Morgan Spurlock's 'Greatest Movie Ever Sold' Trailer (VIDEO)

How much are your eyes worth? What's the value of your subconscious?

Morgan Spurlock, already an anti-corporate crusader known for his fast food attacking "Super Size Me" documentary, stars in the the most meta movie ever made, "The Greatest Movie Ever Sold," and works to answer those questions. The film takes on the product placement and corporate sponsorship that has overtaken film -- by becoming the subject, and making its own sponsorship the entire plot.

Spurlock, in meetings with corporations and Hollywood insiders, takes the viewers on the journey of creating a film that they can only see if he's successful in finding the cash to edit and release it. The collectors cups and pomegranate juice doesn't hurt, that's for sure.

The filmmaker spoke with The Huffington Post's Bianca Bosker, emphasizing his message of corporate transparency, and what he hopes to do with the film.

"Now is the real time when [companies] must to realize that they need to make cognizant steps toward an open stream of information and an honest flow of information. People will respect that," he said.

It's a timely release; recently, Britney Spears was criticized for the bizarre, out of place product placement in her "Hold It Against Me" video, while the website Filmdrunk put together an historical montage of all the product placement in film.

"The Greatest Film Ever Sold," was shown at Sundance, and will be released on April 22nd.

WATCH:

Comments

[GraniteSkyline]

05:42 PM on 03/21/2011

Hmmm.... Sheetz!

[MimiK]

08:04 AM on 03/21/2011

What if we turned this on its head, and Hollywood was required to 'place' products that supported the well-being of people and planet?

Imagine that Hollywood corporate transparency took this form: A website -- maybe Spurlock will do this -- that you could go to, just like the IMDB, that provided the data-base of corporate sponsorship and placement in every single movie, and then rated the products based on their environmental damage and health costs (Coke, for example would get one of the worst well-being ratings).

As a consumer of movies, you would have information to help you counter the brainwashing that corporations pay mega bucks to cognitive psychologists to make happen.

From this transparency could follow boycotting and promoting and supporting movies that place products that support the mutual well-being of planet and people. Movie companies could get "green creds" by only supporting products that will help "sell" a sustainable world.
Like I said, turn placement on its head and use it FOR us, rather than against us.

[marred]

05:58 PM on 03/20/2011

Congratulations Spurlock on pointing out that we "buy stuff". Exposed?.... hardly :)

[Charismatron]

10:49 PM on 03/20/2011

Right. But we buy cigarettes that kill us, cars that contribute to environmental degradation, food that is inhumanely produced and just plain bad for us (and so on) claiming it's all perfectly within our rights to do so. It's not enough to say 'we buy stuff' when often what we buy may be convenient but simply isn't in our own interests.

[marred]

01:07 AM on 03/21/2011

Yes but the points you raised are not why he's making the movie.

[Feenicks007]

10:48 PM on 04/26/2011

Actually he's pointing out how inundated we are with advertising and how we don't even notice anymore.

[QueenOfViolets]

12:26 PM on 03/20/2011

There's something dehumanizing about this theory that people are sheep who can be easily programmed by a simple image on the screen.

If people are sheep who respond easily to this kind of programming, then why don't I own an iPod or an iPhone -- the two most heavily and relentlessly promoted products of the last decade?

[Toddynho]

12:58 PM on 03/20/2011

People are sheep. You place way too much faith in people and their abilities to process data, I think. They are so easily manipulated that they still believe in myths like talking snakes, omnipotent beings and of course zombies raising from the dead.

As well, it's not just the products that are being sold to people. I really don't think you understand the larger picture here.

[bcunnin679]

01:18 PM on 03/20/2011

What do you think happens after death?

[FlashmanYouRogue]

01:26 PM on 03/20/2011

Maybe if you wore a sandwich board for a few hours a week you could afford an iPhone too. Baaaadd idea?

[saltpeter]

08:49 AM on 03/20/2011

It's ironic that most "American" companies rarely hire Americans to produce stuff anymore, but they'll hire all kinds of Americans to market stuff for them. In other words, "American" companies spend more money on people who help sell their stuff than those who actually make it. They'll go to Madison Avenue for the selling and go to 12-year-olds in Indonesia for the producing.

[QueenOfViolets]

12:31 PM on 03/20/2011

That's because you don't have to know anything about people in order to do manufacturing. But you have to know people extremely well to sell them the thing you've just made.

