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Movie Trailers Increasingly Reveal Spoilers

July 28, 2015 by Robert Marich Leave a Comment

Terminator Genisys
“Terminator Genisys” director Alan Taylor laments the trailer reveals a hero character is actually a villain.

We’re in an era of “tell-all trailers” for movies. An Entertainment Weekly article suggests that movie trailers contain spoilers and reveal too much, citing “Southpaw,” “Jurassic World” and “Terminator Genisys.”

“According to experts in the trailer-making business, the more audiences know, the likelier they are to go,” says the ET article by Joe McGovern. The article quotes movie directors lamenting tell-all-trailers for their films.

However, film distributors are simply using what they think is the best creative message to sell movies. Moviegoers say that the trailers for some movies — like “Terminator Genisys” — are better than the movies themselves.

“Decades ago, trailers emphasized mystery. In fact, they intentionally were not explicit about a filmís ending,” says the third edition of book “Marketing To Moviegoers.” “But the trailers with the comprehensive approach tend to score better in audience testing today, which is one reason that the tell-all approach is popular for hard-to-sell films that struggle in consumer-research evaluations.”

Related content:

  • Why Do Trailers Spill All the Secrets? Because You Want Them To!

Filed Under: creative Tagged With: controversy, messaging, movie trailers

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