“Everything is awesome. Everything is cool when you’re part of a team. Everything is awesome, when we’re living our dream.” I am sure the Marketing Execs at Lego have been singing those lyrics every day since “The Lego Movie” was released on February 7th. My children and I went to see the film this holiday weekend and even though we all thought the movie was AWESOME I was more impressive by the movies branding message. As a content and native entertainment executive I was amazed at how organic and seamless the story incorporated the product without it feeling like an advertisement for toys. It was simply entertaining, and I would place it as the greatest branded entertainment movie of all TIME, and a model – excuse the pun- for the future.
Advertising execs and content publishers should see this movie as a prototype of how to answer a brief or RFP for branded entertainment concepts. What makes this portrayal so effective is because it takes all of Legos brand positioning and issues and addresses them over 1 hour and 40 minutes. We can only wish that all commercials could be this entertaining while providing such organic messaging.
I am sure the meeting with the writers went down like this: sure we want a Lego Movie but you need to understand our needs and our audience. We have two types of customers we want to reach: those who build exactly what’s on the box and those who create their own projects and internal inspirations. The demographics are mainly children but we also have nostalgic adults who enjoy playing with models and toys. That group also includes fanboys who enjoy our licensed products. Our brand positioning is that we encourage creative play while installing a passion for building and architecture. Got all that? Ok writers and Warner Brothers Entertainment go make me a commercial… I mean movie!
The best part of the film is that it has an actual plot that could be followed by children and adults alike. Not once did I have to answer one of my kids usual “what’s going on?” questions. Of course that is probably due in some part that I watch PG13 superhero comic book fan boy films with them on a regular basis which perturbs their mother. The second best part is that the moral of the story coincides directly with Lego’s brand positioning centered on creative play and playing together. It took all of our strength not to travel to the late night Toys R Us in Times Square and buy a bunch of Lego build sets after the film let out. We decided to simply sing the theme song by Sarah and Tegan at the top of our lungs instead.
Is this the greatest branded entertainment movie of all time? Is this the best use of product placement that I have seen? I will expand upon that in a lengthier paper but my initial answer is yes. At $147 million in ticket receipts on a minuscule $60 million budget in 2 weeks it is on it’s way to challenging other formidable fare like Transformers, The original Pirates of the Caribbean, and the first two Toy Story movies. It has already crushed or is about to crush both GI Joe movies, Battleship, Kit Kittredge, The Watch, The Internship and the Smurf movies (can anyone explain to me how these movies are popular overseas? I don’t want to take food out of Neil Patrick Harris mouth, but these films are awful). In the end the only true competitors for G.O.A.T are the Transformers movies, The Pirates franchise and the final Toy Story installment. I’m immediately excluding The Pirates franchise because even though the first film was spectacular and it made my son obsessed with swords I don’t think he or most children ever made the direct link between Captain Jack Sparrow and a ride at Disney Land. He hasn’t asked for a trip as yet thank goodness. Next is Transformers. Ignoring the fact that the original Transformers had a decent story line while the following two were panned by critics these Michael Bay wonders have made a boatload of money and has encouraged the sales of a truckload of toys. The original Transformers film made $709 million worldwide and spawned two sequels with another one on the way with an entirely new cast as Shia LeBoef is no longer famous. What makes me lean more towards The Lego movie in this competition is that The Lego movie is loved by critics and fans alike with an 8.5 IMDB score and 96% critics score. Transformers, despite its gaggle of viewers and kids and adults rewatching them on cable and bluray the film has never been entirely loved by critics or fans even with its 57% critics rating and 7.2 IMDB score. The following two rake in more cash but the stories get worse, as do their ratings. And we will not even touch upon the hints of racist stereotypes in Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. But I guess these films are not made for critics but 8-16 year old boys whose tastes for fine storytelling are suspect at best. And if Hasbro is ok with the story lines- they did green light Battleship- then who am I to judge?
This just leaves Toy Story and it’s remarkable franchise. They basically started it all with the original film released in 1995. It landed Pixar on the entertainment map and causes a lot if Mr. Potatoes heads and Barbies to get sold. (Look up numbers). The third installment sold over $1 Billion worldwide and all three movies are loved by critics and audiences alike. So for now I am going to wait and see where Lego movie lands at the end of its run. But I think it will make a strong case as the G.O.A.T. with it’s great story, catchy tune, cheap production costs, and hypnotic messaging to make me and my kids to go directly to the store and purchase Lego. Thank goodness for all of us they waited until after Christmas to spring this on us. Or was that part of their genius plan to make us spend out of season with the DVD arriving just in time for Christmas. Yes, they are definitely awesome and my champion!
Comic Book Movie ADD 