Abram Sauer Online

From the land of product placement gone wrong comes a story that sheds some light on how, sometimes, a product placement deal can be even more disastrous for a brand that it probably already was.

High-end watchmaker Tutima somehow thought it a wise investment to ink a product placement deal to appear on Al Pacino’s wrist in the film Righteous Kill. (Never mind that, in typical product placement fashion, this $4,000 watch was on a New York policeman). While it’s wrong to criticize Tutima for appearing in a monumental disaster like Righteous Kill, it is right to criticize the co. for forking over $50,000 (reportedly) in the hopes that  three-seconds of screen time (from a shooting distance of several feet), in a film with no guaranteed chance of massive success, would translate to $ales.

First of all, wristwatch placement is generally terrible. The brands don’t show up and even when they do they are onscreen for such a short period that there is just no way an audience is going to leave the theater an hour later remembering if Capt. Awesome wore a Seiko or a Swatch. (By the way, that’s it on the left there in close up! One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, three-one-thousand aaaaaaand that’s it. $50,000 please.)

Of course, this failure of recall is what tie-in ads are for, to remind those who saw the film that so-and-so guy you like from that film wore so-and-so watch (that you should now go buy). At best this strategy is limp and it’s destined to fail for the same reason that the placement wasn’t distinguishable in the first place, namely, that the product doesn’t distinguish the wearer any more than it did the hero.

To make this clear: The products that people buy to associate themselves with film characters they like are those that readily identify or can be identified with, said character by other people. That last part is colossally important. I not only want to identify with Brad Pitt’s character in Mr. and Mrs. Smith by buying the stuff he wears; I want other people to associate me with Brad Pitt’s Mr. Smith character by seeing me wearing what he wore. The products that tend to do this best are leather coats or shoes or cars or (especially) sunglasses. Tom Cruise’s Ray-Bans in Risky Business; his Ninja bike in Top Gun; his jacket in War of the Worlds; Carrie’s Macbook in Sex and the City; Ahhnold’s Gargoyle sunglasses in Terminator; or James Bond’s BMWZ3 or Bullitt’s Mustang.

But a watch? Meh. First, I cannot name one iconic film character’s watch brand. Second, a watch isn’t something somebody else can see and identify, either onscreen or on your wrist.

The second part of this catastrophic Tutima anecdote shows just what a bad deal product placement is for most brands is that this $50,000 payment included ZERO allowances for tire-in advertising outside the film. A practical necessity for this kind of placement with no likelihood of being remembered by an audience. De Niro and Pacino’s suit accuses the brand of using their likenesses to promote the watch off-screen, something the original $50,000 didn’t include apparently.

In the end, all players end up stoopid and robbed. Pacino and De Niro for thinking they could cash in simply by playing on everyone’s Heat-as-foreplay desires to see them together in a film; Tutima for thinking it could cash in simply by appearing in a hit that played on everyone’s Heat-as-foreplay desires to see PacNiro together in a film; and audiences, who, generally, get the shaft because even though they know what they’re about to see is two actors cashing in simply by playing on everyone’s Heat-as-foreplay desires to see them together in a film, they see it anyway.