We provided the strategic planning and talent sourcing for New Line Cinema’s ground-breaking ‘mash-up’ viral and buzz promotion of the Antonio Banderas movie ‘Take the Lead’

US movie studio New Line Cinema asked us to help promote the movie online in March 2006, prior to its cinema release. We suggested a method never previously used officially to promote film trailers: making a ‘mash-up’ or digital remix of the film’s video and audio assets.

‘Take the Lead’ is based on the true story of a New York dance teacher who volunteers to teach dance to students at a tough inner-city high school.

London-based VJ team Addictive TV made the first of three mash-ups. They set footage, lines and SFX from the film to a dance beat. Two further mash-ups were then made, one by UK VJs Eclectic Method, and another by American DJ 2nd Nature from Atlanta, Georgia.

The mash-ups were released online to select undergound music, user-generated and buzz web sites. They have since been circulated around the web from sites such as YouTube, and have also been shown in the real world at dance clubs in Europe and the US, including DJ 2nd Nature’s set at Studio 54 @ MGM Grand.

With this campaign, New Line were very innovative and took online viral marketing in a new direction. They embraced the user-generated media culture of audio/video mash-ups, resulting in remixed film trailers which work as great dance tracks in their own right.

The campaign helped the movie reach Number 3 in the US Box Office in its first weekend, and generated a wide range of coverage and ‘buzz’ online and offline, including:

Livejournal (’A Legal Remix’ by scalarparty, 23 March, 2006):

Instead of going the traditional route for pushing the new Antonio Banderas vehicle ‘Take the Lead’, the Hollywood execs decided to be cool.

Contagious magazine (’Viral Movie Mash-up’, 27 March, 2006):

…there’s no doubting one indisputable fact - we’d never heard of Take The Lead before this, and now we have. Score one to the viral marketers!

New York Times (’Going Unconventional to Market Movies’ by Stuart Elliott, 6 April, 2006):

New Line Cinema wants to take the lead in finding alternative ways to market movies beyond traditional methods like advertising on television and in newspapers.

Wired (’Movie Mashups Take On Trailers’, 1 May, 2006):

Hollywood has drafted a British VJ outfit to produce the first official movie mashup.

DJMag (’Remixing Hollywood’ by Terry Church, 4 May, 2006):

This is the first time that a Hollywood studio has embraced VJ culture…

Yahoo (12 April, 2006):

‘Take the Lead’ reaches Number 3 in the US Box Office in its first weekend, and is Number 1 in the Yahoo search of the most popular films.

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