Inglourious Basterds

As part of the social media film review we have been looking at new benchmarks for successful marketing campaigns by films exploiting the social media space to engage and disseminate information to potential cinema-goers. Dark Knight threw down the gauntlet to potential adopters of viral marketing strategies and the success of the multi-pronged Cloverfield campaign saw a creative and intelligent teaser campaign that involved moviegoers beyond the conversations at the water cooler. However, neither of these used the social phenomenon Twitter as effectively as Quentin Taratino’s Inglourious Basterds.

Recently we have seen correlations drawn between Twitter activity and box office performances. “Twitter sinks Bruno” articles, for example. However, according to Steven Zeitchik at Risky Biz Blog, Inglorious Basterds is the first film that can directly thank Twitter for its opening weekend box office success. A bold statement, indeed, given the proven audience-pulling power of both Pitt and Tarantino.

So, how can we/anyone make the claim that IB has, in fact, tamed the mob that runs the Twitter trending topics thus benefiting hugely from the “Twitter factor”?

The first step of any successful social media campaign is to recognise the medium that suits the project/message, and Twitter definitely facilitates the Tarantino fan. It’s a cult film director, slightly niche yet mainstream and with more one-liners per minute then most. It’s the perfect habitat for Tarantino fans to mingle and create conversations around the latest offering. This, in part, might explain the substantial 7,000+ following already acquired. (The Twitter population demographic breakdown indicates that circa 75% of users are over 25 and male and IB Distributor The Weinstein Company’s exit polling indicated that 58 percent of the audience was male and 72 percent was aged 25 and older.)

So far this summer the “Twitter factor” has been blamed for the poor takings of Sacha Baron Cohen’s Bruno on its second day at the US box office, plummeting almost 40% after the first day, and the unexpected success of low-budget sci-fi tale District 9. And the effect seems to have influenced the success of IB. When analysing the timing of its popularity in relation to the tweets about the movie, like Bruno, the effect can be seen after the first showing so that fans can make their mind up, spread opinion and thus influence those waiting for peer reviews before seeing it themselves.

To support this analytics provider, Crimson Hexagon, has commented that “78% of those who commented on Inglourious Basterds on Twitter gave positive responses, and that may have helped encourage people to see it.”

Prior to its release the film had provoked division among critics but Friday and Saturday tweeting swung it in a decidedly favorable direction. And it picked up momentum as the weekend went on, with Saturday Twitterers enthusiastically tweeting and re-tweeting their approval.

it is interesting, too, to compare positive and anticipatory tweets, given that conventional review sites such as Rotten Tomatoes had rated the film as low as 40%.

Positive tweets – Loved It, Pitt was Great, Have to See It, and Vintage Tarantino – make up 78% of all Twitter coverage, whereas combined negative tweets – Not Tarantino’s Best, Unimpressed – make up only 8%.

With that kind of data, it’s hard not to believe that the overwhelmingly positive response from the Twittersphere convinced at least some moviegoers to check out the movie.

As with Cloverfield and The Dark Knight, below are some statistics on the social media campaign, highlighting the importance of this digital element in marketing one of the most popular social past-times.

Trailer Diggs – 1234
Bebo members – 65
Facebook fans – 60,547
IMDb reviews – 42,837
YouTube views – 2,236,026
Box Office weekend total – $38,054,676
Twitter followers – 7,355

Sources

www.guardian.co.uk/film/2009/aug/25/inglourious-basterds-twitter-box-office

www.boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=2611

digg.com/search?s=inglourious+basterds+trailer

mashable.com/2009/08/24/twitter-inglourious-basterds/

www.bebo.com/Profile.jsp?MemberId=7601813869

es-la.facebook.com/inglouriousbasterdsinternational?ref=share&_fb_noscript=1

twitter.com/therealbasterds

www.slashfilm.com/2009/05/20/early-twitter-buzz-inglourious-basterds/

www.riskybusinessblog.com/2009/08/inglourious-basterds-twitter.html

mashable.com/2009/07/13/bruno-twitter-reactions/