Release
The president of Fox's marketing department felt the film was an "extremely difficult movie to market", that its story of two species evolving from enemies to friends made the science fiction picture less about the technology used to film it and more "along the lines of brotherhood." This was epitomized by the film's tagline: "Enemies because they were taught to be, allies because they had to be, brothers because they dared to be."
The studio pushed the film with a full marketing blitz: On the Sunday before Thanksgiving, full-page advertisements ran in 43 of the largest newspapers in the United States. Meanwhile, Fox arranged for a "network roadblock": three 30-second television commercials ran at virtually the same prime time moment on what were then the three television networks. Still that same day, 3,500 theatrical trailers were shipped to theaters across America and 164 of the nation's biggest shopping malls were covered with posters for the film.
The campaign received some critical scorn from those in the industry. The poster, with the two leads staring at each other, was singled out for failing to convey the warmth of the story. A marketing head at another studio called it "one of the worst of the year, really terrible. There was a way to make the movie much more palatable."
Read more about this topic: Enemy Mine (film)
Famous quotes containing the word release:
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