Monday, May 7, 2012

Lame Trailer Clichés: From the People Who Did This...

Okay, this is more of a lame marketing cliché. We all know that name dropping gets you places. And I don't know about you, but whenever I see the words "From Christopher Nolan" or "A Film by Steven Spielberg" I'm instantly hooked. Mind you, 50% of people who watch trailers knows who Spielberg is. However, some people take name-dropping the entirely wrong way, and we have lazy things like "From the Producers of..." or "From the Makers of...", when they don't really add anything to the movie that they're trying to see. I mean, come on, who went to see Battleship because it was "From Hasbro the company that brought you Transformers"? Oh that's right, you Americans don't have it yet. And you suspectedly have good taste.

How about some examples, guys?

Battleship - Because only Hasbro would make an entire movie based on a board game.


Immortals - Not only is it from the producers of 300, it looks exactly like 300.


Sunshine Cleaning - It has sunshine in the title, Alan Arkin in it, and it is from the producers of Little Miss Sunshine. Therefore it was to be the next Little Miss Sunshine.


The Five-Year Engagement - This one occurs the most. Since the success of movies like Bridesmaids and Knocked Up and Superbad etc etc etc, they've been plastered in every other raunchy comedy trailer. Because this one is wedding themed, it has Bridesmaids.


Oranges and Sunshine - Well thank goodness, we all needed another The King's Speech.


New Year's Eve - Who would have thunk it? They want to chase away potential viewers.


The Thing - This one is just plain lazy. First, it slaps on the 'Universal Pictures' thing like it was the only movie Universal made in 2011. And the producers of Dawn of the Dead produced much better movies like Children of Men, and much more relevant films like The Last Exorcism. But no, they chose Dawn of the Dead. 


The Lucky One - If anyone feels compelled to see a movie because of those words I feel genuinely sorry for them.


Do you feel compelled to see any of these movies after those examples of blatant name dropping?

13 comments:

  1. FUCK name dropping. Hate it. One of the countless awful problems I have with trailers. I'll discover who produced/directed a movie by looking it up, not watching the stupid bloody trailer.

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  2. I don't mind it. I guess Sunshine Cleaning and Oranges and Sunshine (huh sunshine's everywehere lol) are okay.

    Some name dropping is even good in my opinion. For inctance, in Prometheus -- from Ridley Scott, the director of Alien and Gladiator, it looks proud, nicely proud and celebrating.

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    Replies
    1. Haha, lots of sunshine.

      I do like it sometimes. As I said, seeing Christopher Nolan's or Steven Spielberg's names in shining lights gets me excited.

      Delete
  3. I think the fault of name dropping, at least where I come in, is in basically every situation where name dropping would work, I'm already well aware of the film. I keep track of what people I like are doing.

    What I like about the Dawn of the Dead reference is they don't specify which version, though I assume they mean the Zach Snyder remake.

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  4. I liked that they had to include "The Notebook" under Nicholas Sparks' name. Really, we know he writes sappy, crappy, love stories where someone dies in the end.

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    Replies
    1. Haha, yes we do. It's a bit of a no-brainer, really.

      Delete
  5. I hate those cliches. It's insulting and I just groan whenever I see that. Remember that trailer for that movie produced by M. Night Shyamalan? I remember seeing a trailer for that and when M. Night Shyamalan's name came up, myself and the audience groaned and booed!

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    Replies
    1. Hahaha, that's what I do whenever I see his name.

      Delete
  6. I love the "From the Producers of 300" that was huge in the IMMORTALS marketing.

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  7. I guess it was. One of the people I work with kept referring to it as the 'new 300 movie'. And I just went along with it.

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  8. This cliche is just a way to raise the profile of the movie- you would be amazed to know how many people fall for it and go to see a movie just because the trailer says "From the producers of Bridesmaids"

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You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.

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