Product Placement as Realism

It was recently suggested to me that, since movie-goers are all so attuned to living in a branded world, they would all get up and leave the theatre if they encountered generic or 'no-name' brands on screen. (The movie in question was Cast Away, for which we clocked some 56 appearances of the Fed Ex logo.) To me, this attitude signals a worrying lack of awareness of the conscious choices being made my directors and cinematographers: since nothing in the frame is accidental, someone, somewhere, decided that multiple appearances of the Fed Ex logo would not be marketing overkill. And they made this choice 56 times.

Suppose, instead, that the producers really felt that the story depended on being associated with a recognizable shipping company, if only to provide a short-hand way of effectively signalling what it is that Tom Hanks' character actually does for a living, and why we should care. Wouldn't just one, early appearance of the logo be fine for that purpose? (The joke about this movie, of course, is that the one package he doesn't open on his deserted island actually contains a box of matches, some novocaine, and a satellite telephone...)

The folks whose job it is to broker placements deals are fond of defending themselves with the claim that they're merely providing 'realism'. This pretext often includes the now-familiar bromide about our apparent, collective intolerance of generic products. (It's worth noting that the discovery of this universal distaste coincides rather neatly with the rise of product placement.) To illustrate: "Feature films saw the value of brand-name identification....The film viewer just didn't buy into the reality of a Brand-X soap on top of the sink anymore." (Barbara Maultsby, VP of production, UPP Entertainment Marketing)

A quotation like this, apart from being both presumptuous and patronizing, is plain wrong. As some of Wikipedia's contributors have pointed out, some directors actually make a habit of using their own invented products as an alternative to placement, eg Kevin Smith (Nails Cigarettes, Mooby Corporation, Chewlees Gum, Discreeto Burritos); Quentin Tarantino (Red Apple Cigarettes, Big Kahuna Burger, Jack Rabbit Slim's Restaurants); and, Robert Rodriguez (Chango Beer).

We must also question the rather unreflective claim that movies are really about realism. Placement agencies, after all, aim to profit from brokering deals that will provide brand exposure, not by delivering some magical 'realism' quotient. And what is 'realistic' about people traveling through time, or landing on asteroids, or slaughtering vampires?

A brief survey of recent movies shows that, while placements abound, so too do generic products - often in the same film.

Starbucks in Meet the Fockers (2004)

A fridge full of generic products in Meet the Fockers (2004)

A Pepsi dispenser in Assault on Precinct 13 (2005)

An invented brand of matches in Assault on Precinct 13 (2005)

An Apple monitor in Blade: Trinity (2004)

A generic drinks dispenser in Blade: Trinity (2004)

A Coke dispenser in Brokeback Mountain (2005)

Invented beans in Brokeback Mountain (2005)

Campbell's soup cans in Capote (2005)

Invented baby food in Capote (2005)

As these examples show, placement is not an either/or choice for movie makers. In some senses, the appearance of generic products or unnamed services in otherwise placement-friendly movies can be understood as placeholders for 'branded entertainment' deals that just didn't pan out.

Posted by Matt Soar, May 25, 2006