01 PROMOTING MEDIA: LEGO MOVIE

1. We study the 5 Lego posters  of Emmet, Wyldstyle, Lord Business and Vitruvius
2. We view a walk-through of the video game and note what the audience pleasures consist of.
3. If there is time, we read the review by Stuart Beedie:
   "Today’s blockbuster franchises rarely exist simply to sell themselves – they double as advertisements for a raft of goods, from tie-in video games to personal appliances. A film studio is never just a film studio, but a small subsidiary of a conglomerate, with revenue to be raised by the many arms of the octopus..."

PREP Get to know a bit about The Lego Movie (2014) by watching the trailers or, if you have access, a bit of the movie itself. We will not be tested on the whole movie, but we do need to understand its appeal to its audiences.

For instance, it is really interesting to watch the Behind The Scenes of the Lego Movie 
which opens with the question: "What is The Lego Movie? Well...." then explains it.
Useful to note comments such as 

• "The whole world is created out of Lego bricks and populated with Lego figurines."
• "Emmet is just this normal guy who is thrown on this crazy adventure with some famous personalities."  
• "There were some big egos."
• "Like all my movies, Batman is the main character and this is no exception."
• "The cool part is, all these Lego worlds come together... there are superheroes, Ninjas, knights, pirates, a space dog, a space cat.." 
• "Wyldstyle, she's the most awesome kick-butt hero of all time, a strong role model for girls everywhere."

Read the OCR pdf guide to the Lego movie video game: industry and audience here

Read the OCR pdf guide to the Lego Movie: industry here

Making the Lego Movie Ad Break

Lego ensemble poster

In Section B, there are three questions on how media is promoted.
Your case study is The Lego Movie, its marketing (ad break trailer  & advertising posters) and the video game. Below the specification is the exam paper.

Question 6 = one mark. Question 7  is worth 4 marks, so write half a page.

Question 8  is worth 10 marks. Write a page and half. Refer to theory.

PEGI regulates the video game industry. Open the link to see PEGI's website. Pan European Games Information.
Film companies release video games that are linked to films in order to promote the film. They market a number of related products as a form of media synergy, with each product cross-promoting the next.
Read this interesting article about the synergy of the Lego movie franchise.

 

Wyldstyle poster

Lord Business poster

Emmet poster