Copy Lines
Key copy lines are extremely important in the creative strategy process. Key copy lines are slogans or short sentences intended to catch a potential viewer’s attention. Here are a few great examples:
1. Society’s uneasy reaction with technology is the theme of Warner/DreamWorks 2001 release of A.I. Artificial Intelligence with the advertising text, “His love is real. He is not.”
This slogan makes us ponder the question how can love be real if he is not? How can something artificial love? How can something without feelings feel? This copy line is extremely witty because it has two very short lines, which contradict one another, making them fascinating and engaging us (the readers/potential moviegoers) and wanting to find out the answer.
2. The terror of Alien, the Twentieth Century Fox thriller from 1979, was conveyed with, “In space, no one can hear you scream”
This slogan on the contrary evokes a sense of mystery and eeriness. Outer space is something out of the grasp of everyone, besides a few astronauts who have been to the cosmos. After reading a key line as such, at least in the writer’s opinion, people generally automatically envision a person lifelessly floating in outer space, terrified and screaming, inevitably waiting for their death, because no one will hear anyways. An effect key line has to move a person in one way or another, attract their attention, and lure them into thinking and/or questioning a certain topic and so on.
3. Miramax Dimension’s 2003 sullen comedy Bad Santa is positioned directly opposite the popular Christmas icon with the key copy line, “He doesn’t care if you’re naughty or nice.”
This copy line as oppose to the previous two examples, gives a potential viewer a taste of the humor and basic feel of the movie prior to going to the cinemas. It has a satirical, sweet-sour vibe, that not everyone may appreciate, most likely intended for grown-ups as oppose to children, who tend to usually be the main target in seasonal Christmas type flicks.
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