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Marketers frequently create social media content (i.e., firm-generated content; FGC) to ignite interest in new movies. Thus, there is a clear need to understand the magnitude and heterogeneity of the effect of FGC on movie demand and associated user-generated content (UGC). The authors empirically examine the complex interactions among FGC, UGC, and sales using social media (tweet) data that are normally available to firms. They investigate two potential mechanisms by which FGC may drive box office revenues: (1) a direct mechanism, such that users who see FGC directly drive revenue, and (2) an indirect "ripple effect," by which FGC increases movie-related UGC, which then drives consumption. By analyzing 145,502 firm-generated and 5.9 million user-generated Twitter posts associated with 159 movies, the authors find a positive and significant effect of FGC on movie sales, which UGC fully mediates, which supports the indirect ripple effect reasoning. Impressions of FGC by followers of firm accounts, as opposed to nonfollowers of firm accounts, mainly drive the effect of FGC on UGC. In addition, FGC by movie accounts is more effective than that by actors and studios. Firms' regular posts with a movie-specific hashtag are more effective than replies, retweets, and posts without the hashtag. The finding of the ripple effect suggests that movie executives should focus on creating FGC that sparks conversations among followers when new movies are released. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The feeling of being caught between immersion in cinematic fictions and having one's attention pulled away from them by a range of distractions has shaped the experience of cinema for many decades. In the 1910s, several developments emerged in tandem with each other: the promotion of films and their stars/directors, narrative becoming the dominant form of cinema production, and the materialization of tension between immersion and distraction for audiences. The environment in which 1910s promotional and narrational strategies thrived set the stage for how we have thought about the bodies of women on screen, behind the camera, and in the seats of the theater. This essay focuses on the example of Cleo Madison as a filmmaker, actress, and a site of discursive energy to explore these issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Terry Turner was one of the most influential film promoters of the twentieth century, but his achievements have been largely overlooked by film historians. As an exploitation man for RKO, he pioneered "saturation" releasing with his promotion of Hitler's Children (Edward Dmytryk, 1943)—more than three years before David O. Selznick's promotion of Duel in the Sun (King Vidor, 1946). Turner created multifaceted, multimedia campaigns, and he was a significant creative force within the industry. Turner's ecosystemic approach to promotion integrated many dynamic elements into his campaigns as he fulfilled his stated goal of targeting "anybody with a buck." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Promotional materials – such as posters, trailers, press/campaign books, lobby cards – have been part of the commercial film industry for almost as long as there have been films to advertise. The history of these materials, their creators, and the industries that produced them remains largely unexplored territory in film and media history, even while academic interest in such materials has increased over the last decade. This article argues that much of the existing scholarly work on promotional materials – including the recent 'paratextual turn' – lacks a strong methodology for approaching, selecting and analysing such materials. Through an exploration of academic theories and approaches currently used within historical promotional material scholarship, the article considers the limitations found in the current dominance of textual studies, and proposes new methodological steps to help refine and enhance the future of studies of historical promotional materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research investigates how movie ratings from professional critics, amateur communities, and viewers themselves influence key movie performance measures (i.e., movie revenues and new movie ratings). Using movie-level data, the authors find that high early movie revenues enhance subsequent movie ratings. They also find that high advertising spending on movies supported by high ratings maximizes the movie's revenues. Furthermore, they empirically show that sequel movies tend to reap more revenues but receive lower ratings than originals. Using individual viewer–level data, this research highlights how viewers' own viewing and rating histories and movie communities' collective opinions explain viewer satisfaction. The authors find that various aspects of these ratings explain viewers' new movie ratings as a measure of viewer satisfaction, after controlling for movie characteristics. Furthermore, they find that viewers' movie experiences can cause them to become more critical in ratings over time. Finally, they find a U-shaped relationship between viewers' genre preferences and genre-specific movie ratings for heavy viewers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The contribution of this research lies in the use of real-world data to test several hypotheses about the role of two signals--sequels and advertising expenditures--in the motion picture industry. The authors analyze the data with a dynamic simultaneous-equations model of the drivers and the interrelationships of the behaviors of movie audiences, studios, and exhibitors. Specifically, the authors test for the attenuating role of third-party information sources, such as critics' review consensus and cumulative word of mouth, on the strength of the two aforementioned signals. The authors find evidence of such an effect both at the release phase across movies and over the postrelease phase for any movie. Notably, they hypothesize and show that sequels and advertising expenditures have a positive interaction effect on box office revenues. This is an important finding because though most firms use multiple signals for their products, empirical work on the interaction of two or more signals is rare. This study offers several new and interesting empirical insights into the market dynamics of the motion picture industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on motion picture trailers as synecdoche. The author discusses trailer audiences and how trailers are utilized to market motion pictures, explores the relationship between trailers and the motion pictures they represent, and examines trailers in terms of paratext and textural identity. An example includes the film "Spy," starring Melissa McCarthy.

