Many movie critics have slated the latest sequel in the Transformers franchise series, ‘Transformers: Dark Of The Moon‘ with one describing it as ‘two hours of incoherent drivel‘. Nonetheless Michael Bay’s third outing with the transforming robots has already earned $500 million nine days after its worldwide release and is on course to be the ninth movie to ever make it past $1 billion dollars at the box office.
Metersbonwe in Transformers 2 (Courtesy of Penn Olson)
The latest Transformers (变形金刚) film will not be released in Mainland China until the 21st July 2011, but pirated versions are already popping up all over Chinese internet sites. The Transformers series is extremely popular with the Chinese, and marketing managers are taking advantage of this through product placement.
According to the site The Economic Observer, Chinese people hate product placement in their domestic tv shows / movies, but enjoy a sense of pride when they see homegrown products and brands in Western films.
Fashion brand Meters/bonwe became the first Chinese brand to feature in the series, appearing twice in the second film, ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen‘. For the third film the number of Chinese brands featured has increased to four. This may seem like a lot, but the total number of brands / products that have paid to be placed in the latest film stands at a staggering 68 and includes big names from Apple, Mercedes-Benz, Ferrari, Nokia, Adidas, Nike, and even Starbucks.
Here are the Chinese brands that feature in the film:
Yi-Li: Shuhua Milk
Perhaps the oddest of the four products to feature in the films, but the comedy of the placement and the fact it features in the script makes ‘Shuhua Milk‘ the most memorable.
Meters/bonwe: M-Tee
Within 5 minutes of the film starting, leading actor Shia Labeouf appears wearing a Meters/bonwe MTEE t-shirt.
Lenovo: Ideacentre A series
Lenovo desktops / laptops feature throughout the movie.
TCL (The Creative Life): HDTV range
TCL was personally handpicked by the US film outfit and by movie director Michael Bay for its creative technological innovations and brand concept which make it the perfect marketing tool for the movie.
(Watch on Youku)
Don’t forget to like us on Facebook.
.
