This year’s Lucca Comics & Games (Nov. 1-5) is set to end on a high note with a special fan screening of “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes,” one of the most anticipated launch events hosted by Europe’s largest pop culture meet.
The release of the prequel to the iconic saga will be handled by Rome-based Notorious Pictures, which takes over distribution duties, previously handled by Warner Bros. and Universal Pictures.
The dystopian sci-fi movie is set 64 years before the events of the first 2012 installment and follows young Coriolanus Snow’s rise to power as the tyrannical leader of Panem, including his relationship with tribute Lucy Gray Baird during the year of the 10th Hunger Games. The cast is toplined by Tom Blyth (“Billy the Kid”) and Rachel Zegler (“West Side Story,” the upcoming “Snow White”), starring alongside Hunter Schafer, Peter Dinklage and Jason Schwartzman, among others. Francis Lawrence is again at the helm.
“It’s a franchise whose popularity grew incredibly. [In Italy,] the first movie grossed €3 million ($3.2 million), and the last one over €8 million ($8.5 million). It’s now a cult [saga], with a large fan base that expanded over time. Being able to pick up this title has been of crucial importance to us,” Notorious Pictures head of theatrical distribution Alice Panada tells Variety ahead of the Lucca launch.
The movie is one of the key projects of Notorious Pictures’ solid commercial slate. It will hit Italian theaters with around 450-500 copies. Distributed in cooperation with Medusa (which is in charge of most of the commercial duties), Notorious Pictures’ efforts on the project mainly focused on its marketing campaign.
“We kicked off the movie’s marketing campaign in March, and we released the first trailer. We published a lot of content, including three trailers as well as several clips and posters. Since March, we’ve been able to keep the fans hooked,” says Panada.
“The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes”
Courtesy of Lionsgate
The Lucca fan screening will be preceded by a special “Hunger Games”-themed installation in Piazza San Michele (the medieval town’s main square) and a dedicated flash mob “paying homage to the movie and the fans of the whole saga” on Nov. 4.
“We’re very happy about this [screening] since we know how Lucca deeply cares about this IP. Moreover, we are promoting a ‘rewatch’ of the first 2012 film, set to hit Italian theaters on Nov. 6,” Panada adds.
Owing to the SAG-AFTRA strike, however, no talent will be in attendance in Lucca and, for the time being, video recorded messages to the fans are not planned.
Aiming to intercept a wider audience, spanning older and younger generations, Notorious Pictures prepped a more traditional TV ad-based campaign, but also collaborated with a group of Italian creators active on social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitch, Instagram and TikTok. A partnership with Mondadori, the Italian publisher in charge of Suzanne Collins’ book saga rights, has also been sealed, with some promotional activities set to take place at the Tuscan gathering and online.
“The interesting aspect of this new movie is that, although it displays many references to the previous movies, it can still be enjoyed by those who are not familiar with the saga or haven’t watched any of the ‘Hunger Games’ movies,” Panada says.
“The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes” will be out in Italian cinemas on Nov. 15, with pre-sales opening on Oct. 30.
In Italy, Notorious Picture has recently distributed the Johnny Depp-led “Jeanne du Barry” and Marc Forster’s “Wonder: White Bird,” which is slated for release in January.
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