Skyfall: Promotion & Marketing

Strengths Weaknesses

Opportunities

Threats

In August 2011 the Serbian newspaper Blic stated that Bond 23 would be entitled Carte Blanche and would be an adaptation of the recent continuation novel by Jeffery Deaver. On 30 August Eon Productions officially denied any link between Bond 23 and Carte Blanche, stating that "the new film is not going to be called Carte Blanche and will have nothing to do with the Jeffery Deaver book". On 3 October 2011 fifteen domain names including 'jamesbondskyfall.com' and 'skyfallthefilm.com' were reported to have been registered on behalf of MGM and Sony Pictures by Internet brand-protection service MarkMonitor. This led to supposition in the media that the film had been given the name "Skyfall". These reports were not confirmed at the time by Eon Productions, Sony or MGM. Skyfall was later confirmed as the title at a press conference on 3 November 2011, during which coproducer Barbara Broccoli said that the title "has some emotional context which will be revealed in the film". The title refers to the name of Bond's childhood home "Skyfall", and the setting for the film's finale. How has the promotion already started?

Trailers: How do they use the existing conventions of the Bond genre? What new things do they offer the audience?

Key Revelations: Information The main cast of Skyfall was officially announced at a press conference held at the Corinthia Hotel in London on 3 November 2011, fifty years to the day since Sean Connery was announced to play James Bond in the film Dr. No.
Director Sam Mendes described Bond as experiencing a "combination of lassitude, boredom, depression [and] difficulty with what he's chosen to do for a living"

Significance/ Audience Response

In casting the role, director Sam Mendes admitted that he lobbied hard for Bardem to accept the part. Mendes saw the potential for the character to be recognised as one of the most memorable characters in the series and wanted to create "something [the audience] may consider to have been absent from the Bond movies for a long time". He felt that Bardem was one of the few actors up to the task of becoming "colourless" and existing within the world of the film as something more than a function of the plot. To play the part of Kincade, Mendes cast Albert Finney. The producers briefly considered approaching Sean Connery to play the role in a nod to the 50th anniversary of the film series, but elected not to as they felt Connery's presence would be seen as stunt casting and disengage audiences from the film.

Promotional Tie Ins: The Bond films are well known for their high levels of product placement. Eon Productions earns huge amounts of money from the deals, and companies will compete vigorously to win the rights to be a partner in the film. Some attempts are made to weave the products into the narrative, although more cynical commentators feel that these attempts are very obvious and actually detract from the films narrative. Products featured in Skyfall: Cars: Landrover, Audi, Beetle, Range Rover, Jaguar and Aston Martin. Landrover Defender and Audi were seen in a car chase scene: Eve drove Landrover, while the bad guys tried to escape in Audi. During the chase a few VW Beetles fell from the train. Range Rover was used to transport Bond to MI6s new location and M and Bond used Jaguar XJ. Sony: Bond (or was it Q?) used Sony Vaio laptop (first seen in Casino Royale) and Sony Xperia T mobile phone. Macallan whisky: Macallan whisky was probably the most in your face placement. It occurred during the first meeting between Bond and Silva. The main villain offered James a drink, a 50-year old Macallan, because its his favourite drink. Additionally, we saw M and Bond drinking Macallan on two different occasions. Heineken: The much hyped Heineken appeared in two scenes: Bond was lying in bed with a girl and we could see a bottle of Heineken in his hand. The other appearance was in a big office: Tanner, one of MI6 employees was sipping beer from Heineken bottle. Omega: Bond wears a Seamaster watch. Tom Ford: Bond wears the designers suits. Walther PPK: Walther PPK pistol is a longtime Bond companion. Abridged from this link, where you can see screen stills of products: http://brandsandfilms.com/2012/11/productplacement-in-pictures-skyfall/ How does each of these related texts use and represent conventions of the Bond genre?

Sony

Visit Britain

Heineken

Coke Zero

Omega

007 Legends

Bollinger

OPI

Adele: Skyfall

Other Promotional Tie-Ins: