In preparation for the release of this week’s Annie, Sony have stepped up their marketing game. In what’s an interesting move by the studio – considering the family-friendly film it’s promoting – they’ve rolled out a website for teen sci-fi romance, MoonQuake Lake.
Of course, neither the site or its trailer are real. All a part of Sony’s hip advertising campaign, MoonQuake Lake is actually a film-within-the-film. In Annie, Jamie Foxx’s billionaire Will Stacks treats the young orphan (Qhvenzhane Wallis) and her friends to a trip to the cinema. One of the movies they decide to see is, you guessed it, MoonQuake Lake.
The faux-website materials for the film indicate that the slushy melodrama was directed by The LEGO Movie and 22 Jump Street‘s Phil Lord and Chris Miller. A brilliant touch, but of course, everything you see onscreen in Annie was directed by the film’s helmer, Will Gluck. He’d previously directed Kunis in Friends With Benefits, so it was probably a no-brainer for the comedic lass and her husband, Kutcher, to step in for the 40-second teaser trailer. Along with them, Rihanna pops up as a baddy to prevent the two star-crossed lovers from ever uniting.
It’s a fun, cheeky poke at movies that were most recently tackled in Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Don Jon, when the lothario Don takes Barbara to the movies. He hates romance, but she still opts for a rom-com called Special Someone starring Channing Tatum and Anne Hathaway.
The remake of the classic musical Annie opens in theatres on December 19th, while MoonQuake Lake sadly won’t ever find a big-screen audience.