Quick! What do "Brokeback Mountain", "Fahrenheit 9/11", and "the Blair Witch Project" have in common? Outside of being "independent" films, it would seem, not much. But the truth is, they all reaped the rewards of a largely deceptive promotional campaign, with BWP essentially being the trendsetter in that regard.

When "the Blair Witch Project" was released, the producers of the film heavily used the internet. They created a mythology around the nonexistent "Blair Witch", and they had their friends hit the websites heavily and repeatedly in an internet medium that had still not adjusted to the concept of differentiating repeated views from the same IP address from separate, independent views. They heavily bombarded internet message boards and built the legend up, and before long, a legend was born. As BWP became available in more and more theaters, peer pressure kept the phenomenon alive. "I have found the only people who don't like The Blair Witch Project", one memorable poster I read once stated, "are those who do not UNDERSTAND it."

I saw it, understood it, and found that, while it was a quite good film considering its low budget approach, it was not a film of lasting entertainment value whatsoever.

Now, Fahrenheit 9/11 entered the picture some years back and a similar approach was used. Internet message boards, the insinuation that anyone of any intelligence, sophistication and culture was seeing that and the implication that, if you weren't, well, the conclusion was obvious.

Fast forward to 2005, and "Brokeback Mountain", which goes even further. Gay activists have spent over a decade trying to convince us that anything short of an outright endorsement of their culture is "homphobia" and shamefully exploiting the tragic deaths of Matthew Sheppard and Teena Brandon (No I will NOT call her "Brandon Teena"; she never went by that name while she was living!). They have used the similar peer pressure of the previous two releases, making the obvious implication that NOT seeing the film is because of our homophobic (and/or latent homosexual) tendencies.

But they've gone further even than THAT. You see, "Brokeback Mountain" was subject to the usual late season limited release of movie producers hoping to generate ticket sales from Oscar buzz. But they released it exclusively in markets where they KNEW they had strong support from the homosexual community, who would stand in line to ensure this movie received the publicity it deserved. They brought out the cameras and created a phenomena; hordes of people who were standing in line to see the "gay cowboy" movie, as if those hordes were at all representative of the public at large. The purpose seems clear; the hope that, as Brokeback moves to smaller venues and towards the heartland, the collective guilt of those who stood by while Sheppard and Brandon were murdered would drive them to see this movie as some sort of penance regardless of their beliefs, and that the producers could then market this as a "phenomenon", citing, among other things, its staying power despite the fact that the "staying power" was only the result of a carefully strategized scheduling not entirely unlike a political campaign.

The sad part of it is, from my perspective, they may have ruined what some otherwise harsh critics have called a quality film with their hype.