IT was the film no one would admit to seeing which made nearly £460 million at the box office.
And now it appears that the sequel to the bondage-themed bonkbuster Fifty Shades of Grey is inspiring purchases which won’t be talked about at the dinner table either.
The latest in the series of erotic movies, Fifty Shades Darker, will hit cinemas just in time for Valentine’s Day, resuming the tale of impressionable office girl Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) as she is once again swept off her feet and into the sex dungeon of handsome billionaire Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan). Just an everyday tale of S&M folk really.
Not so much a rom-com as a rom-dom, Fifty Shades Darker is the second instalment based on the bestselling trilogy of books by E L James, with the final film, Fifty Shades Freed, due next year.
High-street sex shop Ann Summers is betting that cinemagoers will be inspired by the antics onscreen to give some of their products a whirl, or whip, after launching their first-ever cinema advert to accompany the film.
Since the first film was released, Ann Summers has recorded a sales spike in sex toys seen on screen, with more than 75,000 whips, floggers and spankers sold.
This is matched by a similar interest in straps which secure a willing participant to a bed, dubbed ‘under the bed kits’, with 20,000 bought from UK stores.
Ball gags have also become popular items, too, alongside the chain’s more traditional lingerie, while 90,000 nipple clamps and also enough sets of handcuffs to outfit every police officer in the nation leaving the shelves last year.
Nobody knows how many people enjoy BDSM – an abbreviation for bondage, discipline, submission and domination or what used to be called plain old S&M – however, one US study suggests 11 per cent of women and 14 per cent of men have engaged in it. If those figures are translated to the UK, it could mean around four million people have tried it.
Britain is known abroad for being more than a little kinky. Many European countries think that while the British are sexually repressed and, frankly, not very good in bed, that the nation also enjoy's a dirty little secret: namely that we are all into spanking. The 'Carry On' cliche owes something to the view around the world that all Brits went to public school where they developed a taste for a good flogging.
The Summers advert, designed to showcase the store’s Valentine’s 2017 campaign entitled, ‘Love. Lust. And everything in-between’, will be shown before screenings of Fifty Shades Darker on the DCM network of cinemas, which just happen to match the locations of Ann Summers’ stores.
The 30-second film was created by an in-house team and shot on location in London. It features a Dakota Johnson lookalike model seducing a man.
Ann Summers is also launching a marketing campaign based around the expected upswing in interest in sado-masochism including window and in-store graphics in 134 stores nationwide, dedicated campaign pages on its website and a range of blog posts on the Ann Summers blog detailing the proper use of restraints to thought pieces on BDSM-based relationships.
CEO of Ann Summers, Jacqueline Gold, said: “I’m thrilled that Ann Summers will be launching its first-ever cinema advert. Our brand has been empowering couples to take control of their sex lives for 40 years.”
Brand Director Jane Eskriett added: “Our Valentine’s 2017 campaign celebrates our heritage, but also shows that we know just what the customer wants from us.
“If it’s beautiful lingerie for a romantic encounter, or an erotic piece and accessories for something more daring, we’ve got what you need."
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