Movies That Try To Cash In On Trends/Fads/Crazes

I thought of this topic while seeing a trailer for Lucky You (2007). As sad as it is, some movies are made with the sole intention to cash in on current fads, crazes and trends, or they are just unbelievable coincidences...

Lucky You (2007)
The poker craze that has been sweeping North America, and the world if you want to go a little bigger.


The Wizard (1989)
Obviously this gem going after the Nintendo gamers of the 80's.

"I love the Power Glove. It's so bad"

The Net (1995)
Well...this one is a tad obvious.


Hackers (1995)
Yet another internet fad movie...in the same year no less!


I'm sure there are hundreds more...drop them in here if you can think of any!

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This is on DVD? *adds to Christmas list* I loved this movie when I was a kid, but I think it's to blame for all of my neuroticisms because I was a Nintendo nut who just didn't have this kid's wizardy powers. He flew through game after game, while I had to wait for Game Genie to be invented just to beat Super Mario Brothers. His gift drove me crazy! Why couldn't I be The Wizard?! Luckily, I don't care much for video games anymore. They're now uber dangerous, thanks to this:



They should make a sequel, The Wii Wizard.

Any Comic Book Film Made After Spiderman

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Why not after Blade or X-Men?

"Coincidences"- Deep Impact and Apocalypse, Red Planet and Mission to Mars. There's a few like that, almost duplicate films.

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I should have specified...I meant cashing in on societies trends, fads, and crazes...not really films cashing in on the popularity of other films, knawmean?

The Real Cancun comes to mind; it seemed to be a poor attempt at cashing in on both the surge in reality television and, sorta/kinda, spring break.

That said, there are two truly blatant examples of this. One is Y2K, a TV movie which came out in (duh) 1999, and depicted a nuclear meltdown (or something) amidst panic and chaos around the turn of the millennium.

The other is From Justin to Kelly, which tried to shamelessly ride the American Idol crest.



Of course, it didn't work; it didn't even manage to recoup half of its modest $12 million budget at the domestic box office.

Breakin, Breakin 2, Beat Street, You Got Served, Gleaming the Cube, Rad, BMX Bandits, and The Fast and the Furious Trilogy come to mind.

"Cry_Wolf" and "Swimfan" tried cashing in on using Instant Messenger and Emails in the horror/suspense rather than phone calls.

"Cruel World" and a few other horror movies tried to use TV reality shows as their settings.

Material Girls comes to mind for some reason.????

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For some reason Airborne (1993) comes to mind. I love the quote on the poster: "The most popular guy on Earth...Once he took to the sky!" So unbelievably cheesy.

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Cashing in on the Hilton sisters!

what about football factory / mean streets cashing in on the whole "gang / football supporter" social trend?

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You reminded me of another movie trying to cash in on the American Idol concept....


...I can't believe I watched this.


Must Love Dogs also comes to mind...in cashing in on computer dating.

1 night in China



Cashing in on the sex tape trend.

Ok so its not really a film.

I haven't watched it! I just ended up reading the review here:

http://www.gumgod.com/derek_china.htm

Scary Movie doing the 'What's Uuuuuuuuuuuup!" catch phrase of the time while on the phone.

Well, wait. I think a lot of parody movies cash in on a LOT of trends at the time. It's part of the thing's very existence, whether it's Airplane! or the Naked Gun movies or the Scary Movie flicks.

Really good parodies transcend this, and yes, I'm thinking of Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein, which are still hilarious over thirty years later.

A film that cashed in on a recent trend successfully was You've Got Mail. Now it seems outdated already (dialup, anyone?), but it was timed well with the AOL days and was very popular due to good casting.

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Yes but I mean to me just because they are expected to do that, the point is they are cashing in on them. Making money out of trends. With Scary Movie for the most part they were making the trends about other movies so the 'What's up' deal was actually a non movie trend and is why I put that down. Sure I suppose I could have said Parody films and used that one for an example and we could have moved on from those types of films for good too. But that what's up was huge at the time. So huge they actually already had the film finished and went back to do re-shoots just to fit that in there.

Aha, gotcha. I see. Plus, of course, specific lines like that one will quickly date themselves. If a person watches that movie thirty years from now, will they "get" that reference (unless they're old enough to remember it, IF they remember it)?

Ok yeah and allot of these type of films that will be named or have already been named I notice are going to inevitably date themselves except for something like 'The Net' as it will likely continue to go for a looooooong time. But yes, catch phrases would be the first to be lost as generations move on.

Well, even in The Net, I think they used 3.5" floppy disks. Today you'd see USB flash drives, and in a few years from now, what other portable devices would we be using?

I realize every movie dates itself, though. Hard not to. Especially with technology. I was flipping channels semi-recently and saw some movie with a character using one of those gargantuan "portable phones" from the '80s that was the size of a large brick. Hilarious to look at now.