The Lego Movie: Poster Campaign

Analysis Recap:

DENOTATION - Denotation is very explicit information. It is information which is incredibly easy to gather, and stating the obvious.

CONNOTATION - Connotation is finding the hidden meaning.

Analysis of The Lego Movie Video Game Cover:

Denotations:

• It features a yellow male character in a high-vis jacket right at the forefront. He has dark hair and is holding a large blue wrench. There is also a large red brick on his back. He is smiling.
• Standing to the left of the frontal character is a female. She is wearing dark clothes which feature a minor blue and purple colour scheme, this mirrors her hair. She is smirking.
• In the far left of the background there is a large ominous figure who is wearing a large headpiece which is red and black with an orange orb which is gleaming. He has an apparent frown on his face.

Connotations:

• The yellow character at the front is the lead character of The Lego Movie - Emmet. As he is smiling in the midst of all the chaos and the danger is probably heroic. Due to the high-vis jacket he is probably a construction worker who builds things.

Lego Movie Promotional Posters:

In order to promote the Lego Movie, WarnerBros released many posters. Some of these feature individual posters of each character:

This is effective to do as it lets the audience familiarise themselves with the cast of characters. This will let them recognise characters, or memorise their favourite characters for later.

Different Types of Posters:

The first type of poster is the Teaser Poster. This one tends to come first and contains the least amount of information. It usually has a large dramatic image which builds suspense and anticipation for the film

The second type of poster is the Theatrical Poster. This poster tends to contain more information about the movie

The Lego Movie: Video Game

Simultaneous Release:

These are games released that tie into a movie. Some of these may be:

• TellTale's Guardians of The Galaxy
• Lego Pirates of The Caribbean 
• Lego Marvel Avengers
• Lego Star Wars
• Lego Harry Potter

The different reasons behind doing a simultaneous release is because:

• It will maximise profit. The promotion of a film will create some sort of awareness in potential consumers of the game.
• It's already familiar, so the characters will be recognisable and this may or may not make them interested in buying the game.
• It extends the pleasure of the film as it gives you a chance to partake in the film.
• The game promotes the film and the film promotes the game. With good marketing the likelihood of fans finding both of these is heightened.

Uses and Gratifications:

Blumler & Katz, in 1973, came up with a theory. This theory stated that people use media for 4 specific reasons. These reasons are:

• ENTERTAINMENT - Offers distraction from the world.
• PERSONAL IDENTITY - Helps us consider who we are; what ideas and values we identify with.
• RELATIONSHIPS - We find things we share and discuss with others.
• INFORMATION - New information we want to know or take pleasure in knowing.

Which Apply?:

These separate reasons apply to video games, as they are designed specifically to entertain. They also help build relationships as you can talk about how easy a certain level was or challenge each other to beat each others scores.

Put It All Together:

Explain two reasons why a film would release a tie-in video game for a film:

Two reasons as to why a film company would release a tie-in video game for their film is so the fans can engage and be the characters they love so much. It also lets them experience the events of the movie firsthand and lets them actively perform activities from within the movie. Also the film lets them promote the video game and vice versa.

Analyse how the Uses and Gratifications Theory can be applied to The Lego Movie Video Game:

The Uses and Gratifications Theory can be applied to The Lego Movie Video Game as it is a form of entertainment, in fact it was specifically designed to entertain people. It also affects relationships as it becomes a talking point so people can bond over it. Lastly it is a source of information, as possibly you may know some form of trivia and it gives you great pleasure in knowing it.

The Lego Movie: TV Advertising

LEGOtainment:

In Dancing on Ice at 7:27pm on Sunday 9th February - five days before the movie launched - ITV broadcast a world first, an ad break made entirely out of LEGO. The 3 ads it consisted of were the British Heart Foundation, BT, Confused.Com and Premier Inn. The final advertisement was for The Lego Movie itself. This is a work of intertextuality.

This generated a lot of hype, and many people started talking about it on social media. This means anyone who hadn't already seen it looked for it on Youtube.

This allowed the Lego movie to get a lot of free press.

The Lego Movie was incredibly successful but that was all due to its effective marketing. This marketing broke so many boundaries with branded marketing as it created varying adverts out of LEGO. It targeted many different portions of their target audience through the use of these LEGO rendered adverts. The Confused.com advert would appeal to most people as it had a lego robot, whereas the BT one would be viewed by people who actually wanted to switch their broadband provider, but they both served the same purpose and did the same thing, promoting the Lego Movie.
This drew the attention of newspapers and the Lego Movie immediately made front cover when naturally it would've cost thousands of pounds.

