Monday, February 3, 2014

Reel Facts & Opinions: The Super Bowl Movie Trailers - The Good, The Bad, & The Glorious


With squillions of eyes on the small-screen for the event which is the Super Bowl, the Gods of the big-screen have an opportunity to showcase and tease their big releases for the upcoming year. With short(er) time limitations, the studios have their work cut out for them in achieving their ultimate goal, which is to sell their product. The ones who did it best are the ones who showed-off their product the most while debuting something new. Here are the good, the bad, and the glorious of Super Sunday’s movie trailers…
The Good

NEED FOR SPEED – This film, based on a video game, seems to be banking on the popularity of the FAST AND THE FURIOUS long-running franchise, so racing cars is all it wants to sell. What made this trailer work is that there was no music, and the editors used the revving of the car engines to create a great, energetic, and rhythmic sequence. Great editing here.
MUPPETS MOST WANTED – Who doesn’t love The Muppets?

The Bad
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2 – Aside from the beginning and the end, this Spider-spot was mostly recycled material from the previous trailer. You would think that a big-nuts studio like Sony would show off their main superhero a little more. Lazy effort which had more explosions than content.

NO-SHOWS – You get negative points for not showing up. There were no trailers for the highly-anticipated X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST, DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES, or GODZILLA.
The Glorious

CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER – By using the National Anthem as its music, the trailer for our favorite star-spangled hero aired just before the singing of said National Anthem, which makes it the most perfectly-timed effort of the night. There is a fair amount of mystery still surrounding the film’s plot, and the trailer managed to show off a lot without giving away too much.
TRANSORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION – If the task of a trailer is to sell its product by showing off and giving us new footage, then the trailer for the 4th robots-in-disguise movie nailed it. We were given a sizzle reel of special effects featuring fan-favorite robots doing (and riding) awesome things while making time for the human faces. It was fast, eye-popping, and gave the fans exactly what they want to see.

KURT RUSSELL LIVES – Not movie-trailer related at all, but the Broadcast Gods found a way to un-earth the great Kurt Russell from his semi-retirement. Russell provided the voiceover and on-camera work for the Official Open to the big game. He was perfectly cast and his delivery was able to make a few references to his own movies without bringing the cheese. Hopefully more Movie Gods can entice Jack Burton/Snake Plissken/Wyatt Earp to appear more often in the coming years.
What say you?




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