I'm so acclimated to product placement that it didn't bother me either. The Lethal Weapon movies and the cologne Hero was the hump I never got over :P......

The product placement was just a smidge over the top, and the characters were characatures, but I still loved the movie. Lots of good action and very funny.

Well, look at the movie Matrix Reloaded. The two prominent vehicles portrayed in the Highway Chase scene were two new Cadillac models. The CTS and the Escalade EXT. You can't tell me that was coincidence.

:up::up:

Of course it wasn't. But would you rather a) buy 300 cars to destroy or b) have GM give you 300 cars to destroy in trade for using their vehicles. That's the mindset behind all of these moves, and as long as those products aren't used in a tacky way (Matrix wasn't at all imo) then I've got no issues with it.

You may not have noticed, but every vehicle in the Frenchman's garage was a cadillac, including many classics. Do you think he might possibly have had a caddy collection? Granted, GM probably supplied the cars, which is a huge cost offset, but at least it was put into the context of the story.

Nice sig BTW. -rolleyes-

Looks like someone didn't watch one of the featurettes on the original Matrix Reloaded DVD. If you thought the fact that all GM cars were featured throughout The Matrix Reloaded, God forbid you watch The Matrix Revolutions when Powerade billboards are featured during the subway chase scene...

[And as mentioned before, GM supplied 300+ cars to the two films FREE OF CHARGE. The highway chase scene alone cost around $40-45 million. Would've been a bit more if Warner/Village Roadshow had to buy 300+ brand new cars themselves.]

Being honest that scene didn't bother me because of product placement, I was too busy trying to get past this vampire hunter was going to hunt vampires with something drowning out surrounding sounds while her prey has super hearing and the like. It was just baffling .

I don't mind it when it's in context and not too obvious. Sometimes though, they just focus on the item too much, or make it really stupid by having one company's items throughout the movie, when it's totally unrealistic to do so.

The Matrix stuff I didn't mind so much, because the Cadillac thing made sense, seeing as I thought it was a Cadillac collection. On the highway thing, I didn't really notice much because I'm not a big expert on cars, and GM has a lot of different types of cars... also, the whole thing is a computer simulation, so it's easier to ignore :) That's why I don't mind the Powerade thing, which would have bugged me if in another movie.

I think Cast Away was somewhat unique, in that Fedex paid no money for product placement. According to the director:


Of course though, the CEO of Fedex did happen to be one of the investors in the filming company that did it...


That aside, it did bother me a bit to see Fedex every few minutes...


Another movie that had does badly with product placement is "I, Robot". I just saw it for the first time on my way back from Sweden...


Vintage 2004...yeah, whatever. Let me just go hop in my Audi.

I think it's funny that product placement was the biggest problem someone had with Blade: Trinity.

Hey I still had a blast during the entire movie so I really couldn't give two shits. It's not like any of the movie was realistic or serious to begin with. It just adds something else to laugh it. It was a hella fun movie.

Sure it made them money, and had they not used the products, would have lost them money. Jack is right. By bringing in revenue from product placement they're subsidizing the making of the movie. Look at how Blade: Trinity is falling fast on the box office charts now...... they managed to recoup some of what they may lose by spending Apple's money to make the film.

It's like athletes with product endorsements. They get paid huge amounts for endorsing a product. In this case the movie is the athlete. It bothers me alot more seeing a kid out of high school with a 90 million endorsement contract for friggin' smeakers than it does to see an Ipod in a movie.

I highly recommend an episode of the PBS show Frontline that touches on product placement. It's called "The Persuaders" and you can watch the whole thing HERE. (Product placement is discussed in the third segment called "The Times They Are A-Changin'")

When it comes to motion pictures and pay TV, I think product placement goes too far when the content of a story is heavily altered, or entirely created around a specific product. "The Persuaders" gave an example of this occurring in a episode of "Sex and the City." This is from the transcript...

"To mate a brand with the commercial-free HBO series Sex and the City, Absolut Vodka and HBO writers worked out a storyline in which one of the show's characters finds his way onto an Absolut billboard...
LINDA EATHERTON, Ketchum Public Relations: [Absolut] created a drink called the Absolut Hunk. So we went to the producers of Sex and the City , and we said, "OK, we've got a real product and a real drink called the Absolut Hunk. We want you to weave an entire storyline around this drink and this product, so that it is unmistakably the conversation piece on Monday morning at the water cooler." It was quite the buzz. " (end quote)


Yes, the studios have every right to recoup costs, and attempt to lower their financial risk, but I agree with the following quotes (though they are directed at television, I think they apply to movies, and I think this thread exemplifies what they're saying...)


"MARK CRISPIN MILLER, New York University: Now, you think back to those dramas, those comedies that have really stayed with you, that have moved you tremendously, that you want to see again, that you think about for days. Well, those kinds of works are increasingly unlikely when the stuff that's on TV basically functions to sell Pepsis, to sell Nikes, to sell selling, to sell consumption. "

"BOB GARFIELD, Columnist, Advertising Age :There's no secret that the American public, and the public of every society on the face of the earth, is willing to consume crap. They consume crap, you know, from their cupboards and pantries, and they consume crap on television. But they're very particular about which is which, and they don't want to see them conflated. And they don't want the purity of their tele-crap to be adulterated by merchandising of the fast food crap. And they will rebel."

blade 3 - spolier question
 

watching blade 3.. missed the 2nd one... who are the people that have the tattoos on their wrists, but can still walk around during the day?

are they like vampire helpers? reg. people who help the vampires in exchange for staying alive?

They're mentioned in the first movie, Familiars.

They're basically vampire cronies, regular humans who want to become vampires, so they do the vampire biddings in hopes of being turned.

^ What he said.

check out the second one, its the best in the series

thanks guys