To anticipate a film nowadays is to wonder what its tipping point into overexposure will be. “Iron Man 3” is set to open tomorrow — have you stayed away from trailers completely, or have you paid attention to every casting announcement and TV spot, hoping they won’t reveal one set-piece too many? It’s that question of enjoyment linked to movie marketing that a new study hoped to investigate, and the results are both predictable and surprising in equal measure.
According to the YouGov Omnibus survey findings, taken at the end of April, half of Americans think that movie trailers reveal far too much from the films they promote, with 16% of people strongly in agreement. However, the results also found that trailer spoilers would stop only about 19% of respondents from still attending the film, while on the opposite end, 24% said that they would actually want to see the film more.
As we begin to enter the summer movie season, filmgoers might feel an ominous shudder echo from this time last year, when “Prometheus” was launching its creepy and evocative trailers. Once Ridley Scott‘s film was released that June, what we thought were tantalizing hints of scenes turned out to be full-on reveals (including the climax), and audiences were left disappointed before they could even consider the film on a critical level.
“Flight” and “Stoker” were two recent films also tagged with trailers dangerously close to oversharing, and this summer finds some prime candidates as well. “This Is The End” has unfortunately revealed the majority of its celebrity cameos in its trailer (but left its apocalyptic threat hidden, thankfully), while “Kick Ass 2” and even “Pacific Rim” could be seen as possibly revealing too much at this point.
The recent study group showed that plot or storyline is the most important aspect to the surveyed moviegoers’ decision (77%), followed by cast (45%), genre (22%), director (20%), and then source material (15%). But which aspect do you feel to be the most integral, and how do you prefer your trailers, if at all: “The Master” or “Men in Black III”?
Leave your comments below, and check out some trailers for recent and upcoming movies — Too much? Not enough? Just right? [THR]
