ATTENTION: THIS IS ADVERTISING!!!

I often mentioned the status of Hollywood as an economical entreprise. Not surprising so, that the big studio bosses try to make some money. Of course selling tickets, DVD´s, blue-rays and merchandise is one main source to fill the cash boxes. Well, there still is the XXX rating their movies, but no nasty code is really preventing them anymore to produce blockbuster with a lot of blood or other nice pictures that attract the audience. Only too bad that the mechanism of dulling is coming in. At least that wouldn´t be surprising looking at the following statistic of the society pages:

Introducing with this little excursus, the main point lays somewhere else. There is another income source that Hollywood studios like very much: Using synergy-effects. Meaning that certain images of the movie follow specific interests of either econonomical/political partners or simply cooperating companys. Some examples:

- The universal studios like to produce movies like U-571 (2000) and Charlie Wilson’s War (2007). Maybe because Universal’s parent company is General Electric, whose most lucrative interests relate to weapons manufacturing and producing crucial components for high-tech war planes, advanced surveillance technology, and essential hardware for the global oil and gas industries, notably in post Saddam Iraq.

- Disney likes to produce pro-establishment messages in its films like In the Army Now (1994), Crimson Tide (1995), and Armageddon (1998), maybe because several movies received generous assistance from the US government and were Pentagon-backed.

- Disney released the TV movie The Path to 9/11, which kind of intended to exonerate the Bush administration and blame the Clinton administration for the terrorist attacks

- Twentieth Century Fox glossed-over the history of the aboriginal Natives and made the country look like a fantastic place to go on holiday in Australia, maybe because Twentieth Century Fox’s parent company (Rupert Murdoch's News Corp) worked hand-in-hand with the Australian government, that were waiting with millions of dollars of tax rebates in reward to the well done tourism campaign.

You get this kind of "product placement" or "opinion placement" free with your ordered ticket. Isn´t it great?

"The greatest movie ever sold" is a documentary coming up in Hollywood 2011. It deals with these topics of branding, advertising and product placement. It´s the new movie of Morgan Spurlock (" Super Size Me" 2004) Ironically it is financed and made possible by brands, advertising and product placement! Enjoy!