• New York Times, Monday, July 26, 2010 10:37 AM

"If this thing ["Tron: Legacy"] isn't a hit," an attendee at the Comic-Con conference says, "somebody at Disney is going to have a lot of explaining to do." Indeed, Brooks Barnes reports, the studio and marketing juggernaut has been pushing its futuristic movie for more than three years, "redefining the Hollywood hard sell" in the process.

Marketing for "tent-pole" movies -- big budget/big risk/big potential payoff -- used to start about a year before their release, but this is the third year that a trailer for the movie has made a debut at the comic book confab. "We're going to show you five minutes of the movie every year for 20 years," quipped comedian Patton Oswalt when introducing it.

The original "Tron," released in 1982, features a man pulled inside a video game who is forced to play space-age gladiator games. It was a hit with young males but failed to attract a wide audience. Given the costs of this version -- as much as $350 million -- Disney needs to get out the message "that this is a film that everyone will find cool and contemporary and relevant," says Sean Bailey, Disney's president for production.

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