SHORT TAKES / MOVIES : ‘Howards End’s’ Quiet Ad Campaign

Post-Oscar nomination day and it’s congratulations all around--evidenced by the kinds and sizes of advertisements the studios take out touting their nominated pictures.

As expected, Warner Bros. took out a full-page ad on Page 3 of The Times’ Calendar section Thursday for “Unforgiven,” listing the categories and the names of its nine Academy Award nominations in can’t-miss-it large type.

But where’s the ad for chief rival “Howards End,” the only other film that garnered as many nods? It’s on Page 11--about twice the size of a postage stamp.

Unusual? Definitely, said Sony Pictures Classics co-president Tom Bernard. “Howards End,” after all, has never been marketed like a big studio picture.

With a smaller-than-studio marketing budget to work with, Sony gambled that “Howards End” was guaranteed a certain number of nominations (“between 6 and 10”) and so advertising time was purchased on Wednesday night’s “Entertainment Tonight” and CNN’s “Showbiz Today.” Larger newspaper treatment was saved for today and Saturday in The Times and the New York Times. Sunday it’s back to a Munchkin-size ad.

“Believe me, after marketing this picture now for nearly a year, we’ve figured out who our audience is,” Bernard said.

And, he explained, that audience plans on Friday to see a matinee or early evening showing. With an Oscar push, “Howards End” expands today from 10 to 40 screens in the metropolitan Los Angeles area and from 71 to 350 nationwide. Its also going for the first time to places like Pensacola, Fla., and Baton Rouge, La.

To date, the picture has grossed $18 million, while “Unforgiven” has sold more than $75-million worth of tickets. Clint Eastwood’s Western, which came and went from wide release last fall, will expand from three exclusive engagements to an additional 43 screens.