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Do Horror Movie Trailers Show us Too Much?
Have you heard about that new movie coming out? It has "so and so" in it and has what seems to be a compelling story. All the pieces are there right? Then all the sudden Whamo! Here comes the trailer and guess what? It's too damn long and shows us too much!.
Have we struck a nerve, are you tting there thinking to yourself yeah that happens all the time! The almighty movie trailer/teaser/preview. Action packed, dashing and full of information...too much information. When we watch a movie trailer, we are excited to see what the film is all about. That's fine and dandy but I've noticed that sometimes it's a bit much.
A movie trailer in my opinion should be about a minute to a minute and a half long max. That's plenty of time to share what the film is bacally about. If it's any more than that, say 2 - 5 minutes, hell, I've seen the movie! (and yes I've seen 5 minute trailers. *snooze*)
You can imagine where I'm going from here; yep, they always show the "good parts". A car jump, a hot babe, gun play, the bloody kill scene, the sexual gobbledygook, some karate or at least some type of fighting action, and...that's it. You've seen the good stuff. So, when you get to the film, there isn't much left.
Everything else is dialogue, smaller pieces of action, more nudity and/or sex scenes and fillers. Hmmm...kind of spoiled the meat there professor. You have bacally turned your feature length fantasy into a short film fumble by expong the best parts of the movie in hopes of gaining everyone's interest.
How about we take half of the action out of it, half the time length, and make the audience want to spread the word that your trailer should be seen. Don't tell us what the film is about and don't share all the scary scenes. Give us something brief with a chilling mucal score, something that begs us to come back.
You have to leave the audience wanting more. If the teaser is too long, it's a spoiler. As a student of film myself, I have to study what draws a crowd in. I have to find out what entertains them, and that is not easy, but at least I know not to go over the minute and a half mark. I at least have that one down.
As a viewer, hell, I want to be entertained!
With the change of cinema over the years, the editing of the teaser has become lengthy. I actually went to a te once just to watch some previews to see what was out there. Anything over 2 minutes bored me. Get to the point already.
Ok, a hot babe wearing a bra is involved in some drama, a tough guy who saves the day makes a move, a car races down the road, a killer scares someone and some clever dialogue is exchanged between the lead characters. The End. Thank you, now 60 seconds later I actually want to see the movie to find out what happens.
Somehow, we seem to forget about movies that have those 2 -5 minute wonders. Your friend mentions it to you and you say, "Oh yeah, I saw that one", or you at least feel that way.
A movie preview should leave you wanting more. It's a marketing tool, a way of drawing interest to your feature presentation. Tell the audience what they need to know, nothing more. If you have more "good parts"
to show them when they watch the entire film, you have entertained them. If you have entertained them, you have done your job. What do you think Bidites?
Below is the official trailer for Paranormal Activity and one of the greatest examples of what we are talking about. Regardless of your feelings about the film the trailer completely ruins everything for you by showing ever posble frighting moment down to the last scene. WHAT WE'RE YOU THINKING PARAMOUNT
Well whatever they were thinking it worked because PA is the highest grosng movie of all time. That my friends is why Hollywood won't change. Because regardless of how much we might hate seeing the whole movie a head of time apparently it gets our butts in the seats. Time will tell but the days of the 60 second trailer may be gone.
http://youtu.be/F_UxLEqd074
Have we struck a nerve, are you tting there thinking to yourself yeah that happens all the time! The almighty movie trailer/teaser/preview. Action packed, dashing and full of information...too much information. When we watch a movie trailer, we are excited to see what the film is all about. That's fine and dandy but I've noticed that sometimes it's a bit much.
A movie trailer in my opinion should be about a minute to a minute and a half long max. That's plenty of time to share what the film is bacally about. If it's any more than that, say 2 - 5 minutes, hell, I've seen the movie! (and yes I've seen 5 minute trailers. *snooze*)
You can imagine where I'm going from here; yep, they always show the "good parts". A car jump, a hot babe, gun play, the bloody kill scene, the sexual gobbledygook, some karate or at least some type of fighting action, and...that's it. You've seen the good stuff. So, when you get to the film, there isn't much left.
