
The People Who Grind Out Movie Trailers - pmcpinto
https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/7/23/17601024/movie-trailer-editors-marvel-pixar-how-made
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rawoke083600
Funny story:I use to work for a tech company that buid pay-to-view systems for
hotels (small atom box with nice screen in each hotel room). Thennnn the guys
wanted porn movies... fine we got it and it was great (ppl buying porn with
their breakfast). But the porn movies didn't have trailers so we just took any
30 sec of it.... BIG MISTAKE... no one was buying the movies anymore... We
quickly realised our random 30sec were too graphic People were only watching
the trailers on repeat (yes this is the one time your mind-in-gutter is right)
! lol We had to make new trailers but show nothing below the naval :D

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lsh
I watch a lot of trailers just for fun, mostly from this site:
[http://davestrailerpage.co.uk/](http://davestrailerpage.co.uk/)

I've gotten very picky about what constitutes a 'good' trailer. Any trailer
that has any of these:

* an overly dramatic deep manly narrator

* is actually a 'clip' rather than a trailer

* is actually a 'making of' rather than a trailer

* has a pre-trailer to the trailer

and a bunch of other things, gets deleted immediately. Thought I would share
;) I also have a dave's trailer page scraper if anybody is interested/obsessed
like I am.

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B-Con
What about summarizing the entire movie? That's an instant NO from me. I've
literally not watched movies because I've seen the trailers and feel there's
really no wiggle room left plot-wise, I know it all.

I very actively avoid all trailers for movies that I'm going to see. Modern
blockbuster trailers just ruin the movie.

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lsh
Trailers don't summarise the whole movie. And even if you feel they do,
knowing the outline of a movie isn't going to ruin the actual movie experience
itself. I avoid heaps of crap movies simply because I dismiss them out of hand
by their trailer. Obviously there is the occasional movie whose trailer was
crap but was actually exceptional. These come around again.

There is so much drek out there a strong filter and upturned nose is essential
to carefully picking something that won't waste your time and money. Otherwise
you're saddled with Transformers 12: Re-revengance the pre-sequel. Or Star
Wars 8 ;)

It's how the same old variation of a story is told, how well did they pull it
off, was it charming, was the dialogue and it's delivery any good, etc.

And watching a movie with another person changes the movie again. Or watching
it at a cinema surrounded pigs at their troughs.

So many ways to appreciate movie watching that a trailer can't ever touch.

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B-Con
> Trailers don't summarise the whole movie.

Some do. If they contain:

* the protagonist's set-up

* the antagonist's set-up

* an explanation of the protagonist's challenges

* the protagonist overcoming the challenges

* the nature of the twist

* (sometimes the twist itself is hinted at)

* any romantic relationship of significance is both shown and the direction it ultimately goes is implied

* half the big awesome SFX scenes

* half the funny scenes

* almost every character of significance to the plot

then there isn't much left, I know almost all the key checkpoints, who has to
be where and do what and what action has to occur. It's pretty much sketched
out. There's minimal suspense because I know who can't die and who has to be
where at the end of the movie.

> And even if you feel they do, knowing the outline of a movie isn't going to
> ruin the actual movie experience itself.

It definitely can. Part of a story is experiencing it for the first time,
watching it unfold and not knowing what will happen. Trailers take that away
from you. "Oh yeah, I've seen this fight sequence and heard that joke before"
just doesn't carry the same weight. And when I have a checklist of people with
places to be and action scenes to happen, I can predict things. "Well, I know
there's going to be a twist because X has to fight Y in the streets and it
looks like they're getting along OK as we approach 1h 20m mark."

There's minimal surprise left, which really hampers my ability to empathize
with the characters and engage in the story.

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zaarn
A movie can work even if you know how these things. The how is just as
important as the what in a movie, even if, for example, you know the twist of
a movie, it can be just as fun to watch how you get there, how all the scenes
and narration from the trailer is strung together into the movie.

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always_good
I don't believe anyone here was suggesting that the movie becomes literally
unwatchable.

But a movie is just a 90 minute experience. It's nice to maximize it. And one
simple approach is to avoid giving in to curiosity by watching its 30 second
summary for the same reason you don't read plot outlines on Wikipedia before
reading books or tv show episodes.

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zaarn
I do actually go to Wikipedia and other places to spoil the plot outline to
myself. Makes it much easier to focus on the implementation of the story
rather than having to focus on both story and implementation.

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ironcan
If there is one comment that embodies the HN spirit, it's this one...

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zaarn
I would disagree there a bit, I do it because I enjoy taking things apart and
seeing how it all ticks together.

Like taking apart a running grandfather clock to see it tick.

Movies and TV series or even books are similar to me. I do enjoy digging deep
into TVTropes and AllTheTropes so I can whlie watching a movie, take it apart
and see how it ticks.

How the movie achieves the suspension of disbelief, how the heroes journey is
being implemented in lockstep with the villain (if there is even one) or how a
character is built, what parts make them what they are.

