Film Trailers

Definition:

A trailer is an advert designed to attract the audience encouraging them to watch the film when it is released.

Key points about trailers:

• Has to be a maximum of 2 minutes and 30 seconds in length (However studios and distributers are allowed to exceed this once a year for a film if they deem it necessary) 
• The clips shown are usually the most noteworthy parts of the film e.g. the most exiting or funny sections (but without ruining the plot)
• The scenes shown do not have to be shown in the order they happen in the film 

The First Film Trailer:

The name 'trailer' comes from the fact that they actually used to be shown at the end of a feature film screening - however this did not last long as people would leave when the film ended and not wait to watch the trailers, but the name stuck.

The first film trailer was for the musical 'The Pleasure Seekers' which was shown in a US movie theatre in November 1913. This trailer was produced by Nils Granlund who, a year later in 1914, went on to produce the first motion picture trailer for a Charlie Chaplin film. These trailers would have consisted of  key scenes being shown with large text describing the story.

In the 1960's textless trailers featuring a montage of the film with quick editing and voiceover's became popular - mainly due to the 'new hollywood' and more advanced techniques becoming popular on TV.

In 1964, Andrew J Kuehn independently produced a trailer for the film 'Night of the iguana' which used high contrast photography, quick editing and a voiceover. As this new type of trailer was successful Kuehn started Kaleidoscope Films in 1968 - a company that would be very important in making trailers over the next three decades.

As more expensive films were made the more money was spent marketing them - so the trailers became more important and in depth.

With the arrival of VHS, trailers were placed at the beginning of the tapes. Nowadays with DVD and Blu-Ray trailers are more of a bonus feature and viewing them is optional.

Trailers are now shown:

• Before the screening of a film at the cinema
• On DVD's and Blu-Ray discs
• On the internet (out of the 10 billion watched per year film trailers are ranked third after only the news and user created videos)