In a shrewd marketing ploy, a couple of weeks ago Sony bought ad time during the Thanksgiving NFL games and aired promos for the Will Smith-starring drama “Concussion,” a film in which the league isn’t exactly painted in the best light. With both the regular football season coming to a close and the awards race heating up this month, Sony has turned up their marketing blitz in an effort to get noticed during the busy holiday release schedule.
Four new spots have been released for the Peter Landesman written-and-directed film which follows the true-life story of the Nigerian-born forensic pathologist, Dr. Bennet Omalu, who fought to legitimize and publicize the chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, suffered by football players against the efforts by the NFL to suppress his research. There is no doubt that the source material is rich and controversial, but whether the film will catch on with a larger audience — especially football fans — or even with film critics still remains to be seen.
You can watch the four TV spots below along with a fifteen-minute-long discussion with the filmmakers and a couple of clips from the film. And if all that’s not enough, one of this year’s most acclaimed new artists, Leon Bridges, has released the song he’s written for the film, titled “So Long.” “Concussion” opens everywhere on Christmas Day.