Of course they spend more on marketing than on manufacturing. Marketing is much harder. It takes a lot more education.

And let's not confuse the issues of child labor with the issue of America's loss of a manufacturing economy. Child labor is wrong no matter which country it's done in or for what purpose.

America would be losing in manufacturing even if there were no child labor in the world, because adults don't get paid much over there either.

[saltpeter]

08:20 PM on 03/20/2011

Actually, it says that American companies care more about selling the ILLUSION that their products are cool, hip, or desirable than crafting well made products. There once was a time when Americans also MADE products and those products tended to last for decades if not over a century.

Now the items the 12-year-old Indonesians or Chinese kids and their occasional parent makes has a tendency to break down every two years (which is no accident, btw). About the time your old iPhone breaks down is precisely the same time the next version comes out.

At the end of the day, if American companies unlike say some German or French companies don't take pride in their product and spend more effort trying to con us with advertisement, then why should anyone else take them seriously. And in the end, if it's an "American" company that actually hires FEW Americans, then it doesn't deserve the corporate welfare and subsidies they often use to pay for their marketing costs in the first place.

[marred]

05:13 PM on 03/19/2011

Watch the short film Logorama and you get the point in 11 minutes that it will take this guy 2 hours to do.

[marred]

05:09 PM on 03/19/2011

I don't find this concept remotely interesting in the slightest. Product placement is the least of hollywood's problems. It neither offends me or surprises me and I barely notice it anyway. Supersize me was lame and pointless. At least he's consistent.

[QueenOfViolets]

12:32 PM on 03/20/2011

Agreed. Let's have some better films, please. Like -- comedies that aren't aimed at the poop and fart joke crowd.

[tonyjim]

02:20 PM on 03/20/2011

From Idiocracy.

The #1 movie in America was called "Ass." And that's all it was for 90 minutes. It won eight Oscars that year, including best screenplay.

[SILVANUS]

03:41 PM on 03/19/2011

HOLLYWOOD IS DEAD.

[Mendez1981]

12:31 PM on 03/19/2011

I really thought he was going to be a one trick pony with "Super Size Me," but he's been pretty creative with his docs. This one seems pretty interesting.

[Kiabell04]

10:07 AM on 03/19/2011

Sounds very interesting.

[Rick Hudak]

09:54 AM on 03/19/2011

its kool. to see a Sheetz ad in this pic...for those who dont know about Sheetz...lets just say youre missing out

[Toddynho]

08:27 AM on 03/19/2011

It's not just that products are placed into films to help fund the production, it's that products and at times ideologies are placed into films and they have too much influence over the subtle plot lines and messaging of the production. The US military is totally in bed with Hollywood and lend the use of aircraft carriers, jets and other expensive war toys but they are adamant in not only reviewing the script, but usually contributing to it it so that the "raw raw raw, let's all join the army and be heroes" messaging is included leading to further nation-wide pro war/military indoctrination. If a film goes against a certain political line of reasoning, or challenges a designed cultural meme, or the messaging corporations or the military want consistent, than that film doesn't get funding nor support - and the artist's vision is quashed, and so is another point of view further contributing to the Mcdonaldization of films and the America Culture. It can have serious, although not overt, consequences.

I like Spurlock's films, and his show. He's a thinker and will take a risk or two. I'll be eagerly awaiting the release of this documentary.

[marred]

05:10 PM on 03/19/2011

Subtle plot lines? What Hollywood films are you watching?

[Toddynho]

06:27 PM on 03/19/2011

I don't think you understood the post.

[InedaName]

06:28 PM on 03/20/2011

The McDonaldization of Society is an interesting book by George Ritzer.

The 2002 British TV documentary "The Century of the Self" is about Edward Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud, who wrote the book "Propaganda" in 1928, and pretty much invented modern public relations. Bernays is the reason we eat bacon and eggs for breakfast and women began smoking cigarettes--or 'torches of freedom' as he called them--in public.

"The Century of the Self" and Spurlock's new doc would make for a fascinating double bill.

[Toddynho]

06:43 PM on 03/20/2011

Thank you for a thoughtful response. I read Ritzer's book, at about the same time I read Niel Postman's "Amusing ourselves to death" (although the latter was written about a decade earlier). After reading both (as well as a lot of Marshall McLuhan et.al) , I've not looked at media the same way since.

Fanned!!!!

I'll be looking for the doco "The Century of the Self" on your tip. Thanks!