Avalon – 2001, Directed by Mamoru Oshii
Watch trailer here
This is a Japanese trailer that I remember first seeing when I was a freshman in college. If there’s anything I’ve learned it’s that Japanese trailers do have a certain style but it really doesn’t compare to American trailers. Usually it involves some Jpop song as the climax (complete with music video style annotations).
This movie was riding the wake of its own sweet looking visuals, because I remember thinking that the trailer didn’t have much impact at all. It just felt kind of flat, but couldn’t figure out why. So now I’m going to analyze it and determine what it is that makes something so cool looking so uninteresting.
Story – There’s no subtitled version of this trailer that I could find so I had my girlfriend translate the few subtitles there are. The story you get from this trailer is that they’re apparently in some kind of virtual reality game that seems impossible to beat, but they say that there is a way. That’s it.
Music & Editing – Right from the get go this trailer has what trailers love to edit to. What’s that? Big choral songs of course! This one is from the actual film and is the only cue used for the duration of the trailer. Right away I think this is one thing that makes this trailer flat. Music is of paramount importance to a trailer, not just what song but also how it’s edited. How the song is edited to the trailer will determine how much impact the song and trailer ultimately will have. When you’re not really editing to the music it’s basically a music video or simple montage.
As an example I’ll show two trailers for one show that use the same music. These are from the company I work for (just so I’m not being wanky with my own trailer I’m using one a friend edited instead). This is for the anime “Ramen Fighter Miki.”
The first trailer is what I mean for one that doesn’t use a song well such that there’s no impact. Watch it here. I’m pretty sure any moments that sync to that song were coincidental. Not only syncing to the song but in this case a lack of sound mixing makes it a very very sloppy trailer. A friend of mine did this trailer which is shorter, sweeter and makes much more of an impact. Watch that here. The second trailer plays with the music suggesting it’s only going on outdoors, but especially the punches and title card sync make it more fun to watch.
The trailer for Avalon has music that seems largely incidental. As far as I can tell it only really syncs up in three places. First when the tank shows up, second on the first “Avalon” matrix numbers ripoff bit and at the end when it’s over. After watching it a bunch of times I think one of the chief problems with this trailer is its sound mix. The music starts off pretty strong but after the Matrix numbers it’s mixed waaaay down and barely audible in certain sections. On top of that the sound effects are really loud. One thing I think really separates American trailers is the use of sound effects. There are tons of hits, swishes, whooshes of sorts in American trailers but most of the time in other trailers you just have the sound effects from the actual film.
Sound effects are also a big part of what makes the trailer exciting and also gives the flow and transitions between scenes. When you cut a bunch of scenes together one after another like this it’s choppy and boring. Cut to this shot, bang bang bang, this shot, bang bang bang. There’s no flow or rhythm. Rhythm and timing is a big part of a good trailer. The timing of the dialogue, music, sound effects are what come together to make it cool to watch. It could be timing of an explosion or timing of a joke’s punchline. This trailer has no rhythm, just disparate shots. Albeit cool looking shots, but that only goes so far. In this case I think the shots are what make you want to see the movie, not the trailer.
Selling Points – The beginning card is a quote from James Cameron basically saying Avalon is the most beautiful, artistic and stylish science fiction movie ever made. The trailer is selling on its action and visuals, but man does it look boring in its presentation. If I liked this movie more I’d almost be inclined to make a fan trailer because of how crappy this one is. Last bit is that this movie is directed by Mamoru Oshii who directed the “Ghost in the Shell” film. Though that’s only catering to the anime fans really.
Final Thoughts – I was one of the fortunate few in the U.S. who saw this in a movie theater. Miramax got the rights but decided to have some focus group screenings which my friends and I got to attend. After that they sat on it forever before releasing it direct to DVD. The movie is really pretty to look at but it’s also very slow and pretty boring. Plus it has some flashbacks of moments that literally happened ten or so minutes prior. The movie was slow, but that didn’t mean the trailer had to be. It’s a shame too because cool visuals and music should be allowed to be made into a kickass movie trailer.
