History of Film Trailers

1937 - Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1mEHEgDehg

• In this trailer there is no actual footage from the film only single cells of Walt Disney showing us these cells. Also in this trailer to introduce the audience to the characters Walt Disney describes who all the characters are and their personalities. This is one of the very first movie trailers to come out and the first of its kind for a cartoon based film. Without the technology we have today it would of been to demanding in 1937 to create a trailer with actual clips from this film.

1942 - Casablanca http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLU41jUnWM4

• In this trailer the whole trailer was in black and white. Casablanca is heavily texted whereas film trailers in the modern day are not as heavily texted as trailers from the past. This is because now film trailer companies want to sell the film and by showing more footage and less text the audience will get a better in site into the film.

1960 - Psycho http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9klJA1JMbM

• This trailer is on for 6 minutes and 36 seconds. Whereas most every other trailer is under 2 minutes long. Only one trailer per year from a certain production company is aloud to exceed the 2 minute mark. In this trailer we see Alfred Hitchcock  giving us an in site into the film by giving the audience a tour of the set of were Psycho was filmed. We see no footage from this film and there is no text either. He takes the audience on the tour to tell them about certain significant events in the film and describes what happened, making the audience want to go the cinema and see what actually happens.

1991 - Terminator 2: Judgement Day http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eajuMYNYtuY

• This trailer has come on alot in terms of the technology it has used. There is alot of CGI used but it is not of the great quality we have today, they have used this format when you see lightning, characters morphing and explosions taking place. In the trailer there is also a very loud voice over giving the audience a better insite to the film. But in my opinion this trailer is in danger of showing all the best scenes from the film in the trailer because of the amount of detail it goes in to.

2010 - Inception http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66TuSJo4dZM

• Inception is a trailer that shows modern technology at its very best. CGI is more enhanced so that it looks more realistic for the audience. When you compare this trailer to Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs from 1937 you can see a drastic change in technology and see how technology has advanced in this space of time. For example at the start of the Inception trailer we see three logos from different production companies and in Snow White we don't. This trailer consists of footage from the film itself and has quick cuts from one scene to the next. Whereas in Snow White there is no footage from the film. Text that is used in this film trailer shows the director's name Christopher Nolan, the main actor's name Leonardo DiCaprio and other text saying "your mind", "the scene of the crime" and finally the title of the film "Inception".

After studying these five trailers from 1937 - 2010 we can see how technology has drastically changed. Where technolgy has become more advanced and more and more CGI Technology has been used, less text on the trailers and more footage from the film included within the trailer.