They are blurbing tweets now? Yes they're

It appeared inevitable, and today it's finally happened: Movie entrepreneurs have started mining critics' Twitter feeds for blurbs. Open Road Films a week ago dropped a brand new trailer for "The Gray," the indie action thriller starring Liam Neeson. Spread through the place are six blurbs, all excerpted in the Twitter accounts of movie experts and writers who saw the film in an event in Austin, Tex., recently. "@THEGREYMOVIE has floored me," reads the very first, credited to @JHoffman6, the Twitter handle of IFC blogger and movie critic Jordan Hoffman. "Kicks unholy ass," reads the following, from @headgeek666, the well-known handle of Ain't It Awesome News poobah Harry Knowles. It isn't the very first time tweets happen to be utilized in traditional ads -- that precedent seems to fit in with "Paranormal Activity 3," whose trailers incorporated several positive tweets just before its October bow. The main difference: Individuals 140-character-and-under reviews were released by average people who experienced early tests, not professional authors and experts. But that threshold was entered Wednesday, when Open Road first showed its third "Gray" trailer on iTunes, culling individuals six tweets from five different movie writers who saw the film 12 ,. 10 in the annual Butt-Numb-A-Thon, a 24-hour screening series located by Knowles in the Alamo Draft House. The gathering of movie scribes were advised these were liberated to talk and tweet concerning the movie soon after seeing it none stated they'd any difficulty with Open Road's subsequent utilization of their responses. (Open Road was not able to instantly discuss the process, but was organizing a job interview to become incorporated inside a later update for this story.) "I believed it was really, really awesome they did that," stated Alan Cerny, who creates for Ain't It Awesome. Via his Twitter handle @NordlingAICN, Cerne tweeted directly at director (and relative Twitter newbie) Joe Carnahan: "That, mister, was DIRTY DOZEN good" -- a sentiment Open Road saw fit to incorporate in its trailer. Neither Cerny nor some of his co-workers who spoken with Variety expressed any concern the blurbing of Tweets -- instead of the standard reviews they are compensated to create -- would undermine the influence of individuals reviews. Hoffman did indicate that some authors (who have been not incorporated within the "Gray" trailer) opposed the concept, and wondered aloud if the practice would gain momentum, particularly only at that month's Sundance Film Festival, where 100s of media types will stream from tests nightly. "I believe there's room for immediate responses and regular reviews," stated Cerny, who stated he was requested with a Open Road repetition whether or not this was OK to make use of his tweet. "I am type of surprised they had not tried it earlier." Though Knowles states he never got a phone call for clearance on blurbing his tweets, "I am absolutely awesome with this. ... I believe that many of us with Twitter handles would like bigger audiences anyway, therefore it can't hurt." Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com