Misleadingly tedious DVD blurbs

[MichaelB]

I just received the Blu-Ray of Black Narcissus and on looking at the back I was struck by what must be one of the dullest and least enticing blurbs ever penned:

BLACK NARCISSUS

Based on a novel by Rumer Godden, Black Narcissus stars Deborah Kerr and Jean Simmons as nuns dedicated to the Indian mission in which they work. Obstacles in the life of a nun's community high in the Himalayas range from a cynical British Agent to suspicious natives, and the arduous terrain surrounding them. The mission prospers, but often at the expense of spiritual progress. A sick child dies, a mission pupil elopes and one of the nuns falls to her death after an emotional breakdown. The sisters finally retreat from the mission and the menacing mountains, but with the knowledge that their work has not been devoid of good results.

...and that's it!

Sounds gripping, doesn't it?

Granted, I suspect most people tempted to buy Black Narcissus on Blu-Ray will know what they're in for, but you'd have thought they might at least try to sell it to people who don't!

[cdnchris]

Sounds sexy.

I'm at work so I don't have it on me but I remember the blurb on the back of my Stalker DVD (which looked to have been poorly translated from Russian) didn't do much for the film.

[Jonathan S]

Sounds more like Zinnemann's The Nun's Story. I'm so glad their work was not devoid of good results...

This isn't quite the same issue, but does Optimum have a proof-reader? Most of their releases have inaccurate info on the cover, but Canyon Passage is perhaps the worst:

The cast list on the front cover includes "SUSAN HAYARD"

The film is said to be "B&W" (it's Technicolor)

"Feature Aspect Ratio: Anamorphic 1.33:1"

In the small print it's copyrighted "1946 Paramount Pictures Inc." - but this was always a Universal film.

[domino harvey]

My recent favorite, from the front and back of the Bluebell Love on the Ground:

"Controversial"
New York Times

[cdnchris]

Sounds sexy.

[davebert]

Separate of synopsii, I frequently cringe at smaller indie or foreign films where the publisher has insisted on having a review blurb... no matter what.

I think that if your only recommendation comes from the reviewer "IMDB," you should just scrap the review blurbs altogether and focus on making the rest of the packaging do the selling. Although I did chuckle when I saw that all the new RAMBO movie quotes came from horror-themed fansites, and all the blurbs spoke highly about was the gore factor. I guess if the human midsections exploding get the lauds that attract you, then RAMBO actually wouldn't disappoint.

[domino harvey]

Doesn't one of the recent Legend Paramound releases have a blurb like

"Three stars!"
--Leonard Maltin

[jbeall]

The back cover of The Venus Beauty Institute claims that it's about "three strong, smart women." I realize that any film featuring female protagonists has to be about "strong" women, but this designation couldn't be farther from the truth. It's not clear that any of the three has her shit together, as one of them is overbearingly negative and the lead character is neurotic as hell. That blurb (which in fairness has nothing to do with the film) makes me dislike the film that much more.

[colinr0380]

Could be describing Sex and the City there jbeall!

[fiddlesticks]

BLACK NARCISSUS

Based on a novel by Rumer Godden, Black Narcissus stars Deborah Kerr and Jean Simmons as nuns [...]

"What's that? I'm playing a nun?!? WARDROBE!!!"

[swo17]

I recently bought the Anchor Bay of Aguirre: The Wrath of God, and was pretty disappointed with the blurbs they felt some need to stick right in the middle of the front cover:

"A film which haunts you."
-Sunday Times

"3 stars."
-Video Movie Guide

Um, was this the best praise they could find?

[davebert]

Considering that J. Hoberman has published lengthy odes every time the film hits NY again on the rep circuit, I'd say that is pretty weak. Any reference to AMG, Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide, Video Hound DVDog Book etc. should be eliminated from jacket covers, in my opinion.

[MichaelB]

I think that if your only recommendation comes from the reviewer "IMDB," you should just scrap the review blurbs altogether and focus on making the rest of the packaging do the selling.

That's a very sore point with me, because I was involved with the marketing of a feature film a few years ago, and the director did a mock-up of the poster that said - and I swear I'm not making this up - "***** - IMDB". And not buried somewhere insignificant either: it was the most prominent poster quote.

In actual fact, the film had scored five point something in IMDB votes, so it was hardly a glowing endorsement - and I pointed out to him that because converting an IMDB score into a star rating was pretty meaningless, people would go to the IMDB and look up the film and discover this, and then wouldn't go to see it. I also highlighted a genuine four-star review (out of five) that he hadn't quoted at all, and suggested he use that instead. He wrote back saying that I'd made some good points and he'd have a think about it, and the next thing I knew he'd gone ahead with the poster as originally planned.

I was furious, because I'd spent years going right up to the wire regarding potentially misleading quotes in film marketing, but I thought that this was a step too far - and not only was it deceptive, it was actively counterproductive.

[jesus the mexican boi]

This was always one of my favorites.

"A tale of mystery, intrigue and revenge!" (can't quite make out who this "review" is credited to)

How about, "A movie!"

[Cash Flagg]

From the back of Home Vision's dvd of The Demon: "A strange relationship develops between a man, his wife, and his mistress, and a young boy becomes the pawn in a dangerous game of passion and intrigue that ends in a shocking climax." What is this "strange relationship"? The man's wife is barely in the film after the first few scenes. And how exactly is the boy a pawn?

[Lino]

From the back of Home Vision's dvd of The Demon: "A strange relationship develops between a man, his wife, and his mistress, and a young boy becomes the pawn in a dangerous game of passion and intrigue that ends in a shocking climax."

That's hot.

[Antoine Doinel]

I think that if your only recommendation comes from the reviewer "IMDB," you should just scrap the review blurbs altogether and focus on making the rest of the packaging do the selling.

