Jersey was the lucky location for a sneak preview of World War Z.
The article is making a hoopla about propaganda, but seriously, everyone does these previews to get audience reaction.
With one month to go until it opens in theaters, it’s time for World War Z to get serious about promotion. To that end, Paramount held a surprise screening in New Jersey, and Brad Pitt himself stopped by to introduce the film. And wouldn’t you know it? The audience overwhelmingly liked the movie.
It’s not dirty pool—everyone does this. But listen to that crowd as Pitt talks. They’re practically hyperventilating. An advanced screening, particularly one that features the presence of a high-profile star, always gets a positive reaction. That audience has just had one of the single most famous people on the planet—who is coming off a deeply personal revelation, adding to audience sympathies—tell them that this screening is for them because they are special, because Pitt didn’t make WWZ for those industry fancy-pants in New York (where there was another screening), but for them, the real moviegoers. So here, have a tee shirt, take my picture, and watch this movie I brought all the way to New Jersey just.for.you. If it had been two hours of howler monkeys shrieking in their faces, they would have loved it.
Again, everyone does it. I’ve seen terrible movies get great advanced audience reactions using this same tactic (GI:Joe leaps to mind). But does that mean that WWZ is terrible? Not necessarily. A year ago, when rumors of WWZ’s nightmarish circumstances first started surfacing, I said that a terrible production doesn’t always equal a sh*t movie. Often, but not always. So it’s possible WWZ ends up decent, if not even actually good. But forgive me for not taking the word of a group of people who were still audibly fangirling Pitt as the movie started.
It is interesting, though, how very many people from that screening ran out and tweeted something to the effect of, “I don’t like zombies, but…” Either they’ve made something so good you’ll like it in spite of yourself, or they’ve made something so generic the fact that it’s got zombies is irrelevant; it could be any monster/alien/plague and it’d be the exact same story. (I’m voting for the latter.)
http://www.laineygossip.com/Brad-Pitt-shows-up-at-surprise-World-War-Z-screening-and-working-hard-to-sell-the-movie/26986
