Trailers and the magic they carry;
Back in December 2019, the motion picture ‘TENET’, launched their first trailer. Being a massive Christopher Nolan fan, I was eager to finally get a glimpse of this movie and see what was in store for the future. I ended up watching that trailer far too many times, to a point where it was just bizarre. This had happened even with the trailers of ‘Dunkirk’, ‘Joker’, ‘Avengers Infinity War’, and ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. Which got me wondering, what exactly excited me so?
What sets these trailers apart from other trailers is the fact that they show you a lot, but with the bare minimum context. You begin rewatching these trailers, hoping for that extra crumb, that would help you figure out what was going on. ‘Dunkirk’ gave me an adrenaline rush due to the way it was set up, with the world at stake, and with an excellent background score by Hans Zimmer. ‘Joker’ practically showed us the entire film in 3 minutes, including some stills of Joaquin Phoenix’s immaculate acting skills, without revealing what tied each scene to the next. ‘Avengers Infinity War’, well, Marvel released 19 movies which ultimately built up to this one. The trailer gave the perfect blend of action and drama with even larger stakes. I’d re-watch it just to get excited. ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was quite different from the other films I listed. It showcased the extravagant life lived by Freddie Mercury, along with the band’s struggle to stick together and make the iconic music that they did. All this paired up with the Live Aid sequences and ‘Under Pressure’ playing in the background, just manages to give me goosebumps. This is what made me think about the significance and the importance of trailers for motion pictures.
Trailers are made to hype up the audience and showcase the film’s best moments, usually under three minutes, the sole intent being to draw in a bigger crowd. Leaving the audience in a state of curiosity to find out what happens next has proven to be a successful tactic, on the whole . This promotion tactic is used for almost every major Hollywood and Bollywood production nowadays, to the point where it seems strange when a movie doesn’t have a trailer made prior to its release.
The origin of the word ‘trailer’ is an interesting one. Back in the day, the cinemas used to receive the reels to the motion pictures un-rewound, which meant that the ending of the film was the easiest part of the reel to access. Trailers for other movies were attached (rather spliced) to the end of this movie’s reel which meant that it was “trailing” the original feature film showcased. Hence, the word “trailers” was used to denote the fact that it was added at the end of the film. Now, most of us don’t bother staying back in the cinema since the credits start rolling on the screen. Imagine waiting to watch movie trailers after the credits roll out too. That’s the reason why featuring trailers at the end of a motion picture wasn’t exactly feasible since there was no one left to watch it. Hence, trailers started playing prior to the movie.
Trailers back in the ’50s used to feature voice over narrations with the story shown in the form of text, on the big screen. It wasn’t until the ’60s when the face of trailers changed with quick edits and fast paced montages. Stanley Kubrick was one of the pioneers who changed the face of trailers. Kubrick always wanted to control all aspects of his movies, right from marketing to the score. Hence, he took control over the trailer aspect too and made it what it is today. Eventually, trailers started being featured on VHS and DVDs from the same production house those VHS/DVDs were from. Currently, production houses release the trailers to video streaming and social media platforms across the web, YouTube being the most famous platform for it. This gets a wider reach and the chance to re-watch it several times.
The editing of action or big budget movie trailers are done in such a way as to match the percussion of the background score, which makes the trailer generally a lot more thrilling and exciting. Independent films usually don’t have such exuberant trailers when compared to movies from larger production houses. They feature soft and mellow music with clips from the movie featured in them. Horror movies trailers follow the same idea as the movie itself and try to use jump scare tactics to hype up the movie, with the usage of an eerie score.
Let us take an example of an action movie trailer. I choose TENET cause at this point, I know the trailer by heart. TENET is a big budget ($200 million, produced by Warner Bros.), action packed movie related to espionage and science fiction.
The trailer opens with a shot of skyscrapers at night (Proud to say that this is Mumbai). We already know that it’s going to be a big budget movie with the next shot which shows 2 men climbing up a building (in the weirdest way possible). The score used was composed by the Oscar winner, Ludwig Göransson with heavy bass synths and a quick tempo. We see a few more shots of the film’s protagonist, The Protagonist (yes, I know it sounds absurd), with a narration by a man who is later shown in the video. This is the first act of the trailer that builds a platform for the rest. It shows us that the stakes are high, with death involved too. The second act of the trailer tries to explain what’s at stake. “Nuclear Holocaust?” “Something worse.” We now get a vague idea about the seriousness of the situation and the massive task at hand for The Protagonist. The third and final act of the trailer is packed with quick cuts, big action sequences, glimpses of famous actors (to gain popularity) and several inexplicable shots. “Don’t try to understand it, feel it.” These are the words narrated in the background as we see an accident going backwards while The Protagonist is moving forwards. This concludes the 3 main acts of this trailer. An extra bit is shown after the film’s name is showcased, to hype up the audience once again to show them what’s in store for the future. The reason why I love this trailer is because it says so much, with such little time. It showcases some beautiful looking shots and gives you the feeling of the classic “Movie Magic” which is the reason we all watch movies.
Another important aspect of trailers is the music used in them. I used to remember trailers better when I heard an iconic song being featured in the background, even if the footage wasn’t visually striking. I have even found some great songs by just listening to them in trailers. I feel bad to say this, but the first time I heard the song ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was back in 2016, when it was featured in the ‘Suicide Squad’ trailer. It was love at first sight. (yes I do know that it doesn’t involve sight) Similarly, I fell in love with ‘Under Pressure’ when I heard it in the ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ trailer, ‘Way Down We Go’ in the ‘Logan’ trailer. Another instance is when I first heard the iconic ‘Miserlou’ in the ‘Pulp Fiction’ trailer. This piece of music, from the 60s, gained popularity thanks to this movie and is even featured in The Black Eyed Peas’ hit song, ‘Pump It’. A trailer for the film ‘Joker’ took a song from the 60s, ‘Smile’. This song wasn’t composed to sound creepy or psychotic, but was made to do so in the trailer. I can keep going on but I am trying my best to not bore you so I shall stop. Some trailers employ the use of scores instead of songs. In these instances, the score is taken from a part of the music composed for the movie and is featured in the trailer. Nolan’s movie trailers usually end up following this trend.
The point is, trailers are fun to watch, a great way to promote the movie and electrify the audience. It takes a lot of work to make one (not much in comparison to making a movie) and they need to be well thought out as this is a great way to get those big box-office collections in the future.
~Rohan Prasad
