The conclusion of a viral marketing contest eventually led fans to the above picture of Tom Hardy as Bane in Chris Nolan’s upcoming The Dark Knight Rises, which started principal photography on Monday.  I would’ve covered the contest more closely before now, but viral marketing is for assh*les.

Bane, the chemically created brute who first appeared in the comics in 1993, is a “younger” villain for Nolan’s Batman mega-franchise, which has most prominently featured the Joker (who first appeared in 1940) , Two-Face (1942), Ra’s Al-Ghul (1971) and the Scarecrow (1941). But don’t let Bane’s relative newness fool you; the muscular juggernaut once broke Batman’s back in the comics. [LA Times]

And luckily, Brett Ratner wasn’t directing, or else he would’ve shouted “I’m the juggernaut, bitch!”   Anyway, Tom Hardy’s okay, I guess, if you like muscular, super-handsome yet masculine Brits who act really well.  Pff, whatever, man.

[Full sized, high-res version]

While Vince was busy smashing Pajiba’s Texas Instruments graphing calculators, there was a viewing at Sundance for The Woman, a new film from director Lucky McKee, who does not, unfortunately, have a sister named Tits. McKee previously directed some other stuff, but namely The Woods, which starred Bruce Campbell and therefore makes it awesome. But McKee’s latest film is getting buzz for something that happened off the screen – namely some guy freaked out during the screening and had to be escorted out.

The man, who is not identified in the video, claims that The Woman is incredibly offensive to women and should not be shown. In fact, he points out that one woman in the audience fainted. Wow, sounds like it’s a pretty graphic film, so what’s it about, IMDB?

When a successful country lawyer captures and attempts to “civilize” the last remaining member of a violent clan that has roamed the Northeast coast for decades, he puts the lives of his family in jeopardy.

So it’s like Nell but with graphic violence? Cool, I’ll take it. As for the guy and this perfectly timed video… he’s an actor and it’s fake. I don’t necessarily have much proof other than some comments on a YouTube page, but I’ve got a pretty good BS detector and the siren is blazing on this one. But I tip my hat to Lucky and crew, because their promotional idea is working and many people who are annoyed with this a-hole want to see the film now. Maybe I’ll try something similar for my first film, Watch Me Bathe Grandma.

Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s another one of these faux-candid “viral” videos of Cameron Diaz and Tom Cruise on the set of Knight and Day.  It’s newsworthy only in the sense that 20th Century Fox has been sending these out, and I only post it because it confounds me in every way.  Seriously, what in the f*ck is this? It’s so poorly conceived and executed and so pointless on every level that it might as well be one of those Mary Worth comic strips where two ladies stand in the backyard talking about stamps. The only thing I can figure is that they’re just making these to piss me off.

Let me see if I can identify what they were going for in this: you have an imaginary crew member, who for some reason was filming a fellow crew member while he puts a camera lens into a box.  We’re to believe that this guy, who presumably works in the camera department of a big Hollywood film, can’t shoot video without turning his camera 90 degrees clockwise for no apparent reason.  This person then captures, COMPLETELY BY ACCIDENT, Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz playing soccer.  And here’s the kicker (Get it? kicker?  soccer?  I hate my life), THEY’RE REALLY GOOD.  Oh my gosh, people will say, I wasn’t planning on seeing this retarded hunk of sh*t movie BEFORE, but now that I know that CAMERON DIAZ AND TOM CRUISE ARE SURPRISINGLY GOOD AT SOCCER, I am powerless to resist such fascinating and candid Hollywood star power!  THANK YOU, MY MOM’S FRIEND WHO SENDS OUT EMAIL CHAIN LETTERS, WHAT WOULD I EVER DO WITHOUT YOU????

BUT WHAT OF THE DANCING CGI BABIES?!  I DEMAND THEM AT ONCE!!  I REFUSE TO SEE THIS MOVIE FILM UNLESS IT INVOLVES ELF BOWLING AND BIG MOUTH BILLY BASS!!  HOW WILL I KNOW YOUR MOVIE IS WORTHWHILE IF IT DOES NOT CAPITALIZE ON RECENT TRENDS??!! CALL THE WICHITA BRANCH! SET UP A BRAINSTORMING POWER POINT AT ONCE!

People send me links to movies’ viral sites all the time, but I rarely cover it because viral marketing is generally stupid.  I love The Dark Knight, but I couldn’t give less of a sh*t about your pretend campaign to elect Harvey Dent the mayor of a fictional city.  And you’re still a marketing douche, so stop acting like you’re Lenny Bruce.

That said, Piranha 3D is doing it right.  After I posted the trailer yesterday, reader Brendan discovered this viral site (NSFW).  It’s basically a fictionalized Girls Gone Wild with Jerry O’Connell playing the Joe Francis character.  There’s also a Facebook page with pictures of Eli Roth’s wet t-shirt contest emcee guy who looks like Channing Tatum’s Jewy cousin from back east.

Jerry O’Connell is his usual not-funny-but-trying-really-hard self, but I give the people behind this a lot of credit for making the whole thing really explicit.  The Meet the Girls section is especially boob-filled, and a lot of the girls look like they came from that strip club near the airport where my stepmom works.  …And I like that.

So if you’re one of the guys planning a viral marketing campaign, remember: straitlaced, unfunny backstory of fictional characters = who cares; explicit, funny, vulgar material you wouldn’t be allowed to show anywhere else = you’re doing it right.

Our friends at Screenjunkies just sent over this adorable video of what’s supposedly an elementary school production of Scarface.  Between the way they use a mound of popcorn to stand in for cocaine, say “motherfudger”, and use stick-figure drawings to represent Tony Montana’s security cameras, it’s all pretty cute.  But get real, people, no way this is real.  It’s too clever, the “amateur” camera work is too good, and the whole idea is just a little too Rushmore to be believable.  Nonetheless, pretty well done.  Enjoy it for a day or two before we find out what it’s selling.

“First ju get da money, den ju getta power.  Den ju get da women, den you getta cooties.”

[give it a Digg if you enjoy it]