A film’s success at the box office rests on a shopping list of factors, most of which have nothing to do with its quality.
There is the “star” effect: the history and persona that movie star brings from their past films and well documented personal lives. It is the reason why your grandma (who lives in a weatherboard house in western Newcastle) seems to know Angelina Jolie so well. “She’s such a lovely woman…all that she does for the kids in Africa,” says granny.
But what about films with no budgets and no stars, what do film marketers do then? In this situation, the “Little Film That Could” plan is deployed. This involves the personification of a film into a kind of struggling entity. Films can be like Idol contestants: underdogs with past trials, tribulations and their very own journey.
Take The Blair Witch Project, to this day it is one of the most profitable movies ever made with respect to its cost to profit ratio. Its alleged twenty-five thousand dollar budget was worn as a badge of pride which symbolised its frugal ingenuity. Here was a film with no stars, no known director and no production values that became an event film on the very basis of these “deficiencies”.
In the perfect storm of hype surrounding the film’s success, the question many were left asking was – “was that actually any good?” In hindsight, removed from the context of its humble budget and well-executed marketing campaign, it was atmospheric if eventually tiresome and nausea inducing. But in the period of its theatrical reign, one could do little to resist the pluck of the filmmakers, and the at times chilling 
effectiveness of their conceit. Ingenious marketing, like all other forms of propaganda, is sometimes hard to shake.
Now we have Paranormal Activity, the “Blair Witch” of 2009. This film follows a couple who attempt to expose and capture on camera supernatural activity in their home. Like The Blair Witch Project, this film is similarly imperfect and dull despite some neat moments. But it has and will continue to make money. People enjoy a success story, whether it be Susan Boyle or a small film made with a budget of eleven thousand dollars that goes on to make a hundred million. And as hard as you try, it is sometimes near impossible to disassociate a film’s marketing “story” from the end result we see on screen. When we gain such clarity, it generally comes with that distinct bitter feeling of having been ripped off.
A fantastic take on the whole thing. I will never watch either ‘Blair’ or ‘Paranormal’, because I don’t really do scary movies, but I’ve liked the story behind both of them. I guess that means I got sucked in as well.
It’s a very clever trick to convince people to pay to see terrible camera-work on a plot-less project.
What does irritate me is the spate of low budget attempts to cash in on their successes that inevitably follow. Suddenly everyone thinks they to can just whip out a feature film.
It’s interesting to note the guys who made ‘Blair’ haven’t gone on to make anything significant since.