This paper discusses Pablo Larraín's use of pastiche and hyperrealism in his 2012 film No and how these aesthetic strategies relate to contemporary Chilean issues of memory, postmemory, and the experience of collective trauma by subsequent generations. I argue that the focus on advertising of Larraín's film doesn't take away from its weightier examinations of the political and social fallout of the Pinochet regime, but rather acknowledges the very particular tensions and dis-encounters in that process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses developments in motion picture audience research. The different responses evoked by educational films and entertainment films, and the variety of human emotions and knowledge which are elicited are described. The sneak preview is noted as a method for checking viewers' response, but the primary downfall is that viewers seldom provide critical commentary. The Motion Picture Research Bureau has developed methods for determining viewer response to small segments of a film. Title testing is noted as a method for choosing a movie's title with the help of viewers. A system for determining the potential audience of a film is presented.

This essay examines the British films of Julius Pinschewer, the pioneer of German film advertising, starting with propaganda he made during World War I. In the films he subsequently made for the British National Savings Committee and National Coal Board, Pinschewer employs techniques from his anti-British war propaganda. By tracing cinematic techniques and commercial themes that migrate across national borders, I argue that Pinschewer's films qualify as a transnational advertising cinema. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Before making-of documentaries became a regular part of home-video special features, 1960s promotional featurettes brought the public a behind-the-scenes look at Hollywood’s production process. Based on historical evidence, this article explores the changes in Hollywood promotions when studios broadcasted these featurettes on television to market theatrical films and contracted out promotional campaigns to boutique advertising agencies. The making-of form matured in the 1960s as featurettes helped solidify some enduring conventions about the portrayal of filmmaking. Ultimately, featurettes serve as important paratexts for understanding how Hollywood’s global production work was promoted during a time of industry transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The notion that the authority and influence of professional critics are in decline is a recurring discourse in the research on criticism. Recently, this vision of decline has focused on the proliferation of lay opinions on the Internet, promoting an “ everyone ’ s a critic ” discourse and more “horizontal” cultural recommendations. The aim of this research is to empirically test this decline of criticism by considering changes in a particular indicator: the practice of using quotations from critics in film advertisements. Our analysis of quotations on 1329 press advertisements, which were collected in France over four sample years (2007, 2010, 2013 and 2016), contradicts the hypothesis of decline. The results show that (1) the frequency of insertion of critical quotes increased significantly over the period 2007–2016; (2) the “markers of legitimacy” within quotations are stable over the period; and (3) no amateur criticism has emerged in advertisements to compete with reviews by professional critics. Rather than pointing to a decline, these results suggest that the role of criticism in cinema’s “intermediation system” is being reinforced, and that its unrivalled cultural authority is being maintained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyze the contents of print ads in the motion picture industry (e.g., number of reviews quoted in the ad, the presence of a top reviewer, size of the ad, star, director, etc.). We find that external validation (a recommendation by a top reviewer) is more important to revenues than the informative content of the ad. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses a natural experiment-the Super Bowl-to study the causal effect of advertising on demand for movies. Identification of the causal effect rests on two points: 1) Super Bowl ads are purchased before advertisers know which teams will play; 2) home cities of the teams that are playing will have proportionally more viewers than viewers in other cities. We find that the movies in our sample experience on average incremental opening weekend ticket sales of about $8.4 million from a $3 million Super Bowl advertisement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cinema advertising films have for many decades constituted an important element of British cinema programmes, yet they remain relatively under-researched. This article examines the production, distribution and reception of one such film, a 90 second mini-epic called ‘Lost Island’, which was made in 1965 to promote Sea Witch hair dyes. As well as outlining the technological and experiential aspects of the cinema and cinema-going that continued to make film an attractive medium for advertisers even after the advent of mass television ownership, the article explores the success of the ‘Lost Island’ film and its eventual transmission on commercial television in the UK. As such, an investigation of ‘Lost Island’ allows for an assessment of the appeal of the cinema in the mid-1960s, and also the appeal of the cinema relative to other advertising media in the same period. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the link between the advertising images represented within Michelangelo Antonioni’sZabriskie Point(MGM, 1970) and the strategies employed for the film’s own marketing and promotion. I argue thatZabriskie Point’s critical and commercial failure is partly due to Antonioni’s misunderstanding of the function of studio publicity and promotion and to his studio’s misperceptions of late Sixties countercultural youth, who are both the subject of the film and its target audience. In order to stimulate new and productive ways of thinking aboutZabriskie Pointin relation to American media and marketing culture, I have structured this article around some particularly resonant advertising images displayed within and used to market the film – images that alternately conceal and confront the film’s own position within the American consumerist system that the foreign-born Antonioni intended to critique. