2. Introduction
‘Murder on the Orient Express’ is a murder mystery/ drama/ thriller based off the 1934 book of the same
title written by Agatha Christie. The film was released on the 10th of November 2017 and was distributed
by 20th century Fox. It stars Kenneth Branagh as Poirot who also directed it, with Penelope Cruz, Willem
Dafoe, Daisy Ridley, Michelle Pfeiffer,Judi Dench,Johnny Depp, Josh Gad, Derek Jacobi and Leslie
Odom.Jr. It received a 12 rating, due to the nature of it being a murder mystery with murder, seeing the
body wasn’t deemed suitable for a PG rating. The target audience for this film was mainly women as some
male writers will pretend to be female to sell crime fiction as the majority of writers in the genre are female
and the target readers are women. I also believe that those who haven’t been a fan of murder mysteries
watched it, considering as it was extremely well marketed and created quite a buzz surrounding it and it’s
sequel. It also earned 325.8 million us dollars in the box office, with an original budget of 55 million us
dollars.
3. Marketing Campaign Purpose
If a marketing campaign successfully informs the audience about the project and raises awareness then
the film may indeed be a success. Much like murder on the orient Express, the film was very well
marketed virally. The film had it’s very own website which showed the room which Ratchett was killed in
on its front page, it is animated with the the room and the victim moving much like the train is moving.
There are interactive elements to the website, dotted around the crime scene which you can indeed click
on, which bring up a closer look and an empty text box where you can write your own ideas in. Logging
into the site, using facebook allowed people to track their progress in cracking the case. On the website
and throughout the posters there were ‘meet the suspects’ with even the very own victim as the suspect,
as throughout the marketing it was never revealed who exactly was the victim until you got to watch it for
yourself in the film. This method, defies normal campaigns, as typically in a trailer for the film there would
be clips of the most important plot points, however wth this film being a murder mystery there is nothing of
the sort.
5. Poster 1
The first example of a poster is Josh Gad’s character of ‘The
Assistant’, which was released on the 5th of October. This poster
follows the seperate character teaser structure for this film. On the
bottom left corner is the films title, in a neon blue text, it isn't the first
things that the eyes go to. The red text saying ‘The Assistant’ is
what the viewers eyes go to first, as the text is positioned it leads
your eyes to Josh Gad’s face and the outside window. The outside
window shows the snow and lights Josh’s face, also showing that
snow may have something to do with the film, which it does.
The main text colours are red, blue and the middle of the text is
white, which are both the flag colours of America and the UK flag,
which all the characters are from both countries. The poster is full of
foreshadowing and hinting, as just under Josh’s bust is the tagline
‘Everyone is a suspect’, this turns out to be very true as the victim of
the murder is open even until the film it has never been hinted at,
only the feet of the victim have been shown.
6. Poster 2
The main poster for the film was released on the 7th of September 2017. The film
poster shows all the characters, with Poirot and Rachet at the forefront of the
poster. This also shows the all star cast as people who aren't fans of Agatha
Christie may be fans of particular actors who take part in the film. Especially
Johnny Depp, which is why he takes the front and centre spot in the film poster,
but also because he is a very prominent character in the film.
The overall colour scheme of the poster follows the typical palette for the film
which are the colours red,white and blue. The film title is always typically pictured
as the colour blue, with character names or actor names always typically in the
colour red. The other text in the colour white completes the colour scheme, at the
bottom of the poster, the film’s tagline “everyone is a suspect,” and the films
release date underneath. The use of neon colours very much draws in people who
haven’t had any interest in Agatha Christie before, especially with using cast
members like Josh Gad, who has starred in two very popular films, “Beauty and
the Beast” and “Frozen” before.
7. Product Analysis
https://youtu.be/Mq4m3yAoW8E
The trailer like most of the products for the film contains the same motif of the train throughout, the train
itself is where the murder takes place so it is quite an important part of the film. It also shows the typical
neon text which is present throughout the marketing campaign, it is used to stand out against the trailer or
posters and draw attention to it. The typical colours of white text with a variation of blue or red glow on
them suggest possibly where it is set as many of the characters are either american or british, hence why
the colours are red, white or blue.
In the poster, seen in the bottom left, both the train, the red,blue and white colours are
present as well as the illuminated glow that is also present in all of the photos and posters
for the film which hints at continuity. There is also the presence of the film’s tagline
‘ everyone is a culprit’ which ironically hints at the eventual outcome of the film, where
everyone is indeed a culprit.
In the top left corner is the official website for the film with the same distinctive blue font and
the same black background, it too has the same ‘ everyone is a culprit tagline like the rest
of the products in this campaign.
8. Film Timeline
Start
Film Release
August 2014
@MOTOEmovie on
twitter account created.
3rd May 2017
Cast released in an
Entertainment
Weekly Article
1st June 2017
1st Official Trailer
release.
7th September 2017
Official full cast poster
revealed.
21st September 2017
2nd Official Trailer
released.
5th October 2017
Individual character
teasers released.
3rd November 2017
Official Release
Date
9. Conclusion
With a very successful and creative campaign, ‘Murder on the Orient Express’
received 325.8 million us dollars in the box office, over 31.4 million combined
youtube views on both of the trailer published to the 20th century studios youtube
channel. The reaction to the film itself was mediocre, with 6.5/10 on imdb, 60% on
rotten tomatoes and 2/4 on Roger Ebert. Though the media campaign itself still
remains admirable for just how interesting and well it showed the film as a whole.
