News
Lagging Cruise Film Tries Early Showings
June 20, 2010--20th Century Fox is lined up a sneak preview of its Tom Cruise-Cameron Diaz action satire Knight and Day after pre-release research shows there is low moviegoer interest in the film yet in closed screenings it plays well to audiences, says the Los Angeles Times.
The film opens next Wednesday at 3,000+ locations after yesterday having one-time-only early showings at 494 screens to paying moviegoers.
‘It’s clear that drastic action is needed to jump-start the picture’s prospects,” says the Los Angeles Times article by Claudia Eller and Ben Fritz. “Polling of potential moviegoers indicates that Knight and Day could generate less than $20 million on its opening weekend in the U.S. and Canada, a dismal start for a picture that cost $117 million to produce, not to mention an embarrassment for marquee actors like Cruise and Diaz.”
The over-the-top satire is in a hard-sell genre because it pokes fun at an audience favorite—the standard action adventure movie. The poster ad campaign for Knight and Day highlights the names of the stars, but only presents silhouettes, though the trailer is much better and clearly shows Cruise and Diaz (if you’ve got big stars, don’t hide them like the poster!).
“The move underscores the limited options available to a studio when last-minute research suggests a movie could go awry,” says the article. “Usually, when a film looks like it will open poorly, a studio will scrap and redesign the marketing campaign. But with only four days remaining before Knight and Day debuts in theaters, such a drastic measure would be prohibitively costly and cumbersome, especially at a time when studios are trying to keep a cap on spiraling marketing expenses.”
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