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This essay examines the pressbook for The Orgy at Lil's Place(1963), a hit sexploitation film that was propelled to box-office success by the overblown advertising campaign created by its producer/distributor William Mishkin. Long thought to be lost, the movie was accessible for years only through the plot synopsis in the pressbook and other ephemeral traces. Following rediscovery at the Kinsey Institute, the film can now be assessed on its own merits, and it has become clear that advertising actively misrepresented the movie's content and subverted audience expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What do film posters on city walls tell us about the relationship between the cinema and the city? In this paper, I rely on the practice and perspective of young men who put up film posters on Dhaka's city walls to explore this question. I argue that the wall is a key site for the production of a cinematic public that does not map onto film audiences; for the experience of newness in the city and of the cinema as analogous experiences; and for an encounter with imagery that is considered luminous and intense, assailing the crowds that pass by the posters in the congested city. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Sex sells movies. It is part of the text we buy, part of what Matthew Fuller terms its 'memetic buzz', producing 'an explosion of activity and ideas' around the text. That 'buzz' is especially apparent in 1950s sf films, when the genre was struggling to find a new identity and an audience. This essay examines an element of that 'buzz' in film advertisements for The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Tobor the Great (1954), Forbidden Planet (1956) and The Colossus of New York (1958) - all of which linked sex and technology in a fashion that reflected the anxieties and hopes that marked this cinema as it sought to shape its new generic identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The movie tagline is the film’s advertising slogan, usually printed on posters prior to the official release. It gives quick and catchy insight into themes, plot, and genre of the product it wishes to sell. This article explores the form, function, history, and rhetoric of the movie tagline. What is the relationship between tagline and poster image? What specific information do taglines give us about the films they advertise, and how do they convey this information stylistically and rhetorically? How do taglines differ, in their forms and functions, from one another? In answering these questions, the article gives credit to a long established yet frequently overlooked element of film advertising. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Massive campaigns are annually launched by Hollywood studios to persuade film awards bodies to vote for their films, with success resulting in publicity, prestige, and potentially millions more in product revenues. During the 1990s and early 2000s, the media were supposedly progressing in their portrayal of LGBT storylines. As the Academy Awards body is composed of mostly older, white men who are, or were, the major players in the film industry, critically and historically analyzing the print advertisement campaigns that targeted these persons gives us telling indications of these culture creators ' views toward LGBT content. This study found that, over sixteen years, film award campaign ads continually avoided queer imagery while promoting heteronormative themes, even in queer films. This counters a notion of progress during this era within this elite group while complementing psychological, political, and mass communication research analyzing how normative voters respond to queer content in advertisements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Movie sequels, a type of brand extension, are prevalent in today's motion picture industry. Prior literature on brand extensions supports the intuition that attaching established brand names (e.g., titles of box-office hits) to new products decreases advertising costs. We counter this intuition and examine factors that may increase advertising costs for movie sequels. Specifically, we investigate the consequences of asset specificity and bargaining power-concepts from transaction cost economics-in the context of the motion picture industry. We find a positive relationship between the bargaining power of the movie studio's suppliers and advertising expenditures for the movie sequel. We also find evidence of a moderating effect: higher bargaining power of the movie studio dampens the impact of supplier bargaining power on advertising. This is the first study to measure the effect of supplier bargaining power on movie studios' marketing decisions. In a broader context, our findings not only challenge the notion that brand extensions are cost saving, but are also novel in linking transaction cost constructs to the advertising behavior of firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper researches the potential additional explanations for the concentration of motion pictures (movie) sales in small numbers by analyzing how incomplete information may effect or skew sales patterns. It analyzes word-of-mouth advertising and information spillover from pay-cable broadcasts as mechanisms of movie discovery, and estimated loss of sales due to incomplete information. The data suggest movie broadcasting via pay-cable channels as a source of exogenous shock to information availability, and suggests that the research contributes to the literature on how information channels may effect the assortment of products demanded in another channel.

