Mediocrity's claim to fame: Sex-sells-Campaign Best PR Hollywood can offer

Januar 19, 2013

Mediocrity's claim to fame: Sex-sells-Campaign Best PR Hollywood can offer

“All is fair in love and war”

Two Razzies and two Oscars coming right up

They say an image is worth a thousand words, especially in Hollywood. If that image hints at a scandalous affair, even better. Hollywood's favourite glittering vampire couple, by now re-enacting breaking up part 2, proved that much. Kristen Stewart and her married director Rupert Sanders are in fact yesterday’s news, the very public perfectly scripted Hollywood apology took care of that, and suddenly all everyone could talk about was the earth-shattering end of Robsten. But at the same time it was the biggest media coup anyone could ever land. In true Hollywood manière no publicity is bad publicity, especially since there is a Snow White sequel looming on the horizon, reportedly without the cheating husband.

“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” (Sun Tzu)

The rumours about a supposed romantic liaison between the Twilight lovebirds were abuzz and an actual real-life Bella and Edward story would have been the icing on the cake, at least for fans. Rumours do have a horrible way of catching you at a time when you are least expecting it, unless of course your public behaviour just keeps the rumour mill running, almost kisses do that. What followed were months of denial and for quite some time they lead fans, yellow press reporters and paparazzi on a merry dance, but than it was time to pay the fiddler. Now, it’s war out there. And the little games you played with the bloodhounds were all fun as long as they lasted, but they caught your scent.
So Ms. Stewart had an affair. And the media has pictures to prove it. All warfare is based on deception, and you got caught up in your own games. Everything is business as usual until, interestingly enough, Ms. Stewart goes all out to confirm not only had she an affair, but she was also in a committed relationship with her British boy toy. The fans were be outraged, but in a place like Hollywood, where marriages are officially annulled, terminated and divorced after only two weeks of wedded bliss (Mario Lopez and Ali Landry), all is forgotten and forgiven by the time the next movie is rolling around.
In a multi million dollar industry a scandal is just another way to make money for all the parties involved, PR guys for official statement, paparazzi to offer up photographic proof, the moralists, the media from morning to evening, talk show host to comedy central, everybody suddenly had not only an opinion and talked about the Hollywood couple. Dozens of media outlets reprint the pics, the paparazzi probably made a fortune. Sun Tzu wrote: “It is the supreme art of war to subdue the enemy without fighting”. And we were so blinded by the spectacle to even realise that we, the public, were the enemy. Everything comes back to Kirsten Stewart and Rupert Sanders, who coincidentally made a movie together, that, according to most critics, is good for a first try. Yet, it for its opening day, the movie toped the box office[1], worldwide it made almost $ 400 million dollars, making it an overall success in spite of mixed reviews.[2]
The New York Times called it the product of the “sleek and seductive marketing campaign”, oddly enough A.O. Scott did not exempt himself, he is part of the business, and on the campaign, outing Ms. Stewart’s Snow White as a new and improved version of Bella 2.0, the “the very embodiment of romantic indecision, there are two possible suitors chivalrously circling her”. Ironic isn’t? According to him this type heroine is “part of an interesting new breed of warrior princesses […] whose ascendance reflects the convergence of commercial calculations and cultural longings”. Even James Berardinelli speculated the film would necessarily feed of Ms. Stewart’s popularity with the Twihards. The British Guardian called it “tangled and overblown” but “franchise friendly, in particular with a director like Sanders who gained his first experiences in the world of commercials. He definitely knows how to tell a good story.

“In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity” (Sun Tzu)

And the props and characters were already in place, the almost Aristotelian drama about to unfold off screen is foreshadowing the only the 2013 sequel on screen. The character inventory is relatively classic, Snow White’s beloved confidante and sister in all but blood, the romantically challenged heroine, the cute and trusting British boyfriend, the betrayed wife as well as the more experienced, older and sadly married lover. All that story now needs is a twist – say, a paparazzi taking pictures of our heroine cheating on her beloved with the older guy – and the scandal is complete, usually dramatists call this Peripeteia, the turning point in the story. As the conflic of protagonist and antagonist or in this case the beloved boyfriend and the ex-lover publically unravels, the action is allready falling. It was over, the love triangle broken at least until the premiere of Breaking Dawn Part 2. Gustav Freytag famously called that “retardierendes Moment” - the the final moment of suspense. Robert’s sisters suddenly were there to forgive Snow White for cheating on their brother, friends supposedly leaked insider info about Robsten’s kinky sex life, all is well that ends well, or not? It is certainly no Shakespearean catastrophe or a dénouement à la Molière. This resolution is in Hollywood manière deus ex machina but as long as it keeps the mills running, until they get new fodder. 2012’s second Snow White version is nominated for two Oscars, so there is a big Reunion coming up in February to spur the media on. But with this tangled web of PR-edited lies and confusion techniques but then again, there is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare.

[1] http://boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=3454&p=.htm

[2] http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=snowwhiteandthehuntsman.htm

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Ophelia de Vere