Cinematic Online Experiences – 2012 and District 9

Happy 9-9-09! No need to talk about Beatles Rock Band or other wacky product launches… or movie launches!

So… I came across another fake PSA and I had to start rambling about how much I love this…

The growing trend for big blockbuster movies is to engage it’s fans months and months before a films release. Build up the hype online for a fraction of the cost during a week of filming, right? Even the dollar amount for the execution is just a fraction of the media buy for the commercials and trailers.

At first I was extremely impressed with the District 9 and the various sites in it’s world… I mean there was a political cause at hand… Humans vs. the Non-Humans. Which side are you on and where do you make your stand. Explore the fictional world… what’s the controversy of their occupation (or are we keeping them here, etc.)

I dream of working on programs that go this deep… that take the narrative beyond the movie. Sort of between the pages of the script so you have this backstory that goes deeper. Heroes has been quite successful in the past 2 years doing this with the TV medium… but to see in spike so quickly and disappear online for movies, just blows me away. It’s like plotting an elaborate story for people to discover hidden nuggets. Not really an ARG… I don’t know what to call it. Online Narrative Immersion? Is that catchy?

And why not another fake PSA for ya?

District 9 Sites:

• Main Website
• District 9 Game – MNU Alert
• Multi National Training
• Multi National
• MNU Spreads Lies (for the Aliens…)
• Multi National
• Math From Outer Space

Holy crap! That’s a ton of content. It’s beautiful, trippy, and keeps you snooping around for more and more.

Then I saw the sites for the new film 2012… and was simply blown away by the details of its online universe. First thing, The Institute for Human Continuity. Just as much info as a real .GOV website.

It goes even further… They have a twitter page with a sweepstakes for fanboys that caught on early… but then it plays the other side just like District 9 with the counter-blog called This Is The End. Of course, the hero of the movie has his own site for his upcoming book, which, by the way, predicted this whole 2012 crap: Farewell Atlantis.

Explore the sites… see the movies. The trend will continue to grow. Some do it better than others. (For instance, Gamer has a bunch of random sites…. Dancing ARG Girls from Society which is kind of quick buzz generator, but then it stops there.)

Some cinematic experiences won’t have sequels, but hope to hook fans before the movie is in the can. I think if you’re pursuing the right audience, they’ll play along because they (we) hunger for unique content. We want to play along in the story, no matter how crazy it may be.