Midweek Mumble – Does our marketing need more marketing?
This week Rodney takes a look / rant at the latest trend in Cinema… Trailers of trailers….
Okay, I’m now officially pissed off.
This past week saw a tidbit of a trailer for Steven Spielberg’s upcoming film about Abraham Lincoln, aptly titled Lincoln, released online. It lasted just 44 seconds. Technically, it was what industry folks call a “teaser”, but what exactly was it teasing? The upcoming release of a trailer for the film. Yes, somebody has decided that the wince-inducing trend of releasing a teaser for the teaser, to announce that a trailer is coming soon, is exactly what the world needs right now.
For God’s sake, is Hollywood’ marketing machine so poor creatively that the best that can do is create trailers for trailers? Just how much anticipation is created simply by spending a week making a trailer to announce that very shortly you’re going to release… another trailer?
If memory serves, I think the same kind of thing happened around Prometheus earlier this year as well. Release a teaser to announce we’re releasing a trailer, then release the trailer a week or two later anyway.
Why? What exactly is the point? I despair at the constant need to promote everything to do with a movie, now apparently including the very trailers themselves. I’m not sure about everyone else, but it’s starting to grate on me. Yes, we all know Spielberg’s got a film coming out. It’s about one of America’s most influential political leaders, sure. Daniel Day Lewis is pretty much a lock for another Best Actor Oscar next year off the back of it, apparently. So why not just simply release a goddam trailer for it? Why bother with a pre-trailer trailer?
I’m a tad too cynical to bother putting up with this kind of crud - that’s what that Lincoln trailer was, crud – and I’m to jaded to bother with trailers much these days anyway (they give away the whole film in 2 minutes…. why not just go see the film?) but this kind of marketing, whereby the studio markets its own marketing, seems like desperation to develop an audience.
Guys, the audience will come whether you market the hell out of it or not.
Trailer for trailers – just when you thought Hollywood couldn’t get any worse.
Rodney Twelftree
That is stupid. Now I don’t watch trailers at all, so I don’t share the frustration
I’m sorely tempted to avoid trailers altogether, myself. After this, I’ve lost interest….
I’m with you guys on this, I rarely watch trailers these days for fear of spoilers apart from the odd film that I can’t hold back from such as The Master. I don’t mind it occasionaly but it seems that every film these days has a ridiculous amount of trailer’s. Great idea for a mumble!
Unless you can piece together the entire film from all the trailers it has, the marketing people haven’t done their job properly….
Ahah yeah, I had the same rant on my blog a few months ago. I kept wishing this trend is just a phase that’ll quickly pass, alas…
Wow, I’ll have to check out what you wrote, Ruth! Unfortunately, I doubt the words of this little black duck will have much effect on the Hollywood system….. so yeah, it looks like trailer trailers are here to stay!!
I don’t mind trailers, but the whole tease for trailers trend has gotten ridiculous.Its overdoing it
Do you hear that, Hollywood? Dirty says it’s ridiculous too!!
i’m with Nostra. i never watch trailers or read the cover jackets of books and haven’t for going on 30 years. Why? They’re full of spoilers. i don’t want to know the first half of the novel or film until i get there myself.
You read, Al?
Absolutely hate this phenomenon of trailers for trailers. That said I still love trailers in general…a cinema outing wouldn’t be the same without my fix of the upcoming movies.
I’s funny, but I do look forward to the trailer at the start of cinema screenings, but at the same time, don’t like the way they often ruin punchlines or plotpoints….. I wish there was a code of ethics they had to abide by…. then again, they’d probably be hard pressed to promote a film if they couldn’t reveal anything too specific.
I rarely watch trailers, because some just revealed too many plots and some got us a hint that it’s going to be a bad movie. But yeah, some movies have too many publicity and over-budgeted for the part. but a trailer of a trailer is just…no point.
Precisely – no point at all!
Remember when there was only ever 1 trailer released for a film? *sigh*