That's a very sore point with me, because I was involved with the marketing of a feature film a few years ago, and the director did a mock-up of the poster that said - and I swear I'm not making this up - "***** - IMDB". And not buried somewhere insignificant either: it was the most prominent poster quote.

That's nothing, the otherwise excellent special edition Fight Club DVD has a number of prominent quotes in large print in the booklet from such revered sources as: [email protected]; IMDB user wykoffKB; [email protected] and (i'm not kidding) "Overheard at the Westwood Premiere".

[Svevan]

The back of the Region 2 DVD of The Dead is tedious not because it is bland, but because it tries to be too vivid by recounting the entire plot of the film and short story, including some poetic analysis of the ending!

It is the feast of epiphany (6th January) 1904 in Dublin, and time for one of the highlights of the season - the grand party thrown by Misses Kate and Julia Morkan and their niece, Mary Jane. Their favourite nephew, Gabriel Conroy, arrives with his beautiful wife, Gretta, and acts as host. Although a splendid evening is had by all, Gretta is profoundly affected when she hears the words of a sentimental old song - The Lass of Aughrim. She weeps as she tells of a brief and innocent romance from her youth, cut short by the young man's death at the age of seventeen. In all their years of marriage, Gabriel has never heard her speak of this boy, locked away in her heart. His jealousy gives way to sadness as he realises he has never felt such passion, and his thoughts turn to death, for without passion there is only death. Gabriel's agony of self-doubt, the sudden awareness of his own frailty, becomes a vision of a bleak, wintry landscape, a revelation of universal truth uniting the living and the dead.

[manicsounds]

The Region 3 version of "The Fountain" - Gotta love that back cover!

[Kirkinson]

That's nothing, the otherwise excellent special edition Fight Club DVD has a number of prominent quotes in large print in the booklet from such revered sources as: [email protected]; IMDB user wykoffKB; [email protected] and (i'm not kidding) "Overheard at the Westwood Premiere".

Isn't the whole point of the quotes printed in the booklet to offer an overview of both critical and audience reaction to the film, though? And the first two you mentioned are quotes of positive viewpoints printed on the same page as a negative quote from a professional critic, which is clearly meant to juxtapose the film's critical reception with the opinions of the cult audience it garnered. I'm not saying it was necessarily a great idea, but there's no indication that they were printing these quotes because they were trying to pass them off as legitimate sources of criticism. The inside booklet on that set is not a piece of advertising, it's a brief examination of the love-it/hate-it passions the movie engendered (which is why the booklet is titled "How to Start a Fight").

[Antoine Doinel]

That's nothing, the otherwise excellent special edition Fight Club DVD has a number of prominent quotes in large print in the booklet from such revered sources as: [email protected]; IMDB user wykoffKB; [email protected] and (i'm not kidding) "Overheard at the Westwood Premiere".

Isn't the whole point of the quotes printed in the booklet to offer an overview of both critical and audience reaction to the film, though? And the first two you mentioned are quotes of positive viewpoints printed on the same page as a negative quote from a professional critic, which is clearly meant to juxtapose the film's critical reception with the opinions of the cult audience it garnered.

I'm all for juxtaposition, but I'd rather hear intelligent remarks - positive or negative - from established critics, rather than quotes from cult audiences that include such gems as:

It saddens me a bit that this is seen as a 'guy' movie. I'm very much a girlie-girl and this has to be my favorite movie ever.

Moreover, the other reason you don't include IMDB quotes from fans is that users easily searchable, and considering this the only message board post this person has ever made, and they've been inactive for five years, I would hazard a guess some low rung DVD production employee made up the quote themselves and then put it in the booklet.

And blueduck? His name is actually Curtis Edmonds and he appears to be a freelance DVD critic, and the quote that's pulled is actually from a review from Killer Movies. And whaddya know? renshaw is actually Scott Renshaw who also writes for Killer Movies. You can find his pull quote on the site as well. So instead of finding legitimate postive/negative posts from critics, of which there are many they took some comments from two (still amateur) writers and tried to pass it off as intelligent cult commentary.

But my powers of Google can't figure out who the overheard voice was at the Westwood party. So that might be legit.

[cdnchris]

The Region 3 version of "The Fountain" - Gotta love that back cover!

There's this website I visit everyday meant for programmers that shows all sorts of errors made by other programmers, and one of the more common ones are the use of place holders that make it to the finished product ("Error message to go here", "This error should never happen", "Calcualte important financial totals here", etc.) That there, though, blows every single one of those away as it should have been more obvious. Amazing.

[Jonathan S]

The Sony back cover for Nick Ray's Hot Blood (R2) certainly fits into the "misleadingly tedious" category (and ends with a spoiler):

Set in the gypsy community of contemporary Los Angeles, aspiring dancer Stephen Torino (Cornel Wilde), is tricked by his brother into an arranged marriage with tempestuous Annie Caldash (Jane Russell). Annie is willing to give the union a go, but Torino wants none of it. Several risque complications and lively musical numbers later, Torino changes his mind.

And just to make the film even less enticing, the box insists it is in black & white - and so are both the sleeve illustrations.

Someone else must have done the front cover, though:

"Jane Russell shakes her tambourines and drives Cornel wild!"

(From the original release poster, perhaps?)

[MichaelB]

There's this website I visit everyday meant for programmers that shows all sorts of errors made by other programmers, and one of the more common ones are the use of place holders that make it to the finished product ("Error message to go here", "This error should never happen", "Calcualte important financial totals here", etc.)

Or a magazine aimed at small children featuring a still captioned 'Type some shit here please'.

The editor nearly lost his job over that one.

[kaujot]

There's this website I visit everyday meant for programmers that shows all sorts of errors made by other programmers, and one of the more common ones are the use of place holders that make it to the finished product

link please