I just want some motherf***ing video on my motherf***ing phone.
Barring that, I’ll take the Samuel L. Jackson apps now available for Android phones after first coming out for iPhones. The applications, created by game and cross-media developers Heatwave Interactive, offer audio samples of Mr. Jackson’s most famous quotes that can be used as ringtones; a so-called “personality scanner” that reads fingerprints and offers Mr. Jackson’s analysis of the print owner; and a Magic 8-ball-ish capability for touchscreens, with which users can get Mr. Jackson’s answers to life’s toughest (and, I assume, yes-or-no) questions.
The SamDroidJackson and iSamJackson apps are a cutting-edge marketing scheme for the popular action movie star.
Sure, he hardly needs them to keep in the public’s good graces–despite the failure of Iron Man 2, in which he appeared this spring as Nick Fury, to deliver critical accolades. But according to the movie site Fandango, Mr. Jackson’s next films aren’t slated to come out until January 2012. Fans won’t get their fix of the BAMF (“badass motherf***er”) for more than a year.
So like any other good mobile marketing strategy, the applications make for interaction between consumers and the brand that is Samuel L. Jackson. They offer a sense of intimacy–his advice, his voice issuing from one’s pocket whenever one gets a call. And they can be easily modified to help promote DVD releases and new theatrical releases in which he appears. As fun as it all is, in terms of marketing these apps are as serious as a heart attack.