The Lego Movie: Marketing

MARKETING METHODS:

Create a trailer and post it on social media like Youtube or on TV.
Make an advert and put it in papers.
Show previews at a cinema before the scheduled movie.
Put an advert on the side of a bus.

SYNERGY:

Upon the release of the Lego Movie, a lot of tin-in merchandise was released in order to help promote it.

There was a Lego Movie Video-game which portrayed the events that occurred within the movie:

LEGO released multiple different exclusive lego sets which depicted scenes from the Lego Movie:

There are Lego Movie themed clothes:

There are Lego Movie themed stationery items, such as pencils and pens:

PROMOTION IN OTHER FORMS:

This is the Lego Movie website:
There have been a multitude of Lego Movie events, some taking place at Legoland:

There are Lego Movie posters:

The Lego Movie was promoted by McDonalds, and they had collectibles featured in Happy Meals:

Lego Audience

The Lego Movie has the Universal age rating

The Primary target audience are kids who like playing with lego.

The Secondary target audience is people who want to feel nostalgic or young cinema-goers who want to watch something light-hearted.

Appeal to Young Kids:

The Lego Movie will appeal to younger kids as they like playing with lego. It will also be cool to see a set composed entirely out of Lego and characters who are made from Lego. This would immediately appeal to anyone of them from the sheer amount of Lego in it, it also makes reference to other Lego sets such as Lego City and Bionicle.

Appeal to Parents:

The Lego Movie will appeal to Parents as it will probably fill them with a great amount of nostalgia as they used to play with it if they had any form of childhood. Upon seeing this film they'll probably recognise a lot from their old Lego City sets, such as how Lord Business is the CEO of Octan, a fictional corporation featured in many Lego City sets. This nudge back to their childhood will probably be a very nice east egg for them to find.

Appeal to Young Cinema-Goers:

The Lego Movie will appeal to any young cinema-goers as it's a very lighthearted movie fun of comedy. It's very easy to watch and has a high replay-ability factor as it has a wonderful story and excellent soundtrack.

Appeal to Both Genders:

The Lego Movie appeals to both genders as it has an incredible gender and a very powerful male and female lead.

Propp's Lego Characters

(Lego Movie) Film Facts

1. The processes behind a film being released are the seven stages of film making:

•  The first stage is Development, which is the creation and development of a script. 
•  The second stage is Pre-Production, this involves setting the vision of the project, and where the shoot will take place as well as who will be in the cast.
•  The third stage is Production. This is the key phase to keep planning ahead of the daily shoot. The main aim is to keep ahead of the schedule and keep within the budget.
• The fourth stage is Principal Photography, which is when the camera actually rolls. It's also the most expensive part of the film production due to the salaries, the costumes, the set and the props.
• The fifth stage is the Wrap, which takes place at the end of shooting. The set must be dismantled and returned to suppliers in perfect condition. A full set of records must be kept of the film shoot too.
• The sixth stage is Post-Production, this involves viewing and assembling the movie as well as doing other forms of editing.
• The final stage is Distribution. This is how the producers make all their money back, with a large interest at that, by selling the right to show it to many platforms such as Netflix or Amazon.But it usually tends to be shown in cinemas first.

2. What is a Conglomerate?

A conglomerate is a large corporation, made up of smaller businesses.

3. Who are the 'Big Six' Hollywood film studios?

• Warner Bros. Pictures with a market share of $5.03 billion globally. They are well known for producing both The Matrix and Harry Potter.
• 20th Century Fox come in at second. They have distributed many successful films, such as Ice Age or X-Men.
• Paramount Pictures are the longest operating major studio in Hollywood. It has a century of experience.
• Universal Pictures is best known for distributing three of Steven Spielberg's most critically acclaimed movies. These are E.T., Jaws and Jurassic Park.
• Sony Pictures Entertainment had an excellent year in 2012, due to it's films collecting $4.4 billion in ticket sales.
• Walt Disney Studios are known around the world for their movies, perfect for people of all ages. With movies based off famous Fairy Tales, like Snow White, or movies with completely original plots like Frozen or Moana.

4. Who regulates the films in the UK?

The British Board of Film Classification regulates the movies. They decide the age ratings of the movies, and which movies must be censored or removed entirely.

5. Which two main companies produced The Lego Movie?

6. Who was the producer of The Lego Movie?

7. Who directed The Lego Movie?

8. How was The Lego Movie funded?

9. Who distributed The Lego Movie?