Inde Navarrette has a note for Hollywood. The “Obsession” star told “The Kyle Buchanan Show” that young audiences will keep showing up to theaters as long as studios stop trying to sell them something once they get there.
“Gen Z just wants to go to something that they don’t feel like they’re being sold,” Navarrette said, according to Variety. She also made a distinction most marketers miss, which is that Gen Z doesn’t hate ads. “We grew up with commercials that are fun that we still quote like State Farm and Aflac,” she said. “It’s kind of fun. But we don’t want to be sold. We want original stories.”
The line she’s drawing separates ads that announce themselves from ads disguised as story. A generation raised on #ad disclosures and sponsored posts learned to spot a sales pitch early, and a brand-name soda placed in the middle of a movie scene doesn’t get past them.
Her own movie makes the case. Curry Barker, who started out making no-budget movies on YouTube, made “Obsession” for less than $1 million.
Focus Features bought it for $14 million, spent little on advertising and let word of mouth carry it. The horror film stayed No. 1 at the box office for four straight weekends this summer and has reportedly earned $522 million worldwide.
A Fandango study cited by Variety found that 87% of Gen Z saw at least one movie in theaters over a year, the highest of any generation, compared with 82% of millennials, 70% of Gen X and 58% of baby boomers.
“Just because we’re living in the time of technology doesn’t mean we’re not living a human life or feel human experiences,” Navarrette said. “We want originality and we want to feel.”
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