Through the example of post-war film posters, the article reveals how the reception of Polish poster art in non-socialist countries influenced, to some degree, the strategies of Polish foreign cultural policy and vice versa in the 1950s. Breaking with a nationally-oriented research tradition for poster art, the so called "Polish School of Poster Art" shall be understood as a transnational phenomenon, generated in the realm of (foreign) cultural politics and international graphic design and advertising. Regarding the production and reception of film posters of the "Polish School..." as an "histoire croisee" the article analyses this visual material in the context of an international discourse on cinema advertising in the 1950s. At the same time, the Polish poster art is examined as a political instrument in shaping foreign relations with non-socialist countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article looks at the production of visual affect generated by film advertisements as they circulated widely through magazines in the 1960s when film publicity depended largely on billboards, posters and printed advertisements. The film advertisement catered to diverse film publics depending on the readership associated with specific magazines. The article focuses specifically on a collection of film advertisements published in English language magazines like Filmfare, Blitz, The Illustrated Weekly, Star and Style and Filmworld. These advertisements became part of a vast reservoir of visual culture that spilled out of magazine pages, catering to an order of perception that was quite different from that of posters or billboards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From billboards to urban screens and now to media facades, the augmentation of our cities has expanded, changing social behaviours and public space consumption. Smart buildings are being developed and, much like the smartphones, these hybrids are not only in sci-fi movies anymore. One of the main promoters of media facades and media architecture has been the advertising industry. But artists and designers showed the potential of different approaches, experimenting with digitally augmented spaces both indoors and outdoors. Going beyond the commercial aspect of being an advertising and branding tool, these hybrids offer a variety of uses. Questions of how and where we use them and how they can improve our life quality are discussed here emphasizing that we developed a media behaviour, adjusting our relation to the physical and information environments. I examine some of the most notable experiments outside of the advertising sphere, offering a base for future development of augmented spaces and opening the discussion over the language of new media architecture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scope of this paper is the semiotic study of the techniques of interlingual translation of French film titles into Greek. Firstly, approaching the film titles as advertisement slogans, we will examine if advertisement characteristics and functions are present into both the French and Greek film titles. Then, we will study the process of translation of connotations of the film titles and the role of non verbal semiotic systems such as numbering and punctuation in translation. Also, we will examine if translation techniques are influenced by extra-linguistic factors such as the period of film production, the film genre, diacritics, and the principle of economy of the words. If a relation does exist between translation techniques and extra-linguistic factors this could be used for a second, a semiotic reading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies analyze word-of-mouth (WOM) communication as a force that drives the success of motion pictures. The authors build upon that research and integrate measurements of WOM into a broader network of success determinants. Results show that production costs and critics’ evaluation are predictors of WOM volume at the end of the first week. No effect is observed for star power and advertising expenditures. WOM volume at the end of the first week is a major predictor of short-term theatrical box office revenues, which strongly affect long-term revenues. The authors conclude that WOM volume after opening week is positively influenced by WOM volume preceding that week, by advertising expenditures, by critics’ evaluation, by awards, and by length of runtime, but not by short term revenues. Surprisingly, WOM volume after the first week appears to be unrelated to long-term revenues. The authors explore the theoretical and managerial implications of these results. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent years, Australian films have failed to capture the public's attention at the Australian box office. Why? Do Australians have an aversion to their own films? Or does the release strategy-advertising/publicity expenditure and opening number of screens-explain the lacklustre performance? We find that even though Australian films are generally advertised more heavily and released more widely than non-Australian films, ceteris paribus, they earn less at the box office. We also analyse a subsample of our data for which Film Finance Corporation funding information is available and find that government subsidies have no impact on a film's financial success at the box office. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the impact of online word of mouth (WOM) and expert reviews on movies' box office revenues, both in the U.S. domestic market and in the international markets. Using a sample of 169 movies released in 2008, the study discovered that the frequency of online WOM and the valence rating of expert reviews were significant factors for box office outcomes in the domestic market. The study also found that only the frequency of online WOM was a significant factor in the international markets. The findings suggest that online WOM and expert reviews play a critical role in moviegoers' consumption behavior in the age of the Internet and social media. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article seeks to reposition the popular cinematic genre commedia all’italiana within the context of the rapid expansion of the media industries which accompanied Italy's postwar economic miracle. The article looks at three distinct aspects of the relationship between commedia all’italiana and other media. First, it outlines the important role played by the media during the boom in disseminating images of consumer lifestyles, and highlights the way in which commedia all’italiana participated in this process. Second, through a discussion of media appearances by Vittorio Gassman and Nino Manfredi, the article emphasises the extent to which their commedia all’italiana star personas were constructed and circulated in a multimedia context. Finally, it examines how the genre represented other media, focusing in particular on the representation of gender in advertising scenes. Through close readings of commedia all’italiana advertising scenes, the article notes points of continuity with and difference from advertising imagery that was circulating at the time. The article argues that in order to further our understanding of commedia all’italiana and its relationship to Italian society, it is essential to understand the genre's relationship to other media production of the period, which both influenced the comedies’ representations and was influenced by them in turn. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

