Movie Trailers are the Perfect Pleasure

Oscar Wilde would get to the movies early | Castles in the Sky #11

Talking about cigarettes, Oscar Wilde once said:

A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want?

He could have been talking about movie trailers. Trailers have everything movies do: intrigue, suspense, action, laughs, love, great acting, and beautiful cinematography. They just do it in under three minutes.

The best trailers give you a sense of the mood of a movie without necessarily giving away the whole story—although they can certainly include some plot.

This is a short essay that aims to open your mind to the idea that trailers are art unto themselves without even needing to reference a movie. To make this point, I have curated five of my favorite trailers below.

Godzilla (2014)

This trailer has great use of atmospheric cinematography and the choice to not show Godzilla straight up really helps to convey the scope of what is going on. It is scary and exciting—you can’t look away.

 The Social Network (2010)

This trailer starst out with the choral version of Creep by Radiohead. It is a beautiful performance but the song is ultimately about alienation, which is a great thematic tie in for a movie about Mark Zuckerberg burning his bridges when building Facebook.

 Alien (1979)

This one is a bit older. Be patient, as the cinematography and photography here is obviously not as snazzy as the last two. However, this trailer has a frenetic, otherworldly feel. It’s is confusing and adrenaline pumping. Not to mention it ends on maybe the best movie tagline ever, “In space, no one can hear you scream.”

Moonlight (2016)

The music is beautiful, sad, confused, lost–a lot like Chiron, the main character. This trailer captures the pain, alienation, and connection of the movie, plus manages to have appearances from every major character doing something perfectly in line with their character, and yet it still doesn’t give away the major story arcs. (Note: I’m always surprised by how few people have actually seen this movie–it’s great.)

Cloud Atlas (2012 

This one is cheating a bit since it’s over 5 minutes long, but this trailer is better than most movies. It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but the snippets of stories, the costumes, the dialogues, and the music! Outro by M83 is one of the best atmospheric songs ever and this is the only time I’ve ever seen it been used to its full potential. This was the trailer that made me realize that sometimes I like trailers independently of what the movie is about at all.