Movie promotion site offers talking to the dead?
By James Howell
A new web site promised a technique for talking to the dead. But it turns out it’s a promotion for the movie “The Orphanage,” confirming the skeptical and amused reaction online.
In the movie, a woman returns to an Orphanage housing a dark secret. It’s haunted by ghosts, and a medium contacts them in an attempt to solve the mystery of a missing boy. For the movie’s Australian release, a web development company created the web site to stir interest in the film.
“I have been talking to the dead for my entire life and after 6 years of research I have perfected a new technique that, under ideal conditions, is more than 73% successful…”
But the prank eventually confirmed the movie’s tag line — “No secret stays locked away forever.” Within days of the launch, the site Museum of Hoaxes had already recognized the site’s movie connection, “but I like horror movies, so I’m willing to give them some free publicity.” Another blogger independently reached the same conclusion, and even contacted the site’s host.
“I congratulated them for the amount of creativity and research they must have put on it,” wrote another blogger.
“Besides, you have to love that detail about how “Nicole’s next project will be the website ‘Communicating with your deceased pet’.”
This morning the Head of Creative and Strategy at a firm called Topia confirmed that, indeed, Nicole Zapruder was not a real medium, and she couldn’t talk to the dead. But in the build-up to the movie’s opening on Friday, the site had already provoked a round of what-if responses from amused commenters on the web.
“D’you think I can contact my budgie?!?!?!” joked one post at parnormal investigation site.
“Beware when talking with the dead,” warned a commenter on another blog — “a lot of them have bad breath.”
“getting them to SHUT UP is the hard part,” added a third.
Not everyone was skeptical. (One blog’s commenter teased that they had absolute faith in the technique because “There’s a strobe light involved.”)
But another commenter summed up the whole episode sardonically by offering one irrefutable criticism of the “Talk to the Dead” site.
“Didn’t work.”
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