|
This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
|
Author
|
Topic: What's Up With That 'Cloverfield' Trailer?
|
Paul Goulet
Master Film Handler
Posts: 347
From: Rhode Island
Registered: Jan 2000
|
posted 07-09-2007 08:44 PM
USA TODAY
Copyright 2007 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc. All Rights Reserved. 2007-07-09 07:21:52
What's Up With That 'Cloverfield' Trailer? By Anthony Breznican,USA Today Posted: 2007-07-09 19:21:32 Filed Under: Movies (July 9) -- What is it?
That's the question moviegoers are asking about a mysterious trailer promoting an unnamed film shown in previews before Transformers.
The 'Cloverfield' Experiment
It's possibly Hollywood's biggest experiment with reverse psychology, creating immense want-to-see passion in people by refusing to say anymore.
The footage is grainy home video of a party in New York, featuring happy-looking twentysomethings dancing and mugging for the camera before disaster strikes.
The lights go out. The party people go to the roof and see huge fireballs erupting in the city. Panic ensues and the group runs to the street, where something large hurtles through the sky and crash-lands in the street in a heap of burned wreckage.
It's the Statue of Liberty's head.
There is no title on the trailer. The date 1/18/08 is shown, along with a line saying it is produced by Lost co-creator and Mission: Impossible III director J.J. Abrams.
The project is known by the code name Cloverfield, but that is not the real title, according to Paramount Pictures, the source of the trailer.
Hollywood-Elsewhere.com's Jeffrey Wells says the trailer is a clever ploy working just as the studio hoped.
"It's probably more enticing to not quite know what is that they're putting across," he says. "It's always better when you can arouse imaginations and get them wondering without making things too explicit. That's not the age and aesthetic of today. Everybody wants things right on the nose."
On the Web, at Fourth of July barbecues and at post-Transformers screening dinners, people wanted to know more. Harry Knowles, the online king of movie previews at AintItCool.com, says Paramount's unique marketing campaign will "drive all the rest of us crazy. The worst thing about releasing a film without a title is my phone starts ringing at inappropriate times in the morning and night. When you have your phone number on your website, people think, 'Let's call him and ask him what we saw."
His theory, based on puzzle websites Paramount set up as clues, such as the fake prophet page EthanHaasWasRight.com, is that the film will involve the late H.P. Lovecraft's tales of monstrous ancient gods wreaking havoc on Earth.
Other online speculators theorize the film is the long-promised Voltron movie (which would explain its placement at the beginning of the Transformers film) about ancient robotic lions that form the titular giant to defend Earth from invasion. More stabs in the dark are that it's a new Godzilla film, a big-screen takeoff on Abrams' Lost TV series or an entirely original project.
Paramount has not posted the trailer online, and pirated versions are being quickly stamped out by the studio, claiming copyright violation.
All that Paramount sources will say is that they can't say anything. Yet.
Copyright 2007 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc. All Rights Reserved. 2007-07-09 07:21:52
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
John Wilson
Film God
Posts: 5438
From: Sydney, Australia.
Registered: Dec 1999
|
posted 07-12-2007 05:14 AM
From Showbizdata.com
YOUTUBE AXES TRAILERS FOR CLOVERFIELD
Tuesday, July 10 2007
YouTube has complied with a request from Paramount to remove copies of a trailer for the forthcoming Cloverfield. The trailer for the J.J. Abrams-produced movie made its first appearance last week with the debut of Transformers in movie theaters. The following day copies of the trailer, apparently shot with a camcorder, began appearing on YouTube, but they were soon replaced by a notice saying "This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Paramount Pictures Corp." Paramount is a unit of Viacom, Inc., which has filed a $1-billion copyright-infringement lawsuit against YouTube. Writing on the TechDirt site, one blogger commented that the studio was obviously trying to generate buzz with the trailer. "Why is it that the studios wanna ruin their buzz?" he asked. Another blogger replied, "It makes perfect sense -- when you let lawyers run your entertainment company. Perhaps we should just be thankful that Paramount hasn't tried to have the people who filmed the trailer arrested."
Lucky they did that...otherwise millions would be able to see he trailer. Oh, wait a minute...
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
All times are Central (GMT -6:00)
|
This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
|
Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classicTM
6.3.1.2
The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion
and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.
|