Trailers are an under-appreciated art form insofar that many times they’re seen as vehicles for showing footage, explaining films away, or showing their hand about what moviegoers can expect. Foreign, domestic, independent, big budget: I celebrate all levels of trailers and hopefully this column will satisfactorily give you a baseline of what beta wave I’m operating on, because what better way to hone your skills as a thoughtful moviegoer than by deconstructing these little pieces of advertising? Some of the best authors will tell you that writing a short story is a lot harder than writing a long one, that you have to weigh every sentence. What better medium to see how this theory plays itself out beyond that than with movie trailers?
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Walt Disney Pictures has finally released a movie trailer for Waking Sleeping Beauty. At the Telluride Film Festival last year, I had the opportunity to see this great documentary. The directorial debut of Oscar-nominated Disney producer Don Hahn (The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast). is an honest look at the behind the scenes going-ons of Disney Animation, from the years 1984 to 1994, a resurrection of sorts, producing a staggering output of big hits – Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King and more.
The film tracks the interesting tale is the story behind the creation of those films, and the growing power struggle between Jeffrey Katzenberg, Michael Eisner and Roy Disney. We learn about how creativity somehow thrived in this environment of corporate chaos. The film is not your typical talking head doc, and is wisely presented almost entirely using archival footage cut from over 250 hours of footage, photos, and cut with narration from newly recorded audio interviews. A lot of the footage has never been seen before, in any film or making of doc, ever.
The movie played at Telluride, the Toronto International Film Festival and even won the Audience Award at the Hamptons International Film Festival. Walt Disney Pictures has decided to give the documentary a limited theatrical release in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco on March 26, 2010. In New York, the film will open at the Landmark Sunshine. In Los Angeles, the film will open on two screens, at the AMC Century City and AMC Burbank. In Chicago, the film will open at the AMC River East and in San Francisco at the Landmark Embarcadero all on March 26, 2010.
Watch the trailer after the jump, and please leave your thoughts in the comment below. Read More »
Paramount Pictures has acquired the U.S. distribution rights to George Gallo’s R-Rated crime dramedy Middle Men. The film, which recently made its world premiere at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, stars Luke Wilson, James Caan, Giovanni Ribisi and Gabriel Macht. Middle Men tells the true story of Jack Harris “the straight-laced businessman who helped launch one of the first porn websites” and becomes “caught between the Russian mob, a porn star, the FBI and his family, all while becoming very rich.”
In their film fest review, Variety called it “Boogie Nights’ meets ‘Goodfellas’” and called the film “a sleazy but undeniably intriguing tour of the bottom-feeding netherworld where porn and organized crime do their mutual bump-and-grind.” Watch an extended red band movie trailer for the film embedded after the jump.
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Lionsgate has released a new red band movie trailer for Matthew Vaughn’s adaptation of the Mark Millar comic book series Kick-Ass. As you know, I’ve been very critical of the marketing for this film thus far. I’ve not only seen the preview footage at comic-con, read part of the comic, but I’ve seen the entire film — it is awesome.
The three reasons why people will love this movie is because of the politically incorrect humor, the vulgarity, and the intense bloody super-stylized action. The posters for Big Daddy, Red Mist, Hit-Girl and now the entire cast, display none of these characteristics. They attempt to appeal to the masses with a colorful bublegum look (see above).
But this new restricted red band movie trailer is Kick-Ass — this is the movie, and this is the way to advertise it. Too bad most trailers and television networks won’t air this kind of trailer, because if you see this trailer, I’m pretty sure it’s as good as pre-ordering a ticket for opening weekend. Watch the trailer after the jump, and please leave your thoughts in the comments below.
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Prana has released a movie trailer for the upcoming animated Bollywood feature film Koochie Koochie Hota Hai, directed by Tarun Mansukhani (Dostana). The film is a quasi-animated take on Karan Johar’s Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (the highest grossing Indian movie of 1998) and marks the 12 year anniversary of its release. The popular Bollywood on-screen pair of Shahrukh Khan and Kajol reprise their roles, alongside other voice cast such as Rani Mukherji, Sanjay Dutt, Riteish Deshmukh, Anupam Kher, Uday Chopra and Simi Garewal. The core of the film is a love story between three dogs, and the supporting cast is made up of other animals, roosters, bears, pigs, cats, “and many others from the barn” I’m posting this because the movie is India’s largest animated production of all time. Watch the trailer, embedded after the jump.
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A full length international movie trailer for Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps has been released in The Sun. The trailer shows a lot more than the domestic teaser trailer (probably giving away too much of the plot this early on), and sports a much better soundtrack: the Rolling Stone’s song Sympathy For The Devil. Watch the trailer after the jump, and leave your thoughts in the comments below.
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Premiering at next month’s SXSW Film Festival in the movie mecca of Austin, Texas is The Ride, a thorough and serenely choreographed doc on young professional bull riders, rodeo entertainers, and the lucrative, tradition-heavy subculture that supports them. To some, the flick will appear an unlikely release from VICE Films, part of the media-and-culture empire that has expanded out of flannel-crowded Brooklyn to 15 countries. But their film offshoot, which boasts no less than Spike Jonze as its creative director, has taken a shining of late to the heartland; a heady Virginian outlaw feature from the company entitled White Lightnin’ is also on deck for oh-ten.
Paced with the bucolic ease of downing beers on a front porch at sunset (the acronym of the Professional Bull Riding circuit is conveniently PBR), the film is interspersed with shit-kicker action and road-life but follows many riders on through candid disappointment, injury, and even tragedy (one rider died during production). After the jump, we have the official trailer for The Ride, images, and thoughts from /Film’s exclusive screening…
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Written and directed by Peter Stebbings, and starring Woody Harrelson and Kat Dennings, Defendor is a superhero dramedy which centers around three characters: an everyday guy who comes to believe he’s a superhero, his psychiatrist, and the teenager prostitute he befriends. It’s part Kick-Ass, part Sopranos, and part Kpax. I screened the film at the premiere at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival and can tell you that it is not your typical superhero movie. Actually, it features no super powers, and the vigilantism is more Home Alone than Death Wish. It’s a character piece with both dramatic and comic elements. It is worth checking out, but not worth going out of your way to see (ie I’d reccomend netflixing the home video release). We now have an official trailer for the film, embedded after the jump.
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Last week we posted a new trailer for Toy Story 3 which revealed a whole bunch of new characters. We even did an extensive write-up of all the fun Pixar easter eggs that can be found in the trailer. Over the weekend, Walt Disney Pictures released an international version of the trailer, which features a litte bit of footage not contained in the domestic release. Watch it now, embedded after the jump.
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The last teaser trailer for Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment’s upcoming computer animated film Despicable Me had a lot of people scratching their heads. Who are these little yellow guys with glasses, gloves and blue overalls, and what do they have to do with a film about an evil villain who is plotting to steal the moon? One of the many things I learned during my visit to Illumination Entertainment’s Santa Monica-based offices is that the moo cow trailer was originally supposed to be the initial teaser trailer, which might have made a lot more sense.
Yes, these yellow creatures are part of Gru’s army of not-so-bright Minions which help him carry out his diabolical plans (unless of course, they get their hands on a Moo Cow Toy). A new international teaser trailer has been released on Times Online which further explains their role in the story. Watch it now, embedded after the jump.
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