For more than a decade, feature films produced by the GDR film company DEFA have been popular items in Germany. I analyze these films as commodities, arguing that this success by DEFA cinema needs to be read in conjunction with clever marketing strategies employed by the nonprofit foundation DEFA-Stiftung and the commercial home video distributor Icestorm Entertainment. Tracing some of these strategies, I show how DEFA feature films have become identifying markers that attest to a new eastern German regionalism and the reconsideration of the GDR past as part of Germany's cultural history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article traces the history of film trailers and film advertising, including the different approaches used by producers, distributors, and exhibitors. The author describes the origin of the term "trailer" and discusses "propaganda films," which showed film studios, and "commercial films," used to advertise products, as precursors to trailers. Specific topics include a 1915 trailer for the serial "The Red Circle" from the Pathé Exchange company, the movement of trailers to be shown before rather than after films, the trailer for the 1934 film "The Thin Man" from the MGM company, MGM's advertising director Howard Dietz, and the National Screen Service (NSS) company. The author also suggests that film trailers flourished in the 1940s.

New media, in the process of stabilization, always encounter the challenge of consumer-goods advertising. This challenge takes recognizable form when successful (and unsuccessful) ideas developed for one medium are revisited as ways to integrate advertising as palatably as possible into a new medium. A study of early film and the early internet reveals historical parallels: the advertising industry conceived of techniques which it failed to integrate into motion picture exhibition, but which have returned and begun to flourish online. Using patent information, materials from academic and trade advertising journals, and examples of internet marketing, this paper reveals the complexity of interactions between emerging media and advertising, and the importance of a study of failed and fringe concepts to a complete understanding of media and marketing development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the relationships between consumers and mobile advertisements on attitude change over time. Two experiments were used to investigate both immediate and delayed effects of different media types on attitudes toward mobile advertisements. Experiment 1 formulated three types of advertisements corresponding to three media types: text, still pictures, and motion pictures. The results indicate that motion pictures on mobile phones significantly influence consumers' initial attitudes toward advertisements. Experiment 2, focusing on delayed effects, was conducted 4 weeks after Experiment 1. Ninety-five of the 117 participants in Experiment 1 were contacted via cellular phone. The results of Experiment 2 showed a decrease in attitude in relation to motion pictures, whereas an increase in attitude in relation to text and still pictures was observed. The findings were interpreted from the perspectives of media characteristics, consumer behavior, and advertising research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The primary aim of this article is to estimate the multiple determinants of film advertising expenditures in four important media, namely television, press, outdoor and radio, in the UK. First, television advertising, the leading film advertising medium, is examined as part of a system of equations, capturing the interdependences between advertising, the number of screens on which films are initially shown and box office revenues. Then a reduced form model is put forward to reveal the determinants of film advertising in the four media. While major distribution companies have different preferences for the use of the alternative advertising media, results highlight the importance of quality signals, such as critical reviews, in determining advertising expenditures in the film industry. Moreover, advertising expenditures can themselves be considered to offer potential cinema goers signals of film quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through an analysis of the first British television ‘trailers’, this article explores an intersection within media history where the film industry attempted to reach out and utilise the new dissemination medium of television. Whilst this moment could be read as an attempt to control the promotion of film on British commercial television, and impose American film trailer aesthetics on the ‘rival screen’, I explore the television trailer as an early cross-media text that offered a challenge to existing trailer structure and style. By focusing on the recreation of these lost texts through trade press commentary, the article provides a new perspective on industry attitudes, media technology and media relationships in this transitional moment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the creation of a new visual environment in interwar Japan through the mass production and extensive distribution of movie advertisements. It explores both the theory and the practice surrounding the production of such advertisements, as well as the figural aesthetics by which they were informed. It argues that figural aesthetics amounted to the creation of a visual milieu, which can be characterized as ubiquitous, distractive and ephemeral. Moreover, the aesthetics was incorporated as an effective mode of appeal into both commercial ads and national/imperial propaganda from the 1920s through the early 1940s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]