I think it's more of a hackers spirit rather than HN. I read the manual of the
movie so I can take it apart like some hacker might read a device manual to be
able to take it apart more easily.

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juliazxu
My friend decided to never watch trailers or teasers, and know as little as
possible before watching a movie.

It worked out really well for him. The less expectations he had, the more he
appreciated the work of art for what it really was.

It's a great philosophy, but it is tedious to time it late to a movie showing
exactly right so that you miss the trailers.

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always_good
I just close my eyes. And if it's a movie I think I will particularly enjoy, I
also plug my ears.

Might look goofy but I'm not exactly the center of attention.

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lalos
Huh what a coincidence I just watched this video
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_jjzzgLARQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_jjzzgLARQ)
which covers the trailer industry. Pretty eye opening to see all the tricks
behind the trailers, a almost-must watch.

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B-Con
I think people are watching movie trailers because they're almost self-
contained movies. Very frequently the protagonist and antagonist are set-up,
the protagonist's challenges are laid out, the protagonist is shown overcoming
the challenges, the nature of the twist is shown (and sometimes the twist
itself is hinted at), any romantic relationship of significance is both shown
and shows the direction it will go in the movie, half the big awesome SFX
scenes are included, half the funny one-liners are included, and every
character of significance is revealed.

Sometimes you literally don't even need to watch the movie, you just got the
tl;dw in the trailer.

I refuse to watch trailers for movies I might see, because they ruin the
experience since I know everything that's coming.

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dejawu
If you like these, you might like the annual trailer mashups like this one:
[https://youtu.be/YU8CvjIwAlY](https://youtu.be/YU8CvjIwAlY)

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rosege
I think the real challenge would be creating a trailer for a movie that is not
very good so that you don't give away the few good bits.

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yodon
In most cases the rule of thumb is you can hide the good bits from the
trailer, in which case no one will see the good bits because no one will go to
the film, or you can show the good bits in the trailer and people will go to
theaters and pay to watch the rest of the film.

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CtrlAltT5wpm
I'm not entirely certain you need to go that far. My issue is that most
trailers, especially the ~two minute ones, show the majority of the story arc,
and either contain spoilers, or hint heavily at those spoilers. That removes
dramatic tension and any desire for me to watch.

A made up example, but I've seen similar: let's take an ensemble superhero
action piece. You see a clip of a scene in the trailer where superhero A is in
mortal peril, set against a desert backdrop. Compelling, but when I see the
movie in theaters, there's an action set piece where superheroes A and B are
fighting against villains C and D. B is temporarily incapacitated, and it
looks like C and D have the drop on A. Unfortunately, this fight has an ocean
backdrop. As such, all dramatic tension is gone, since I know A makes it to a
desert I haven't seen yet.

I've had some success making a strict rule of watching only teasers (~30
seconds), or the first 30 seconds of a normal trailer, where they have time to
set up the basics, but not enough to ruin anything. If I'm at a movie, I'll
just close my eyes after that point, since I can't fast forward, and removing
visuals is usually enough.

I wish movie makers would keep that in mind.

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thaumasiotes
> You see a clip of a scene in the trailer where superhero A is in mortal
> peril, set against a desert backdrop. Compelling, but when I see the movie
> in theaters, there's an action set piece where superheroes A and B are
> fighting against villains C and D. B is temporarily incapacitated, and it
> looks like C and D have the drop on A. Unfortunately, this fight has an
> ocean backdrop. As such, all dramatic tension is gone, since I know A makes
> it to a desert I haven't seen yet.

I don't follow your logic. You already know A makes it out OK, because it's a
superhero movie. Why doesn't that ruin the dramatic tension equally?

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orky56
The worst is when there's something in the trailer that's not in the actual
movie.

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afraca
I have a bad memory, so I would not remember this happening. Do you have an
example? Also: why would they do that? If they already have the footage, and
it is 'impressive' (for the trailer), why NOT put it in the movie?

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exodust
Payback (1999, Mel Gibson) trailer contains a scene not in theatrical release.
The main poster for the movie shows Mel Gibson in a scene which never made it
to theatrical release either.

Usually I avoid trailers. It's marketing, spoilers, trying to sell you the
movie. For me, they might be clever, but that's all. The Payback trailer is
clever because it has no dialog...
[https://youtu.be/ji6aaZRACew](https://youtu.be/ji6aaZRACew)

Drama behind the scenes on Payback saw the director fired by the studio and
replaced, a completely new ending written and shot.

Normally when studios mess with the writing, the film suffers, but not in this
case. The theatrical release of Payback is better than the "director's cut"
released on video a few years later. The director's cut has a boring ending,
just generic gun fights and a mess of scenes. The theatrical release has a
good twist, more substance and style.

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ge0rg
It's really sad that you can't read this article on mobile Chrome without
getting trapped into an annoying "you have won" ad page that also clears the
browser history.

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magic_beans
Why don’t you install an ad-blocker?

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RightMillennial
Chrome on Android doesn't support extensions so you can't install its ad-
blockers.

