Jaunted

Twelve college towns played the ultra-low-budget horror film at late-night screenings Friday and Saturday, and virtually all sold out... Numerous theaters reported sellouts hours before screenings started, indicating that the studio's strategy to build "Blair Witch Project"-like buzz from college students was a success. Based on the positive response, Paramount is putting together expansion plans and will start rolling out the film in new markets Friday, where it will continue to show "Paranormal Activity" in late-night screenings only.

Paramount built up buzz by letting the "Demand It" feature on the film's website help determine where it's opening next. Per the trailer, "if it's not playing in you're area, demand it at paranormalmovie.com." Roughly 200,000 fans have registered and requested the film, creating the kind of individual audience buy-in most films can only long for.

This is a trick that will work at most once or twice more before people get bored with it. It's already kind of old hat in the music industry, where "request the band for your home city" was already tired a couple years ago. But in the meantime Paramount has caught the attention of college audiences with the attention spans of gnats, so points for that.

When the movie does release wider, expect road trips being organized to go see it, midnight outings, and maybe even some halloween travel-related packages to scare the bejesus out of you.

[Photo: Paranormal Movie]

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