15 Independent Film Marketing Clichés That Need to Die

You are not redefining horror, the internet is still functioning and we are almost certainly ready

By Rory Jackson

Independent filmmaking requires confidence.

You need confidence to ask strangers for money, convince actors to work for deferred payment and explain to your family why the dining room is currently filled with severed heads. Without a certain amount of irrational self-belief, most independent movies would never survive the first production meeting.

Confidence is necessary.

Bullshit is optional.

Independent filmmakers have developed their own language for promoting movies. Every project is a game changer. Every creature is unlike anything we have ever seen. Every slasher is introducing the next great horror icon. Every movie is going to blow our minds, destroy our expectations and leave us emotionally devastated.

Apparently, audiences are never ready.

We are ready.

We have been ready for three years. Finish the damn movie.

What the Numbers Actually Say

Before sharpening the knives, Horror-Fix examined the promotional language from a pilot sample of 25 publicly accessible independent horror campaigns. The sample included project descriptions, mission statements and suggested social-media copy from Seed&Spark and Kickstarter.

This was an exploratory audit, not a scientific survey of every independent movie ever promoted. Because one campaign could employ several clichés, the percentages overlap.

Here is what appeared most frequently:

The examples were not difficult to find. Campaigns described themselves as love letters to particular eras and subgenres, promised experiences audiences had never encountered and emphasized practical effects as proof of artistic legitimacy. Film and Storytelling

There is nothing inherently wrong with any of these descriptions. Some of the films may completely justify them. The problem is repetition. Once every filmmaker begins using the same language to explain how different their movie is, they all start sounding exactly alike.

With that uncomfortable truth established, here are 15 phrases independent filmmakers need to stop saying about their movies.

15. “Big Things Are Coming”

Then announce one.

“Big things are coming” is not news. It is what people post when they need to remind the algorithm they still exist but have nothing concrete to share.

A finished poster is something.

A trailer is something.

A cast announcement, release date, festival selection or distribution deal is something.

A picture of your editing timeline accompanied by “Big things are coming” is evidence that Adobe Premiere remains open.

Filmmakers should build anticipation, but anticipation requires an eventual destination. If the big thing has been coming for four years, it may need directions.

14. “From the Mind of…”

This phrase works when the mind belongs to Stephen King, Clive Barker or David Cronenberg.

When nobody has heard of the filmmaker, “from the mind of” sounds less like an endorsement and more like a warning found inside a psychiatric report.

There is nothing wrong with putting a filmmaker’s name on promotional material. Writers and directors deserve recognition. However, presenting an unknown creator as though audiences have spent years waiting to reenter their personal nightmare kingdom may be slightly premature.

Make the movie first.

The mythology can come later.

13. “Made by Horror Fans for Horror Fans”

Who else was going to make it?

Dentists?

Nearly every independent horror filmmaker grew up watching horror movies. Most can describe the exact VHS cover that permanently damaged them as a child. Being a horror fan is not a unique production method.

The phrase also avoids explaining what the movie actually offers. Which horror fans? Fans of atmospheric ghost stories? Italian splatter? Creature features? Slow-burn psychological horror? Movies where naked people are dismembered beside lakes?

“Made by horror fans” tells us that you like horror.

We assumed that when you spent your savings making a horror movie.

12. “We’re Bringing Practical Effects Back”

Practical effects never left.

Major productions, independent movies and television series use prosthetics, puppets, makeup, miniatures and physical gore constantly. What changed is that practical effects are frequently combined with digital work.

Our pilot sample found practical-effects language in 20% of the examined campaigns. Several used it intelligently by explaining what the effects would accomplish. Others treated the mere presence of latex as proof of quality. Campaigns for projects such as Itch, Behind the Eyes and Demon Hunters explicitly promoted their practical work. Seed&Spark

Practical does not automatically mean good.

A rubber monster can look like a rubber monster. Fake blood can look like strawberry syrup. A puppet operated by somebody’s cousin can still fall over in the middle of a shot.

Tell us what you built and why it matters.

Do not act as though you personally rescued foam latex from extinction.

11. “No CGI”

This is the angry older brother of “all practical effects.”

CGI is a tool. Practical effects are tools. Neither is inherently virtuous, and both can look terrible when used badly.

Independent filmmakers love saying “no CGI” because audiences have been trained to associate computer effects with weightless studio spectacle. What the claim often means is that digital compositing, cleanup, color work and invisible visual effects were used—but nobody wants to admit it.

If your movie contains excellent practical effects, show them.

You do not need to insult every digital artist on Earth to make the severed head impressive.

10. “A Love Letter to Horror”

According to our pilot audit, some version of the “love letter” description appeared in 36% of the sampled campaigns, making it the most common promotional family we tracked.

The letters were addressed to ’80s slashers, ’90s horror, practical creature effects, folk horror, cabin-in-the-woods movies and several other corners of the genre. Dead Men’s Poetry, for example, describes itself as a love letter to horror films of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Other campaigns use the phrase for deliberately nostalgic projects. Seed&Spark

That can be an honest description.

It can also mean the film has borrowed its plot, visual style, killer and poster from movies the director already loves.

Horror has received enough love letters.

It would occasionally appreciate an original gift.

9. “Award-Winning”

Which award?

That question should never require forensic investigation.

Our sample found “award-winning” language in 24% of the campaigns. Sometimes the description referred to a legitimate achievement by the director, composer or previous film. Sometimes it appeared without enough context to determine what had been won or who had awarded it.

There are thousands of festivals. Some are respected institutions with real juries and competitive programming. Others exist primarily to sell digital laurels that filmmakers can place above a title.

