Why You Shouldn’t Watch Movie Trailers

In this internet savvy age, successfully avoiding spoilers for movies and TV shows is a talent we all wish we had. All it takes is a brief glance at Twitter after an opening day or a TV air-date to find that what you’ve been waiting to watch for ages has been spoiled before you’ve even been granted a chance to watch it. Yet these overly enthusiastic tweeters aren’t exactly the biggest threat to my enjoyment of a film, even if they do deserve a slap across the face for making me enjoy it far less; the biggest threat is the trailers for the films themselves, which increasingly spoil crucial elements of a movie before it even opens.

Think I’m just being overly spoiler-phobic? Think again. Since working at a cinema, I’ve noticed the trailers played on a near-consistent loop spoil entire movies at an alarming rate. I can now no longer watch trailers without getting annoyed, which rather irritatingly limits my writing here at Film Inquiry (because what’s more fun to write than a snarky review of a new trailer?). Here are some of the biggest offenders that prove you don’t have to have watched a movie to have seen it.

“The Best Joke Was In the Trailer”

Probably the biggest criticism of modern comedy movies isn’t that they aren’t as funny as they should be, but rather that the funniest jokes are in the trailer. A worrying amount of time, these trailers include the climactic set piece of the entire film. Cast your mind back to last year’s Academy Award nominated masterpiece, Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa, the trailer for which ruined the final act, a Little Miss Sunshine parody featuring a young boy in drag dancing suggestively at a beauty pageant and terrifying the parents in the audience.  See the trailer here.

In the trailer, this joke is funny and clearly works; in the movie it proves anti-climactic as we’ve seen it before, leaving us longing for a funnier joke to exit the film on (of course, a better criticism would be for more funny jokes in the fairly mediocre film itself, but that’s a different argument).

People who have seen the films also tell me the trailers for Let’s Be Cops and Sex Tape spoil the jokes and ruin both movies; judging by both trailers then, there are exactly zero jokes in each.

Of course, you can’t blame marketing departments of major studios for trying to advertise a film using its best jokes; after all, they do need to make substantial amounts of money. You can blame the marketing departments of smaller distributors however, who equally ruin movies even if they aren’t exactly a major commercial prospect. For example, in 2012 I was fortunate enough to see a preview screening of Ben Wheatley‘s terrific black comedy Sightseers at a local film festival. A few weeks later when the film was about to be released properly, a trailer for it appeared before another movie I was watching – one that included the final line of dialogue in the film, as well as footage from the bleak final scene, which for those who’ve seen the film can clearly interpret as a major spoiler. This, of course, is a notable example of a comedy film not ruining its best jokes, but ruining the film itself. Even for an arthouse release such as Sightseers, whose advertising campaign wasn’t focused on mainstream audiences, spoilers are still rife.

Wait – Isn’t That the End of the Movie?

The Expendables 3 recently turned out to be the nail in the coffin of the franchise in terms of its box office take. This wasn’t due to it leaking online to a collective “meh” from the internet three weeks before release, but due to the fact that the trailers released were confirmed by those who had seen the film and spoiled the entire thing, rendering it a pointless view. Climactic action set pieces (most notably the ridiculous, yet brilliant sight of Stallone jumping from a building to a flying helicopter) were ruined in a trailer that had the sheer cheek to end with THE SAME EXACT SHOT THE FILM ITSELF ENDED ON. It’s like the trailer for Citizen Kane ending with a shot of a sled and using the tagline, “It was his sled all along!”

Again, it isn’t just mainstream Hollywood doing this. Jonathan Glazer‘s weird almost-masterpiece Under the Skin may not have spoiled the film in the trailer (the marketing department probably couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on), but also ended on the final shot of the entire film. Admittedly in this case that shot is entirely enigmatic and won’t mean anything to people who haven’t watched it. But for a director who had spoken in interviews about his hands-on role in the marketing of the film, surely he could have easily avoided this? Especially when there are many enigmatic shots used in the movie that could be used to entice a potential viewer to take a trip to Glasgow in Scarlett Johannson‘s van. Jonathan Glazer did start his career editing movie trailers though, so maybe, for him, spoiling bits and pieces of films is just part of the job.

Films I haven’t Watched But Feel Like I’ve Seen Already

To really test this theory, take two examples of films that are about to be released in the UK whose trailers appear to spoil the entire narrative arc. The first is The Riot Club, a godawful looking drama about some of the worst people in existence: posh people at Cambridge University. To make things worse, it’s from the director of Anne-Hathaway-gets-hit-by-a-bus love story One Day. The trailer shows both debauchery, which looks quite tame post-Wolf of Wall Street, as well as their apparent downfall at the end of the film. Most shockingly, it also reveals what is sure to be the worst line of dialogue in any film this year: a posh guy angrily shouting, “I am sick to death of poor people!”

Looking better, but no less spoiler-y, is critically acclaimed comedy-drama Pride. After amassing a ton of glowing reviews following its premiere at Cannes earlier this year, the trailer didn’t need to spoil the entire narrative arc to get tickets sold. Yet during the trailer, Paddy Considine‘s character gives a speech that looks like the emotional climax of the film, and I have a sneaking suspicion the best jokes have all been used here. Only time will tell if I’m right in these assessments, but if I am, then it only confirms why I don’t watch trailers (I saw these both at my monthly “team meeting,” where we are subjected to previews for the month’s upcoming releases).

Advice for Marketing Departments and Trailer Editors

Many directors claim they don’t have a hands-on role in the marketing of their film, often complaining themselves about bits being used that should be left out. Directors with clout in the industry, such as Christoper Nolan and David Fincher, are able to get trailers made that accurately represent the films, yet spoil nothing (as evidenced by the recent Interstellar and Gone Girl promos). One of the first trailers for Paul Thomas Anderson‘s “it’s not about Scientology; honest” epic The Master largely consisted of Joaquin Phoenix chasing a car in a forest, a scene which didn’t even make it into the movie. All of these trailers either made me or are making me interested in seeing the movie, despite revealing as little as possible. Why can’t all trailers be this way?

It all boils down to common sense. Editors, if you’re advertising a comedy movie, don’t ruin the best jokes. If you’re advertising an action movie, don’t even include footage of the climactic set pieces. If you’re advertising an arthouse movie, don’t use the same methods the mainstream studios are using. Instead of making me want to see your movies, you’re making me feel like I’ve seen them already.

I’m excited about watching movies, but the fact we’ve arrived at a time I have to avoid all footage before buying a ticket makes it a sad day for being a movie fan. After all, isn’t the excitement and anticipation building up to a film’s release, imagining what it’s going to be like in your head, piecing together footage from the trailer, part of the fun of the movies?

My questions to you are these: do you watch trailers? If you do, do you worry about having movies spoiled by watching them?