Outside the Box

Who Needs Gewgaws When You Have Naked Women?

Typically, as loyal readers know, a film's DVD release is heralded by swag -- some virtually worthless bit of a thing with type or a logo symbolically representative of the project positioned upon it somewhere obvious. If your movie is about naked matrons, what promotes that better than a nude woman positioned somewhere obvious?

In this instance, that's a storefront near London Bridge; GettyImage has pics (posted here.)

Can't be sure, but we ponder if "Calendar Girls" is itself the first movie about a piece of swag (film version).

More Beeping FAQs

Beep: So, here's this thing me and my compatriots have toiled over and sweated about, and all you do is make fun.

That's life in the big city, tinsel town, a place of heartbreak and disappointment and a success that often comes at the cost of interpersonal comfort and good parking.

Beep: You seem really attuned to the entertainment business. You must be waist deep in the river of entertainment releases.

Is that a question?

Beep: Don't be a smart-ass.

You haven't been reading.

Beep: Well?

Immersed in Hollywoodivity? Nope. For example, we see very little TV, broadcast or cable; not premieres nor any movies upon release and no screenings of any kind and few screeners of any consequence; almost no commercial radio broadcasts but some internet; magazines, what a pain in the butt they are; and that industry party ... we weren't there.

Beep: How can you write about the films and TV shows then?

It's about the swag.

Beep: Is this blog just a gimmick to enrich your life, home and office with bushels of promotional items that will grow more collectible over time and after you plug their value?

No. Swag, not otherwise spoken for, is regularly spread between various non-profit thrift shops around the city. What they do with it is up to them. But little swag lingers in our life; it can't be redundant to anything we already possess and it has to be either intensely practical or absurd, plus compact and athesetically pleasing ... and that likely means no project logo.

Beep: What's the trouble with logos? To you, sometimes they're good and sometimes they're bad? What gives?

A projects' logo type increases cache if the project is successful in the mainstream or even more if it's sucessful in some cultish way. But many subjective analyses impinge: Does the logo render the item useless? Is the swag item common and only made uncommon by adding the logo? Might it still communicate some message to those who have no idea what it's referring to? Can the logo be easily removed? Is the item pointless once a logo is removed? Does it look better? Is it something only a completist could love? Or a crewmember? We have no pat answers, only memories of swag and the little shreds of project logos that remain.

Beep: Who says?

You haven't been reading.

Please don't call, this post has been pre-recorded for presentation in this time zone.

Read the PREVIOUS FAQ post

Swag Bags

For those who think there's no justice in the world, here's more proof -- Variety reports:

For the second year in a row, gift bag producers Distinctive Assets, a 5-year-old company also responsible for bagging the Grammys and Tonys, will soften the blow for losers by showering them with $40,000 worth of goods. The "Caesars Palace Presents Everyone Wins at the Oscars" grab bag will be filled with freebies ranging from an all-expenses-paid trip to Caesars Palace in Sin City to complimentary laser eye surgery.

Firm's website says it's only $32,000, but contents can increase until Monday's deadline for other companies to participate.
MSN (last item) picked up the story; GettyImages has fotos (posted here). USA Today remarks on other swag to be bestowed upon those who have trouble bearing up under the stress of an Oscar night appearance.

Closet Deposit

While Adam & Steven and Madam & Eve take license, it's important not to forget issues that face that community specifically, and everyone generally, still. Out of the Closet, despite their testiness, retails recycled goods for good. What's up?
Find fresh swag there.

Previously Been Outside The Boxed: Goodwill, County, Council.

Frequently Asked Questions at the Sound of the Beep

Beep: Hey, my project debuted 2 months ago, and you only blogged my swag last week. What gives?

Your deadlines are not our deadlines. Some efforts -- yours and ours -- require a greater level of researching links and construction of posts. And most people will only be stumbling across any one particular post long after the swagged project's parodied jokes are long forgotten from sophomoric sitcoms long gone from syndication. Also it's not about the project, it's about the swag.

Beep: Hey, you didn't give that swag a grade.

Those jokes didn't make it past our editor.

Beep: These others did?

Yes, scary. We know.

Beep: How do you set the standards you use to award the various grades?

Standards? We don't need no stinkin' standards.

Beep: What makes you so smart?
Vulcan Mind Meld ... that and we have been inwardly and outwardly lusting after and ridiculing this stuff around offices for over 20 years. So if nothing else, ours is the voice of a long-time swag consumer.

Beep: What is with the "royal we" hooey?

We don't know what you mean.

Beep: Your name is really James Hames?

Yes, scary. We know.

Beep: This blog sure has a lot of links.

Not every time.

Please don't call, this post has been pre-recorded for presentation in this time zone.

Swag Jag

As the town filters back from Park City, Sundance-goers return with tales of swag.

Sundance oft-times provides a glimpse of film releases -- and their swag -- on the horizon, causing us to ponder two other films getting a lot of chatter. Wondering which swag could be more unseemly: "Brown Bunny" or "The Passion" ... whose marketing has already begun, for example here.

Goodwill Hunting

Most recent swag items posted here, and others besides, have made their way to a local Goodwill Store.

"The mission of Goodwill Industries of Southern California is to enhance the quality of the lives of people who have disabilities and other vocational disadvantages by assisting them to become productive and self-sufficient through education, training and job opportunities."

The Goodwill has a Hollywood tie in Fred Grandy, who went from "The Love Boat" to the U.S. House of Representatives representing Iowa to being president of the charitable organization. He offers the group's public/private partnership case study, beginning on page 7 of this report (in PDF format).

Trivial pursuit: Grandy was the best man at the David Eisenhower and Julie Nixon White House wedding in 1968.

Which Way Did it Go?

The recent swag harvest was deposited at the County Thrift Shop here. Who are they & what do they do? Their receipt says they're "An inter-tribal Native American Spiritual Community, Benefittting Youth of All Races." Their website says nothing.

Swag Tag

They call it swag, as in loot, not fabric, not drugs. So as verbing weirds language in that slanguage kinda way, it's swag we're swagged (swag, swags, swagged, swug). And the name of this blog (blog, blogs, blogged, blug) references both the boxes that swag comes in, and "thinking outside the box" which isn't really something we need to be told twice. If we had our way, this'd be tagged "Swag Lamp"... < rimshot > how Diogenesian! < /rimshot > which is likely why we're blogging swag rather than telling someone else to. Also, as an acronym, it's SWAG, Stuff We All Get ... which we hope explains, if not excuses, the first person plural (3rd definition) you're reading now.

Tangentially speaking: Def #4: "Herbal tea in a plastic sandwich bag sold as marijuana to an unsuspecting customer." Who writes that stuff? Bulk tea almost $10 a pound. ... If there were a pot website, it'd show a price more than 500 times that... not that we have any particular expertise. Suffice to say, it's like someone buying a Miata and getting a bus pass instead. Unsuspecting?, you bet.

Where Does It Go?

The swag in this blog, and other non-food items as well, have found a home at a Council Thrift Shop (navigate to site's link on left). Who are they and what do they do?:

"mothers and professors…attorneys and artists…activists and entrepreneurs…students and stock brokers…lifelong volunteers and plain old do-gooders. We are women with strong ties to our community, local schools and political and cultural institutions. We are in search of like-minded souls.

Regardless of culture, ethnicity, religion or race, we share in the spirit of Tikkun Olam, Hebrew for 'repairing the world.' "