If the movie won Best Feature at a recognized festival, say so.

If the director won Best Lighting in a 90-Second Vertical Vampire Film at an online competition with six entries, perhaps provide the complete sentence.

Awards can establish credibility.

Vagueness destroys it.

8. “This Is More Than a Movie”

Unless it comes with medical coverage, it is probably still a movie.

Independent films can represent communities, preserve personal histories, challenge prejudice and give filmmakers a way to process trauma. Those ambitions matter. They deserve language more specific than a phrase also used to sell theme-park attractions and premium wrestling events.

Explain why the story matters.

Tell us whose experience it represents.

Describe what moved you to spend several years bringing it to life.

“This is more than a movie” asks the audience to assign importance before the filmmaker has explained what that importance is.

7. “The Next Horror Icon”

Horror icons are not appointed.

They survive.

Michael Myers did not become an icon because a press release declared him one. Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Leatherface and Chucky remained visible through sequels, performances, imagery, merchandise and decades of audience affection.

Designing a masked killer is easy.

Creating a character people still care about after the credits is considerably harder.

You cannot introduce “the next horror icon” before audiences have watched the first movie. At that point, you have a performer in a mask and an optimistic merchandise plan.

Let viewers decide whether the character is iconic.

They enjoy crushing dreams almost as much as creating legends.

6. “The Scariest Movie of the Year”

It is March.

Your movie has screened for 14 people.

Four of them are related to you.

Fear is subjective, which makes “scariest” nearly impossible to prove even when the claim comes from an established distributor. When filmmakers make the declaration about their own work, it becomes the cinematic equivalent of giving yourself a nickname.

Say the movie is frightening.

Explain what kind of fear it explores.

Do not crown yourself before anyone else enters the room.

5. “This Will Blow Your Mind”

Please leave our minds where they are.

They have work tomorrow.

“Mind-blowing” once suggested a genuinely radical idea. Now it can describe a trailer, a casting announcement, a mild plot twist or a new image of a monster standing in a hallway.

The phrase also places an enormous burden on the movie. If you promise to detonate the audience’s consciousness and deliver a dream sequence followed by a character waking up in bed, disappointment is inevitable.

Interesting would be sufficient.

Surprising would be wonderful.

Our skulls do not need to explode every time somebody completes a color grade.

4. “This Will Redefine Horror”

Horror has existed for more than a century on film and considerably longer everywhere else.

Redefining it may require more than shooting a familiar slasher story in black and white.

The genre has survived silent cinema, Universal monsters, atomic creatures, Hammer horror, slashers, video nasties, J-horror, found footage, torture films, elevated horror and whatever the hell TikTok is currently doing to public-domain characters.

Your movie may contribute something meaningful.

It may combine familiar ideas in an exciting way.

It may even influence other filmmakers.

That is different from redefining an entire genre before the trailer reaches 500 views.

3. “A Game Changer”

The game remains unchanged.

Calling a movie a game changer is particularly dangerous because audiences can immediately look around and see that the same movies are being made, funded and distributed in roughly the same ways.

A genuine game changer alters what follows it. The Blair Witch Project changed marketing and found footage. Night of the Living Dead rewrote the modern zombie. Halloween helped establish the slasher grammar that filmmakers are still copying.

Those movies earned the description after they affected the culture.

They did not place it in a crowdfunding pitch.

2. “Unlike Anything You’ve Ever Seen”

Our pilot sample found uniqueness claims in 24% of the examined campaigns.

One promised a creature unlike anything audiences had seen. Another said it aimed to make a movie unlike anything ever seen. A third simply declared, “You haven’t seen anything like this.” kickstarter.com

Perhaps those claims are correct.

The odds are not encouraging.

Most films resemble other films because storytelling develops through influence. That is not a crime. A filmmaker can combine familiar ingredients with a personal perspective and create something worthwhile.

The trouble begins when the marketing promises absolute originality while the pitch proceeds to describe The Evil Dead inside an Airbnb.

Tell us what makes the movie distinctive.

Do not challenge the entire viewing history of everyone reading the post.

Some of us have seen Things.

1. “You’re Not Ready”

Yes, we are.

This phrase is especially popular in social captions, trailer headlines and entertainment coverage. It appeared less frequently on the crowdfunding pages in our pilot sample, suggesting that it thrives once promotion moves away from detailed campaign language and into attention-starved social media.

Recent horror coverage has still used “you’re not ready” to promote individual releases, demonstrating that the phrase remains alive, well and increasingly exhausted. ihorror.com

“You’re not ready” attempts to create excitement without providing information. It tells the audience how overwhelmed they will be while revealing nothing about what is supposed to overwhelm them.

Are we not ready for the violence?

The ending?

The practical effects?

The actor from a television series who appears in two scenes?

Make the case.

If the footage is extraordinary, show us.

If the premise is compelling, describe it.

If the movie is frightening, let it frighten us.

Stop insisting that we cannot possibly withstand a film that is currently raising $8,000 for postproduction sound.

We are ready.

The real question is whether the movie is.

The Last Word

Independent filmmakers face a nearly impossible promotional challenge. They must make an unknown project visible without the advertising budgets, recognizable stars or media access available to studio releases.

That deserves respect.

It also demands better writing.

The solution is not to stop being enthusiastic. It is to replace empty superlatives with specific reasons to care. Tell us about the handmade creature. Explain the personal experience behind the story. Show us the location nobody has filmed before. Introduce the performer who makes the character unforgettable.

Specificity creates interest.

Hyperbole creates expectations.

Your film does not need to redefine horror, change the game or blow anyone’s mind. It needs a compelling idea, a finished edit and a reason for audiences to press play.

That should be enough.