YES. I watched Monsters University in ADVANCED SCREENING !!
To be honest, I haven't really finished the full Monsters Inc movie..I remember watching it but I don't remember finishing the movie. So I always had the impression that this movie is somehow "boring".
For a person who had this impression about Monsters movie, I wasn't a fan of watching this one but when I heard that this movie is about University, I somehow thought it's interesting. As I am an university student for five years and had a semester experience of studying at US university, I certainly had an impression and curiosity of how this movie will be in terms of the cultural education system.
Overall, despite the fact that I thought the previous movie was "boring", this one was certainly not boring and instead, interesting. I liked it .
1. Brilliant plot - use of university. Uni students like myself will definitely have some sort of attachment (idea of "self") in this movie and the character. Since every characters have different personalities, I believe people will definitely see themselves and attach themselves with the movie. For example, I am not smart. I am a hard worker. I am like Mike. Every grades I get, I earned it so I deserve them. I study A LOT compare to other students who know how to study. So when Mike says he works hard and that people like Sullivan don't understand him, I agreed with him from the deepest of my heart. So from this invisible self image and attachement to character (who happen to be the main character), I had positive movie experiences. I loved it. By creating this "attachement", audiences will engage with the movie and character and will eventually create positive movie experiences. Also, by creating the movie in university context, they seem to have enlarged their main target market. I believe their previous movie had a focus group of teenagers and children. However, by creating the movie in university context, they have clearly illustrated that they are targeting university students, graduate students and the moviegoers who have been to university. See how they have just created a huge target market? Monsters movie is no longer a "children" movie. It's now a "student" movie where any students from any education level can watch.
2. Monsters University = Stuff to sell in real life = profit for the movie product company. When I was watching the movie, I cannot help but think "I want that". Everything in this movie has Monsters University logo (MU), just like our real life universities have. Books, Hats, T-shirts, Joursey etc etc. This means that when this movie becomes box office movie, film production company can and will (trust me) create all this goods with MU logo on it. I know it already has MU T-shirt, Water bottle, Pen, Hat and so on. The company could even produce the MU jacket and sell it in high price. But they must be cautious about their target market. IF their target market for this movie is on university students, do you really think university students will purchase and actually wear this MU jacket? I don't think so..? But if their target market is teenagers, they might. This movie is rated as G, for children. Also it's an animation movie. People who actually buy stuff are mainly teenagers and children less than 10 years old. For college students, buying MU goods could mean something or this movie could open their eyes and expectations of what the real uni will be like because in America, this is somehow true. But for primary students, I don't think they will have an attachement with this movie and therefore have "must purchase" motivation to convince their parents to buy the good for them.
3. No product placement. ZERO. Which means good really for this movie because the movie clearly differentiates the Monster world and Human world. So if there were any brands from human world, it would not make any sense. Then how the company paid for this movie production? This movie must have cost fortune to make. But remember, this movie is animation. Company produces goods and sell them to their target markets. This sales of goods can pay off the company's movie production. Even the special Monster popcorn combo can be produced and sold (Despicable Me 2 had special minion cup and it got sold out quickly !!). From this, maybe they don't really need product placement to cover up their cost of movie production. All they need is consumers to purchase the movie goods.
4. It will be interesting to see the next series of Monsters movie. First one was about the Monsters company, then now university. And the movie was linked very well that I don't think there will be any movie in between. After getting expelled from university, Sullivan and Mike were working at Monsters company as mail delivery, cleaning, screaming can storage jobs and finally became the scarer in the company.
In conclusion, THREE out of five (3/5). I would recommend my friends (recent graduates, university students, college students, and anyone who loved and enjoyed Monster Inc the first movie) to watch Monsters University.
No comments:
Post a Comment