Jamie’s Top Trailers

The Dark Knight

So much tension comes from the right sound design and the slow burn of these moody graphics.  Before the bat symbol is even revealed, they’ve got my attention.  Then by crumbling and destroying this icon, they’ve got me hooked.  The dialogue gives away just enough story, but by not showing any of the film, they maintain the intrigue.

Up

Contrasting the highly-imaginative history of Pixar with this seemingly dull old man was unexpected and funny.  But, that just makes the moment his house flies away all the more unexpected.  This sets up a nice sense of a big journey, without actually showing where he’s going or what he’s after.

The Big Lebowski

How do you market a film as off-beat as The Big Lebowski.  One way that worked is by celebrating how out-there the entire film is.  It’s a lot of style of substance, but by getting so many glimpses of what’s happens in the story, there’s enough of adventure to make this worth checking out.

Jurassic Park

It was an interesting choice to take such a fantasy concept and introduce it such a grounded and logical way.  Yet, there’s enough menace at the end of this to let you know maybe it’s not all going to work as planned.  Seeing this before Aladdin when I was a kid terrified me, all because the way it’s present had me questioning what went wrong, instead of if this could actually happen.

Sin City

Everything about this oozes with style, but there also seems to be more to it.  It all builds a real sense of place and purpose to this film, instead of fixating on over-the-top action like some films.  This trailer single-handedly got me interested in the Sin City books.  And I wouldn’t even pretend that I haven’t “creative borrowed” the music from this for student videos.