Synoptic Trailers

So you’re at the cinema (or you put a DVD in the player – same story) and the pre-feature adverts begin. The trailers.

Sometimes these are carefully chosen for the audience of the main feature. Sometimes, not so much. In the end, as long as they aren’t offensive I don’t mind much. Trailers are there for a reason and they obviously do the job well.

But if there’s something that really gets me annoyed in the world of movies, it’s the really badly done trailers.

They come in a few different categories…

Firstly there’s the ones that convey entirely the wrong feeling or experience compared with what the film is all about. I’m talking about trailers that are jump-cut and creepy, when the film is far from that.

Or when they have a completely irrelevant soundtrack over it: like this one for ‘The Emperor’s New Groove‘ (watch the trailer) – if you’ve seen the film can you please agree with me that the music on this trailer is ridiculous!

Or how about the ones that show you the ‘big surprise’ like all the monsters in the trailer for ‘Clash of The Titans‘.

And then there’s my personal most hated trailers. I call them ‘synoptic trailers’ – because they are the whole story synopsis – typically minus the final 2 minutes of the film, but you can *probably* guess what happens anyway.

Here is a perfect example for the film ‘Letters To Juliet‘ (watch the trailer)starring Amanda Seyfried

Seriously, watch it. You have now watched the film. Yippee you saved an hour and a half of your life. Isn’t that good?!

Well, no it’s not good – I get all cross about them. They are pointless. They spoil the story for anyone wanting to see them and they show no imagination or effort from the Studios.

Obviously you need to convey something of the film – what it’s like and what it’s about – but do you need to tell us the whole story? (Oh, and don’t get me started about the animated DVD menus that show clips from the entire movie…!)

…I guess I’m just a big fan of the ‘teaser trailer’

What do you think? Would you prefer to know the whole story? Would you just prefer to see a snippet from the film? Any trailers you ‘love to hate’?

Comment below :)