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. 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.
6. Film Timeline
Cast released in a Entertainment Weekly article - 3rd May 2017
Official trailer release - 1st June 2017
Release date - 3rd November 2017
Any other information is extremely hard to find
7. 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.
