I have to admit that now when I go to a movie and the lights dim and a title card flashes across the screen with “Previews Of Coming Attractions” my heart sinks. It didn’t use to be that way, but today it’s just an endless parade of trailers for movies made about comic book characters, or ghastly romantic comedies, or 12 upcoming previews of films starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Previews are supposed to get you to shell out your hard-earned money to see the film- and often to trick you into thinking the movie is better than it really is. But the new batch of trailers make you start to worry that if these are best clips they could find, how bad could the rest of the movie be? The trailers also tell you practically the entire film, so you feel you’ve already seen it before it even opens.
Give me the old days, when trailers were so hyperbolic and inflammatory, they scorched your eyeballs. The best were the Blaxploitation classics like Ebony, Ivory And Jade (1979), whose ad promised more action than a person was humanly capable of withstanding. “You’re better off dead when they start shooting lead…” “Jump back Jack, ‘cause your skull is cracked…” “They’re women, they’re warm, they’re wildcats…” “You haven’t a prayer when she leaps through the air…”
An inner-city theater staple Dr. Black, Mr. Hyde (1976) starring Bernie Casey and Rosalind Cash, took the Robert Louis Stevenson classic and transposed it straight to the Watts section of L.A. The preview was an alliterative poem: “Super strong, supernatural and super bad!” “No one alive can take that guy. But he’s on his feet when he hits the street.” “Shot full of lead and he still aint dead.” “Don’t give him no sass ‘cause he’ll kick your ass!” “The dude stood tall till his butt hits the floor.” “The crowd is hushin’ while the blood goes gushin’.”
The great Rudy Ray Moore, an unsung comedian who developed characters from his stand-up act into film heroes in movies like Dolemite (1975) and Disco Godfather (1979). As wild and fun as the films were the previews were pure poetry. “I’m Dolomite- I’m the one that killed Monday, whupped Tuesday, put Wednesday in the hospital, called up Thursday to tell Friday not to bury Saturday on Sunday…” “From the first to the last…I give ‘em the blast…so fast…that their life is past…before their ass…has even hit the grass.” You have to hand it to a preview that promises, “Coming to a theater as its next attraction is the picture that definitely will put you in traction.”
One trailer that got big laughs in theaters was the one for The Thing With Two Heads (1972) with Ray Milland and Rosey Grier, “So they transplanted the white head onto the black man’s body- who would suspect that neither would care for the idea too much?”
Scorchy (1976), an action movie with Connie Stevens, also got a rise out of moviegoers, “She’s killed a man, been shot at and made love twice this evening, and the evening is still young.”
Doris Wishman’s bizarre action film starring top-heavy Chesty Morgan– Deadly Weapons (1974) asked audiences. “Did you know that the female breast, known to be the source of life since Eve, can be Deadly Weapons?” “She avenged her lover’s death with the only means she had and they were Deadly Weapons!”
The Pink Angels (1972), a movie about a gay biker gang had a risible trailer: “They rode a lonely road marked ‘Detour’ through a straight world.” “Don’t miss The Pink Angels– hard riders wearing a size 10 dress.”
Horror movies could be humorously tongue-and-cheek. For Blood Beach (1980), about a monster hiding under the sand at a beach, “Just when you thought it was safe to go in the water you can’t get to it.” “Blood Beach– it’s an okay place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to die there.”
Sometimes they warned audiences away from their own film, like in Corruption (1968), starring Peter Cushing as a mad scientist committing murderous face transplants for his wife. “Where will the bodies turn up next? Under a car seat? In a valise? Or in a deep freeze?” “No woman will dare go home alone after seeing Corruption. Therefore, no woman will be admitted alone to this super shocker.”
Producers often tooted their own horn. For Wicked Wicked (1973), about a psycho killer at a holiday hotel, “First it was color. Then sound. Then 3D and Cinemascope. Now the most exciting new story technique in film history- Anamorphic Duo-Vision. A new film experience!” “When was the last time you were really frightened by a film? You’ll be doubly afraid when you see Wicked Wicked in Duo-vision.” Basically Duo-vision was just a split screen, and Andy Warhol’s Chelsea Girls (1966) had already done that, and was a lot scarier.
Often, they were just succinct. Like how they promoted Devil Times Five (1974), a horror film about evil kids, “Devil Times Five leaves nobody alive.” Or, the gory Pieces (1982), about a madman assembling a woman out of body parts, “It’s exactly what you think it is.”
My favorite gambit was when they threatened to freak you out by even showing the trailer. To promote Herschell Gordon Lewis’s Blood Feast (1963), the lead actor William Kerwin seriously addressed the audience: “This picture, one of the most unusual ever filmed, contains scenes that under no circumstance should be viewed by anyone with a heart condition or anyone that is easily upset. We urgently recommend that if you are such a person or the parent of a young and impressionable child now in attendance, that you and the child leave the auditorium for the next 90 seconds.” They returned with the same routine for the trailer for The Gruesome Twosome (1967), where once again actor William Kerwin warned: “So, if you’re revolted by the sight of blood close your eyes for the next 90 seconds.”
Probably the best trailer I can remember was for David Cronenberg’s Scanners (1981), which caused audiences to literally go insane. It showed a man sitting behind a desk on a stage in what appeared to be a symposium. He was attempting to make psychic contact with some member of the audience. Suddenly his body began to shudder violently, his face contorted into a painful grimace and, like a tuning fork, he began to vibrate and vibrate and BAM! His head literally exploded. End of trailer. The audience went ballistic in every theater in which I saw that preview. Every time it played, people applauded and cheered- the buzz in the theater practically drowning out the opening credits of the film.
Nowadays it’s my head that vibrates dangerously while watching the summer movie trailers which go on and on and on. Why can’t they all be like that brilliant one for Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980), which simply showed the lobby of a hotel accompanied by menacing music. Suddenly, a gushing river of blood starts pouring down from the elevators, splashing the walls, even the camera lens. Then the blood rises higher, even causing one of the chairs to float by. It lasts a minute and a half and was a great tease. It made you uneasy but, boy, it really made you want to see the movie. When’s the last time you can say that?