Adventures in Marketing || ||

3-D Sex and Zen Sequel Will Vibrate in 4-D

Despite the censors and lackluster reviews, 2011's Hong Kong softcore period piece 3D Sex and Zen went on to make money. So naturally, producer Stephen Shiu wants to up the ante. A sequel entitled 4D Sex and Zen: Slayer of a Thousand from the Mysterious East is being plotted to include the added in-theater experience of vibrating seats. I mean, of course! How have the folks at D-Box not figured out how to capitalize on the erotic fourth dimension already? [Yahoo! Phillippines via Twitch Film]

Adventures in Marketing || ||

Old Racists, Ex-Colleagues Among Harvey Weinstein's Latest Enemies

What week for Harvey Weinstein: Win a truckload of Oscars on Sunday, re-up on a PR war with the MPAA on Tuesday, and then today — as his company's other notable French import Intouchables prepares for its U.S. premiere in New York City — start a trans-Atlantic flame war with France's most infamously racist old coot. It's like Linsanity, but for Hollywood megalomaniacs! Weinsanity! And there's more.
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Harvey Weinstein's Bully Problem — and Ours

You've heard about Bully, right? The anti-bullying documentary featuring real video of real teenage bullies tormenting real peers, interspersed with experts and victims alike expounding on our ongoing bullying epidemic? Of course you have, because when The Weinstein Company wasn't shoving its 2012 Oscar crop down your throat, it was protesting way too much about a ratings "controversy" that would require youngsters under 17 to attend the doc with a parent or guardian. God forbid! Because the last thing we want is parents and teens watching and ideally discussing a film about bullying, right?
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Will Action-Packed Final Trailer Fix Things for John Carter?

It's no secret that Disney's been scrambling to counteract bad tracking and mixed word of mouth on their mega-budgeted March actioner John Carter, so it's worth a look to see what they've done with the latest (and "final") trailer for the Edgar Rice Burroughs adaptation. And behold! A trailer filled with nearly everything that makes John Carter worth going to see: Alien creatures, political intrigue, Taylor Kitsch in a loincloth, Lynn Collins as Dejah Thoris, and lots of inventive, fantastical action.
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Avengers Assemble in Photoshop -- Er, New Poster

On the eve of a new trailer debut, Marvel has released a new poster for May's superhero superteam pic The Avengers. Here you'll find all your favorite heroes gathered in various states of action and repose: There's Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) stalking her prey while Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) contemplates a sandwich, with Captain America (Chris Evans) having a senior moment in the background as Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) hogs the spotlight. Typical. Get a full look at the cut & paste wonderment after the jump.
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Adventures in Marketing || ||

Adventures in Hunger Games Marketing: Effie Trinket, Style Icon

As The Hunger Games' March 23 release fast approaches, Lionsgate is churning out a steady stream of stills and goodies and tie-ins to stoke the fires of fandom and they've put a surprising bit of marketing muscle behind not only star Jennifer Lawrence, but co-star Elizabeth Banks and her supporting character, Effie Trinket. On second thought, maybe that's not so surprising; Effie's strikingly gaudy visual look, representative of image-obsessed Capitol culture in the fictional nation of Panem, offers more in the way of marketing opportunities than Katniss Everdeen's tomboy-turned-teen warrior ensembles.
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Adventures in Marketing || ||

VIDEO: Shame Prompts Awesome 'Den of Sin' Campaign in South Carolina

Remember Shame? The NC-17 one featuring Michael Fassbender as a sex addict, Carey Mulligan as his off-kilter sister, a couple of notorious "late-night lovers" and a thriving awards-season profile that imploded a month ago like a dying star, seemingly having taken the film with it? Right, that one. Now, as per the rules of the cosmos and/or art-house schemes in Columbia, S.C., that star has finally exploded back into consciousness in perhaps the best way possible.
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Are There A Dozen Headshots Too Many in This Redband Video from Act of Valor?

By many accounts -- okay, mostly just the filmmakers' -- this week's commando pic Act of Valor marks a new kind of filmmaking on account of it's a Navy SEALS actioner starring real active duty soldiers that takes the viewer along on a near-firsthand experience of what it's like to fight terrorists and baddies. From the looks of the film's new redband featurette this means audiences will get to see what it looks and sounds like to drop dome shots left and right in the heat of battle, because nothing says "valor" better than shooting strangers in the head with automatic weapons.
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Adventures in Marketing || ||

Watch the First 12 Minutes of Sound of My Voice: Brit Marling and Cult Jam

Festival darling Brit Marling burst onto the scene last summer with the sci-fi indie Another Earth (and will be seen in the upcoming fiscal thriller Arbitrage opposite Richard Gere and Susan Sarandon), but her turn as a mysterious cult leader in this April's Sound of My Voice is the more impressive introduction to the charismatic up and comer. Hit the jump to watch the first 10 minutes of Sound of My Voice, courtesy of Fox Searchlight, and see for yourself.
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Adventures in Marketing || ||

Weinsteins Piggyback on Smash to Expand My Week With Marilyn

With its soapy survey of a Broadway musical about Marilyn Monroe, the new NBC potboiler Smash is clinging to reasonably good ratings since launching last week. And now The Weinstein Company, never one to miss an opportunity, has discreetly hitched its double Oscar nominee My Week With Marilyn to Smash's own (alleged) Marilyn-fueled momentum.
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Amanda Seyfried Goes Porny for Deep Throat Vintage Art

Happy Monday! With filming underway on Lovelace, one of two competing biopics about '70s porn actress turned anti-porn advocate Linda Lovelace, the New York Times has a look at a faux-vintage poster featuring Amanda Seyfried as the XXX starlet in her star-making 1972 skin flick, Deep Throat.
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Three Stooges + NASCAR Demographic = A Match Made in Heaven?

Fox seems to think so: "Sean Hayes, Chris Diamantopoulos, and Will Sasso -- starring as Larry, Moe & Curly -- in the all new The Three Stooges movie from Twentieth Century Fox, will start the action by delivering the green flag at the Daytona 500, NASCAR’s most prestigious race, on Sunday, February 26th." [Press release]

Adventures in Marketing || ||

Uggie Receives Dog Version of Proust Questionnaire, Naturally

The Proust Questionnaire -- the renowned personal inquisition perhaps best known around these parts for concluding issues of Vanity Fair and episodes of Inside the Actors Studio -- has finally found its way to the dogs. Or at least to the dog. Trust me, you've heard of him.
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Adventures in Marketing || ||

Horribly Freaky Intruders Poster Will Scare Your Face Off

In director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo's horror tale The Intruders, Clive Owen investigates spooky happenings at home and discovers that something supernatural may be haunting his young daughter. How scary is this mystery perpetrator who makes things go bump late at night? Well, just hit the jump to get a good look at what it did to poor Owen's handsome face.
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Adventures in Marketing || ||

This Means War Scared Back to Feb. 17 Date by The Vow

Anticipating total Valentine's Day box office domination by competitor The Vow -- the Rachel McAdams-has-amnesia-and-can't-remember-she's-married-to-Channing Tatum weepie -- Fox has shifted their McG-helmed spy love triangle action rom-com This Means War again back to Friday, Feb. 17 to avoid being slaughtered. The Reese Witherspoon/Chris Pine/Tom Hardy romp is still sneaking into theaters on Feb. 14 for a limited pre-opening run, but who are we kidding: Channing Tatum + tears + pining is the way to go, especially if there's no shot at Hardy and Pine running off together in each others' arms. [Deadline]