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For the Niche Film Audience, Studios Are Appealing by Blog - New York Times

Movie studios typically advertise on television and in newspapers in search of the biggest possible opening-weekend audience. For a new film, "The Constant Gardener," Focus Features is intent on building its audience in a different way: by taking aim at readers of niche Web sites and blogs.

Focus, an art-house unit of Universal Pictures, has purchased ads for "The Constant Gardener" on the political blog Wonkette, as well as the Web sites of politically oriented publications like Harper's, The Nation and National Review.

James Schamus, a co-president of the studio, says that such sites draw the sort of people most likely to appreciate the film, a conspiracy thriller based on a John le Carré novel about pharmaceutical companies operating in Africa.

"We looked for the places that sophisticated moviegoers seek out to find things that interest them," Mr. Schamus said. "These are the people who are engaged with the world, who are informed about the big conspiracies going on out there.

Web advertisements will not eclipse print and broadcast ads anytime soon. But at a time when blanket ad purchases seem ready to decline in tandem with box office receipts, studios may look more and more to the Internet to find audiences. "It's the opposite of buying a spread in a newspaper or a slew of 30-second slots on TV," Mr. Jaffe said. "Studios need to stop trying to reach the most people and focus on reaching the best people."

posted by JOlmsted @ 6:31 PM