Situation :

Post Covid movie market is tough. Consumers got used to watch movies at home.

The French market in 2021 is still more than 50% under 2019 pre covid performances.

The young target 15 - 25 years old is key to turn a movie into a major success. They have time to watch movies, they consume a lot of entertainment. But according to the CNC (centre national du cinema), 15 - 25 years old go less often to the movie (4.9 in 2019 VS 5.6 in 2018) because they are more into other kinds of entertainment at home.

Brief :

Warner Bros had to motivate this young audience to watch Matrix Resurrection in a proper movie theatre.

Objectives :

Reach Gen Z by using its own codes and prediction networks to encourage them to discover the Saga Matrix and watch the last film of the series in theaters.

For the release of the movie Matrix Resurrections on December 27, Warner Bros. France created the very first playable trailer on Fortnite to let the new generation discover the world of this emblematic saga from the 2000s. Based on the world of Matrix Resurrections, a new map “Deathrun” was created on the famous online game Fortnite. Playable for free, it was possible to face the trials alone or with friends, in order to foil the Matrix’s evil schemes. Youtubers partners were able to get a preview of the Deathrun. Together they embarked their communities in their adventure. By revolutionizing the good old trailer, this campaign is a true game changer in the way we make movie marketing and how we address new generations.

Most of this young generation ( Gen Z) has never seen the first Matrix movies launched between 1999 and 2003 so they don’t know any of the codes and references of the Saga.

To create a hype around the movie we needed to involve them in a launch campaign that matched their hobbies and universe.

The insight we worked on was that this generation is already living in the matrix and in a digital world instead of a physical reality.

The brief has been focusing on the metaverse illusion they are already involved in.

The idea was to recreate the trailer launched in September in a gaming world.

The campaign was 100% digital based on two different channels

- Influence with two majors Fortnite players in France. They broadcasted the video of them testing the game on their own Youtube and Social media accounts.

- Video advertising formats with a short format video 15’’ introducing the Fortnite game and quoting the map code so people could join

Preroll videos on Youtube / Twitch to target the gamers community

Social video ads on Facebook to get higher reach

- Thanks to an accessible code, the map was opened to every Fortnite gamers from every country.

The PR coverage enabled to reach up to 59M people through major tech / gaming and mainstream information websites.

4 million views on Youtube

350 000 minutes spent on the map

More than 65 million impressions

1st at the box office the first week in France.

Most pirated movie of the year among the 18-24