The Red Band Project

Being perhaps the most watched televised event of the year, advertisers know that they have a captive audience during the Superbowl–which is why you have to shell out big bucks if you want your commercial to be seen by almost everyone. What I find interesting is that rarely do I ever hear about a movie trailer as being “the best Superbowl commercial” or the most talked about advertisement of the game.

Year after year though it seems as if studios always keep shelling out their money to have trailers shown during the big game. Does this really pay off? I mean sure we had Independence Day that had people talking and maybe even the spot for the Matrix generated some buzz. However, besides those two, none have been as memorable as some of the other types of advertisements during the game.

However, maybe that’s not their goal. I mean let’s face it, if you’re going to spend this much money on thirty seconds it better we worth your while. What I think the hope is for these spots is to serve notice to everyone that “hey, we’ve got our big tentpole movie coming out in a few months, go and see it because it’s going to look as good as this teaser.”

Having said all that I thought that we had a pretty good crop of trailers that were shown during the game this year. Here’s my assessment of what I saw, about when it was shown during the game, the amount of excitement it generated for me, as well as a small critique about each one:

DUPLICITY – Pregame
Excitement Level – 2/5
Nothing here really blew me away. I liked that they played up the relationship between the Julia Roberts and Clive Owen’s characters without giving away too much of the back story.

GI JOE – Pregame
Excitement Level – 5/5
I’ve heard that this movie was in the works but haven’t seen much about it until the past two weeks or so. Needless to say I was blown away by the trailer and am now very excited for this movie. I like the semi-realistic approach that they seem to have taken to the treatment of the movie with the Joes seemingly able to accomplish military precision acrobatics. Did not seem campy at all–which was everyone’s fear.

ANGELS & DEMONS – 1st Qtr
Excitement Level 3/5
From this brief glimpse of Angels & Demons it looks as though a lot of the action from the book made it into the movie–which makes me hopeful as I thought Angel & Demons (the book) was better than the Da Vinci Code (the book). What I fear though is that Tom Hanks will still have the stiff role he had in the first one, which is the feeling I kinda got from this trailer as well.

YEAR ONE – 1st Qtr
Excitement Level 2/5
I have to say I wasn’t overly impressed with this trailer or the movie for that matter. While it did give me a few laughs it seems as if we have the same old Michael Cera and same old Jack Black together in a film. I will give it some points for having the combo of Jack Black and Michael Cera. I guess it’s playing up the straight funny man against the wild funny man angle.

FAST & FURIOUS – 1st/2nd
Excitement Level 3/5
While there was some new footage shown in this trailer, its strength lied in what made the first movie such a success: showing off cars, girls, and action! It also showed the reestablished relationship between Diesel’s and Walker’s characters which I think is a good thing.

LAND OF THE LOST – 2nd Qtr
Excitement Level 3/5
I liked how they made it look as if the trailer was a part of the Superbowl broadcast with Matt Lauer interviewing Ferrell’s character. The special effects looked pretty cool and I think that alone may draw some people.

STAR TREK – 2nd Qtr
Excitement Level 4/5
This trailer showed a lot of new footage, most of it action oriented. What also seems poignant was that the focus still seems to be on the new Kirk. This definitely isn’t your father’s Star Trek. While some die hard Trekkers may not be into all the action they’re showing, on the flip side it’s making me want to see it even more.

UP – 2nd Qtr
Excitement Level 1/5
Once again Pixar plays up their pedigree of really great movies by suggesting that UP will fall in line with what they’ve done before. Didn’t see any new footage here, with the exception of the great joke at the end with the scout losing the GPS, so it was hard for me to get really excited about this movie from what I saw in the trailer.

MONSTERS VS ALIENS – Halftime
Excitement Level 2/5
I didn’t think they utilized the 3D glasses very well and hopefully seeing the movie in 3D will be better than seeing the trailer on TV in 3D. Having said that, they showed a lot of new footage that I hadn’t seen before. These new scenes were funny and had a few good jokes.

RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN – 3rd Qtr
Excitement Level 3/5
Don’t usually get excited for Disney movies but this trailer showed a lot that I hadn’t seen. I liked how it started off by establishing The Rock’s role as a cab driver in Vegas. The basic storyline was also established in this short trailer as well with lots of effects shots mixed in to help out. Kinda looks like The Gameplan meets Men In Black.

TRANSFORMERS 2 – 3rd Qtr
Excitement Level 4/5
Let’s recap the footage they showed in this trailer: an aircraft carrier being blown up, robots transforming, and Optimus Prime fighting a huge robot. I don’t know about you but I’m definitely excited for this sequel.