What the Hell? “Devil Inside” at the Box Office

Edit: For the record, it’s Miranda Doerfler, even though I said Miranda Saico. Also, the formatting gets really weird towards the end.  I’m sorry if it’s hard to read for anyone.  It shows up normal on my screen, so I have no idea what’s going on with that.  Hopefully I’ll get that fixed soon.  Sorry!

I’m a chicken-shit.

It’s true.  When it comes to horror, I’m a big chicken-shit.  I’m squeamish, I get freaked out very easily, and I will scream like a 13-year-old girl (which shouldn’t be much of a surprise since I am a girl..) and I will grab the hand of whoever’s next to me, or the arm of my chair if I’m alone.  I’ll sleep with the lights on for a week after and check under my bed for whatever monster was in the movie.

It is for these reasons I refused to even consider seeing The Devil Inside after I saw part of the trailer (I couldn’t watch the full thing when that girl on the bed started contorting and breaking her bones, it was just too much.  See? Chicken-shit).

From what I’ve been hearing about it, however, it seems like the film was one big million-dollar joke.

Horror writer Miranda Saico, author of Modern Day Horrors, refuses to see it because, “1. Exorcism/possession stuff does not scare/interest me at all, 2. It doesn’t sound like all that strong or original a premise to begin with, and 3. I heard it was a disgustingly bad movie and that people who got to see it for free booed it.”

If the reviews are anything to go by, film critics agree that it was “a disgustingly bad movie.”

The question is then, how did it become such a big Box Office hit?

According to this article on “The Wrap,” The Devil Inside was such a big hit because of,  ”a combination of targeted marketing, lucky timing and the hands-on involvement of one of the biggest producers in Hollywood turned The Devil Inside from a super-low-budget orphan into the No. 1 movie in America.”

Joshua L. Weinstein explains how the popular trailer, which was first shown before Paranormal 3, went viral on Facebook and Twitter, sparking much conversation that was fueled by Paramount Pictures, Insurge Picture’s parent company.  The ad was also used in a targeted marketing campaign and aired during the finales of AMC’s zombie-thriller The Walking Dead and TNT’s American Horror Story. Ads were also shown on SyFy and Chiller.

One of the more unique aspects of the advertising campaign, in my opinion, was that the studio not only marketed the movie to the 18-35 audience but they marketed to the Latino 18-35 audience with Spanish language trailers and radio advertisements in the top 12 Hispanic markets.  In this way, they marketed the movie to two separate demographics.

Weinstein also observes that the movie’s release date played a large part in its success.  During the opening weekend of January 6th, when a movie generally has its largest audience, The Devil Inside was the only big film to open, which seriously reduced the competition.

Overall, it appears as though most of The Devil Inside’s success is mostly because of a very big, very well-planned targeted marketing campaign and a very lucky release date.  It’s clearly not because it’s the next Great American Film.

Either way, I’m still too much of a chicken-shit to watch it.

To See, or Not to See?

Greetings, gentle readers!

The other day, I was thinking about how shocking it was that I actually graduated high school.  It’s not that I’m really stupid and was failing all my classes; I just had a tendency to skip out on all my boring ones (under the guise of going to my locker or the library) and sneak into my friends’ more exciting ones.  If the teachers noticed, they never said anything (actually, a few did, but they liked me so it was all good).  While I wasn’t getting credit for the classes, I liked them.  They were interesting.  I actually learned things.

Today, I did something similar.  Everyone remember FMS 302? Well, there’s a continuation of that class this semester that I was really looking forward to taking; but unfortunately, my Bio 100 Lab is at the same time on Mondays, which means I couldn’t take it (damn scheduling conflicts…).

Wednesdays however, I don’t have a class.  So today, I sat in on the FMS 302 continuation (which I’m pretty sure the Prof was ok with).   It made me realize just how pissed I am that I can’t take this class this semester.

Guess what they were talking about, gentle readers?  Go ahead, guess…

Answer:  Movie trailers aired during the Super Bowl and the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of the movies’ posters.

Now, three stuck out in particular (probably because I’m a bit of a fangirl…):

Thor.

The best trailer in my opinion.  It grabs your attention, gives you a bit of a backstory without giving too much of it away, and sells a number of things to get people’s butts in the seats come opening weekend (adventure, supernatural, Marvel, 3D, sex, romance, redemption…)

Captain America.

Know what this reminds me of? A fan made trailer where they take scenes of a movie that don’t really fit together and do a mashup to really loud music. And it was only 33 seconds! I’m still excited to see this one though

The Green Lantern.

No just….no.

I don’t know what it is about DC versus Marvel in the movies but, to me anyway, it seems like Marvel does a better job adapting their heroes and villains to the times.  I mean, did you see who the Green Lantern’s up against? Couldn’t they have made it less…Sketchy-Mad-Scientist-With-Huge-Foredhead-From-The-1950s?  This is not timeless.  This doesn’t translate well to the screen.

Now, if they had shown it as a comedy (like the end of the trailer, with the suit–by the way: wtf?) I might have considered giving it a shot.  But first, it’s a drama.  Then it’s a–weird thing I don’t even know how to describe.  And then, a couple jokes.

What?

Is anyone else horribly confused by this? Does anyone else plan on paying &7.50 to see this in theaters? I don’t.

Bring on Thor and Captain America!

What say you, gentle readers?  Any thoughts?