Man, gotta hand it to the New York Times for this headline and image side by side: A Director of Two Films Is Suddenly a ‘Visionary’ by His Third? With Dr. Manhattan mouth agape in full outrage one can’t laugh at the delicious sarcasm of it all.
“Marketers at Warner Brothers may have set a new standard on stretching the truth by heaping an unusual amount of praise on the director of the forthcoming superhero film ‘Watchmen.’ Billboards for ‘Watchmen’ are causing some double takes in Hollywood because they call the director, Zack Snyder, a highly regarded but relatively inexperienced filmmaker, a ‘visionary director’ above the title of the film.”
Man, this piece is pretty biting. They note that Wired magazine called “such hyperbole” a sign “that ‘Watchmen’ may not have the goods.” Man, don’t tell that to even the seemingly wisest of the geeks that are taking the slightest ‘Watchmen’ blowback with watchdog-like ferocity (more on that tomorrow, but god, don’t dare think a negative thought as they will snarl!)
Wired goes on, noting, yes, they get what advertising and marketing are — exaggeration –, but warn, “Calling the director a ‘visionary’ because he took some of the most famous comics in the world and literalized them in cinematic form is worse than bad marketing. It’s bad faith.” The Times says that by “publicly crowning the affable Mr. Snyder a visionary,” WB is working against themselves as Snyder’s agents will have plenty of salary increase ammo should they ever need him for more sequels or other franchises (“300” prequels, Frank Miller’s ‘Dark Knight,’ etc. etc.)
I’ve been saying for a while now that Snyder is only called a “visionary” because they can’t call him “award-winning.”
Oooo, or maybe he’ll work on a “Visionaries: Knights of the Magical Light” movie next.
I agree – this is bad marketing. It turns me against Snyder in a big way. It’s like if I made a movie and had myself proclaimed “the greatest living mo-fo in movies” when my name came up. It just makes you look cheap. Just say “a movie from,” and let the pieces fall where they may.
Either way, I have no respect for somebody who’s made a career out of doing cheap remakes of pre-existing franchises.
Hell “acclaimed” would be better than visionary. I could deal with Snyder being called “acclaimed” since there’s SOME truth to that.