
cheated. And as wisdom says, inability
to meet the expectations of an audience
results in a movie's failure. So,
why create expectations that a movie
cannot meet?
There have been movies this year that
have also shown the right way with
some precise and principled marketing.
Dasavatharam, Saroja, Vaaranam Aayiram
etc, are some examples of fine marketing
which painted the exact picture of
what the movie had to offer and the
results are to be seen. Even if anyone
did not like the movie, they never
felt cheated.
On a concluding note. Why are film
makers so wary of marketing the exact
content of the movie? Why do they
resort to surrogate tactics? The answer
is that maybe they don't believe in
the ability of their product to win
over audiences. If the makers don't
believe in their product, can the
audience be expected to do that?
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