Korean Film is Greatest Apple Product Placement Of All Time
Posted by Abe Sauer on January 19, 2011 12:00 PM
Hard to believe the above trailer represents the greatest Apple "product placement" of all time, but it does. Here's why.
Korean director Park Chan-wook is perhaps best known for his moody, violent, fascinating 2003 revenge film Oldeuboi. Also known as Oldboy, the film boasted a few memorable plot tricks. But Park's latest film Paranmajang (Night Fishing) has just one trick. It is filmed using an iPhone 4.
The horror-fantasy flick about a man struggling with whether or not he is a murderer is getting a great deal of press. But not because it's a good film. It's being hailed as a huge achievement for being shot solely on the iPhone. And that's the entire idea. What almost none of the reports of the film note is that the production has been financed by South Korean telecom provider KT, the former Korea Telecom, which just happens to be the exclusive provider of the iPhone in that country.
Indeed, while the iPhone's camera is exceptional, the only reason one would solely use it is for a stunt. And, as others have pointed out, the footage clearly has been "post-productioned to hell so it doesn’t look anything like what you get out of your phones." But then, the film itself isn't the point anyway, is it?
Nonetheless, Apple has scored a branding coup as the exposure for the iPhone's filmmaking prowess makes its way around the world, well beyond the fiefdom of KT.
In the translation process, the fact that the film is essentially a paid commercial has been lost. For example, this Associated Press report quotes all of the director's compliments about the iPhone and the production, noting it was "made on a budget of 150m won (£85,500)". Yet it does not once mention the source of the financing.
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