I’ve become increasingly curious about how Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are going to promote By the Sea. The film was relatively inexpensive to make, but that’s only because so many studios are greenlighting $200 million-plus comic book movie productions. Still, even for a “smaller budget” film, By the Sea is getting some weird expectations. I’ve maintained that it’s probably not about the box office at all for Angelina and Brad, that they’re just hoping the studio doesn’t lose money on them but other than that, the film was just a passion project. Well, Deadline had a story a few days ago called “Inside The Curious Marketing Of Angelina Jolie’s ‘By The Sea’” – you can read the full piece here. It seems like Deadline is very worried that By the Sea is going to flop at the box office because Angelina has made “crazy” demands on the studio, like requesting that the studio not spend a ton of money on marketing. Some highlights:

Why there’s not much advanced buzz: “According to the studio and Jolie’s camp, it’s all by design, a subtle way to deliver a film that is more personal than commercial. However, sources say that at the center of it all is Jolie, a writer-producer-director-star who has ideas of her own and is in involved in every detail of the film’s launch of what is clearly a personal pet project. By allowing the film to go to market in modest fashion as Jolie wishes, they say, Universal is protecting its future relationship with a star who built a strong relationship with film chairman Donna Langley from when the star directed the Louis Zamperini drama Unbroken…So when a trailer cut by Universal didn’t please her, Jolie cut her own. Said one person with knowledge of the behind-the-scenes machinations: ‘They aren’t selling it as a mainstream romantic drama because she doesn’t want that and they weren’t willing to take her on.’”

Releasing it in three cities: Jolie’s camp insists that a limited release was always what Jolie had in mind, but at some point, Universal believed that November 13th was going to be the wide release date, and even now there’s mixed information, with one exhibitor telling Deadline: “It’s still on my list as wide. If they are going limited, they probably need to tell people pretty soon.” Said one observer: “Why would you make a $30M movie with two big stars and deem it worthy of a three-city release?”

Jolie’s art film: “That it was ever going wide was vehemently denied by Jolie’s camp, and by Universal, which has told us that the movie wasn’t ever intended to be more than what it turned out to be: Jolie’s version of a ’70s art film; not a sweeping romance but rather a small “personal” film about a crumbling relationship. They say that this tiny release strategy for a film that is shouldering more than $30M (with P&A added in) was what they had in mind all along.”

No critics’ screenings: “It’s a very kind of private film,” understated one source. So private in fact that it has had no critics screenings to date. And those they will have will only happen days before release. The reason most art house films don’t feature big TV spends is because the expenditure doesn’t support the model, and those films rely dearly on word-of-mouth and the hustling of stars to create any kind of awareness. None of that exists here.

Angelina is self-indulgent? “One source close to Jolie said all along she has considered By The Sea “an indie film.” However, most of those don’t cost $27M film and a location shoot in Malta. Compared to most indies, this one seems pricey and self-indulgent.”

One observer is seriously pissed, saying: “The budget of this film is incongruent with art-house fare. They made the movie because they had a re-pairing of Mr. And Mrs. Smith and thought they would have a marketable movie, but it became an art house film. That’s what happened. They let it go for six months with everyone thinking it was going to be a wide release.”

[From Deadline]

A few things – the $30 million figure is the number of the cost of production AND advertising. But to me, it makes sense to not spend a lot of money on advertising. You’ve got Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, for goodness sake. They are free-media machines. Every time they choose to speak to a media outlet, they’ll make headlines across the world. Every time they step onto a red carpet, or step out for a pap stroll, every single blog and magazine in the world will run the photos. Why spend money on advertising when you can get all of it for free?

As for this whole idea that no one at Universal has the stones to stand up to Jolie lest they damage their relationship with her…? AND? You think Angelina is the only person in Hollywood to make a few self-indulgent, just-for-fun movies? And at least she’s not costing the studio anything more than $30 million, which is a pretty low figure for “self-indulgent” when it comes to movie making, especially considering Universal will likely be able to make their money back from DVD sales and international markets.

Photos courtesy of WENN.