A Lesson in Shilling: Cars and Movies
Posted on February 16, 2009, under Latest News and Trends.
Alright, it’s imagination time! Today we are thinking about cars in movies, don’t we love them. Sleek, lines cut sharp as blades, shining, shimmering cars that make you drool….that’s show biz wheels for you. Cars that have you rushing out the door and racing to the first car dealership, looking for the car finance guy who can show the way to own that beauty on wheels.
I don’t know if you ever think about the cars in certain movies, not think about them in the sense that you can’t think of anything but the car at all times, but think why this particular car and nothing else was used for this movie. Because ultimately, regardless of how gorgeous the cars are, they have been inserted into the frames of the movie for one reason alone – business. Product placement in movies, TV shows is simply done to glorify the product by associating it with stars or characters you like and love, and if it makes more of us get up and line up for vehicle finance to obtain any car loan or car lease to buy that car, then the trick has worked and as we stand, cooling our heels at the car finance company, the moviemakers and the car makers are laughing all the bank.
Products find spots on popular TV shows and upcoming action flicks (there’s not much you can do with a car in a romantic comedy that will make a girl get out and get a car loan to buy it), so we stick to action flicks that show the entire range of the car’s charms in high-speed chases, or lounging about next to the shimmering blue seas of Miami, (who cares if half the guys that own them are drug cartel lords) the LIFE is by the car and of the car. The car makes the life and the life gets the car. Capish?
More blatant instances in recent times:
1) Eva Longoria in Desperate Housewives – dresses up to the nines in a cocktail dress and tries to sell a Buick Lacrosse to the discerning audience in a mall. What follows is a recital of ad copy by Longoria but if you think anyone dared to switch channels, you’re wrong. Maybe she should offer car finance tips as well. Nobody would bother checking the fine print.
2) In Heroes, Nissan made sure that the Versa and the Rogue both got honourable by-name callouts by characters. If it messed with the story line (Why does Hiro need a car if he can teleport?) the carmakers pretended not to notice.
3) Transformers – Ford made sure that all the nice “fluffy” robots were Fords, the evil one was a Saleen.
4) Iron Man – The cast of Iron Man turned out in Audis. a shot in the arm for the automaker as every kid above the talking age could manage only two intelligible words after watching the movie…”Ironman” and “Audi”.
