NBC’s The Mummy and The 2008 Olympic Tie-In
Universal Pictures and NBC are once again proving to be one big happy GE corporate family as seen in this latest TV commercial currently airing on the NBC network. In total it clocks in at 2:30 Minutes and attempts to market both NBC’s coverage of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games alongside the upcoming Universal Pictures release of action movie, “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor.”
Starting out as a seemingly unbranded video, it takes us through various nature shots while a narrator tells us that,
Across the world’s largest oceans, over the earth’s highest peaks, there is a place steeped in tradition…
It then quickly flashes to Brendan Fraser, the star of “The Mummy,” only to interlace his dialogue from the movie with scenes from previous Olympic Games, then in some cases morphing athletes directly into action scenes.
I can imagine the scene now, a conference room full of top-level NBC and Universal executives, all brainstorming as to how they can better market their brands through cross-promotion…and one of these geniuses remembers that the Games are being held in China this year. As the light above his head brightens he quickly tells the other suits of his discovery, reminding them that their upcoming movie, “The Mummy,” also takes place in China. Handshakes and applause all around, this guy’s going to run NBC one day.
This is a pretty far stretch to be a decent movie/olympic tie-in, but you can’t blame them for trying.
Adam Fogelson, president of Marketing and Distribution for Universal Pictures, was even quoted in the NYTimes as saying that:
I think that the Olympics were able to lend an air of quality and credibility to the film project,” he said. “The imagery we were able to use in the spots adds sort of a cool, hip, fresh, young, relatable angle to the Olympic promos.
