If you’re going to sell a movie like Unhinged, you have one of two options: you can either go the more traditional route and sell your film with the utmost seriousness, or you can go the full grindhouse route and play around with your potential audience. As we’ve seen before, director Derrick Borte’s film is not above messing with moviegoers, and now the movie’s marketing department has cooked up one hell of a campaign.
Take a look at this new ad that promotes Unhinged as 100% less confusing than Christopher Nolan’s Tenet:
In a campaign that’s already seen Russell Crowe writing and filming ominously funny ads that sold Unhinged as one hell of a thriller, this road rage rampage is now taking some swipes at the competition. More specifically, the recurring claim that Christopher Nolan’s brand of cerebral blockbuster leaves audiences scratching their heads more than most of the time has come into play. And for a second weekend ad on the picture’s official Twitter feed, it’s a pretty out-of-the-box move.
Again, Unhinged isn’t a movie that’s selling itself through the traditional means of advertising. Not for one second are the folks behind this movie selling the story of Russell Crowe terrorizing Caren Pistorius’ single mother protagonist as the movie that’s going to change cinema. Instead, the marketing minds behind Unhinged are promoting it with an off-kilter sense of humor and promising a junky good time for those who just want to take an hour and a half ride through a brutal romp. Which only leaves us wanting to revisit one of those Russell Crowe-written gems that embody that approach to the hilt:
To be sure, this unorthodox approach to movie ads doesn’t always work. We’ve seen this sort of campaign backfire back when the John Travolta drama Gotti tried to rev up moviegoers and take shots at the critics that didn’t really enjoy the film. So the tricks that Unhinged is using aren’t totally alien to the world of cinematic sales, though they are much less aggressive when it comes to how the critics view either film. Judging by the CinemaScore that Tenet drummed up recently, audiences might find themselves agreeing with this campaign’s overall message.
It’s up to you to decide where your movie money goes, dear readers, as both Unhinged and Tenet are in theaters now! If you’re up to returning to the movies, you have your choice of what film will welcome you back! Though if you’ve seen Tenet and you are indeed scratching your head, don’t try to understand it… just feel it. Okay, you should totally try to understand it, which is why we have not only an ending explanation feature, but also a time inversion breakdown available for your inquiring mind to devour.
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