Crafting a quality trailer is an art form in itself. Though their sole purpose is promoting a film and selling tickets, editing together a 2-minute clip that will do all of that isn’t easy. Trust us, we’ve seen quite a few terrible attempts. But with “Monos,” the trailer not only sells the film in an incredibly artful way, but it does so without a single bit of dialogue.
Obviously, when you release a foreign-language film to English markets, you don’t want to flood the trailer with subtitles that might scare the casual movie-goer away. We see this all the time with foreign films. However, the lack of dialogue not only works in the trailer for “Monos” but it allows the young actors at the film’s center to express the tone of the film completely with just their faces and their actions. And it’s these young actors that look to be the reason why “Monos” is poised to be a special film coming this fall.
READ MORE: ‘Monos’: Guerillas At The Edge Of The World [Sundance Review]
“Monos” tells the story of a young group of guerilla fighters in the Colombian jungle that have to protect an American doctor and follow some sort of mystery organization. But kids will be kids, and when these young people aren’t performing military actions, they’re partying and joking around and acting like kids should act. But make no mistake, when the time comes, they will fight.
The film stars Julianne Nicholson, Moisés Arias, Sofia Buenaventura, Julián Giraldo, and Karen Quintero. “Monos” is the newest film from writer-director Alejandro Landes. The film debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, where it won the World Cinema Special Jury Prize.
“Monos” arrives in theaters on September 13.
Here’s the synopsis:
MONOS, Alejandro Landes’ awe-inspiring third feature, is a breathtaking survivalist saga set on a remote mountain in Latin America. The film tracks a young group of soldiers and rebels — bearing names like Rambo, Smurf, Bigfoot, Wolf and Boom-Boom — who keep watch over an American hostage, Doctora (Julianne Nicholson). The teenage commandos perform military training exercises by day and endulge in youthful hedonism by night, an unconventional family bound together under a shadowy force known only as The Organization. After an ambush drives the squadron into the jungle, both the mission and the intricate bonds between the group begin to disintegrate. Order descends into chaos and within MONOS, the strong begin to prey on the weak in this vivid, cautionary fever-dream.