Everything else is dialogue, smaller pieces of action, more nudity and/or sex scenes and fillers. Hmmm...kind of spoiled the meat there professor. You have bacally turned your feature length fantasy into a short film fumble by expong the best parts of the movie in hopes of gaining everyone's interest.
How about we take half of the action out of it, half the time length, and make the audience want to spread the word that your trailer should be seen. Don't tell us what the film is about and don't share all the scary scenes. Give us something brief with a chilling mucal score, something that begs us to come back.
You have to leave the audience wanting more. If the teaser is too long, it's a spoiler. As a student of film myself, I have to study what draws a crowd in. I have to find out what entertains them, and that is not easy, but at least I know not to go over the minute and a half mark. I at least have that one down.
As a viewer, hell, I want to be entertained!
With the change of cinema over the years, the editing of the teaser has become lengthy. I actually went to a te once just to watch some previews to see what was out there. Anything over 2 minutes bored me. Get to the point already.
Ok, a hot babe wearing a bra is involved in some drama, a tough guy who saves the day makes a move, a car races down the road, a killer scares someone and some clever dialogue is exchanged between the lead characters. The End. Thank you, now 60 seconds later I actually want to see the movie to find out what happens.
Somehow, we seem to forget about movies that have those 2 -5 minute wonders. Your friend mentions it to you and you say, "Oh yeah, I saw that one", or you at least feel that way.
A movie preview should leave you wanting more. It's a marketing tool, a way of drawing interest to your feature presentation. Tell the audience what they need to know, nothing more. If you have more "good parts"
to show them when they watch the entire film, you have entertained them. If you have entertained them, you have done your job. What do you think Bidites?
Below is the official trailer for Paranormal Activity and one of the greatest examples of what we are talking about. Regardless of your feelings about the film the trailer completely ruins everything for you by showing ever posble frighting moment down to the last scene. WHAT WE'RE YOU THINKING PARAMOUNT
Well whatever they were thinking it worked because PA is the highest grosng movie of all time. That my friends is why Hollywood won't change. Because regardless of how much we might hate seeing the whole movie a head of time apparently it gets our butts in the seats. Time will tell but the days of the 60 second trailer may be gone.
http://youtu.be/F_UxLEqd074
Horror Domain - Cursed Evil Overlord
Saturday 8/27/2011 at 01:16 PM | 81641
Great article BooMan! I always wonder when I watch a trailer, whether it be horror, action or any genre in general if they are showing all of the good parts and sadly most of the time they are. I remember seeing Quarantine and when it got to a certain scene, I recognized it from the trailer and I knew what was going to happen. They ruined that movie, they ruined paranormal activity's ending, they ruined all of the funny parts in Mr. Deeds.
I can seriously go on and on with different movies that trailers have ruined but that's why I decided to start making short films so that in the future I can make feature length films with good teaser trailers. I'm tired of the remakes and premakes etc. it's time for the fans to take the matters into their own hands and create the films they want to see.
I can seriously go on and on with different movies that trailers have ruined but that's why I decided to start making short films so that in the future I can make feature length films with good teaser trailers. I'm tired of the remakes and premakes etc. it's time for the fans to take the matters into their own hands and create the films they want to see.
Sephit
Saturday 8/27/2011 at 07:16 PM | 81661
I've been saying this for a long time about all kinds of movies. The most recent one I noticed in the horror genre was Indious. The fact that it's not the house that's haunted was pretty much in every trailer and then the quick shot of the red faced demon tting behind Patrick Wilson at the table. It could've been creepy or have a nice twist to it if I hadn't see it a hundred times already before seeing the movie.
Ed Reilly
Monday 8/29/2011 at 03:37 PM | 81760
