Tag: Trailers

Top 25 Best Movie Trailers (1990-2015): Nos. 10-6

This evening we arrive at part four of my personal top 25 best movie trailers of the last 25 years and that means we’ve reached the top ten! We’ve got numbers 10-6 tonight with the top five coming tomorrow. Here we go:

10. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

This simple yet very effective teaser for Jim Cameron’s follow-up to his 1984 sci-fi hit shows Arnold’s famous Terminator being assembled with the money line at the end, “I’ll be back.” As good as teasers get.

9. Watchmen (2009)

With its Smashing Pumpkins track being used to great effect, Zack Snyder’s adaptation of the famed graphic novel is an expertly edited and visually beautiful trailer that rightly got fan boys into a tizzy a few years back.

8. Independence Day (1996)

So Roland Emmerich’s smash hit was a bit underwhelming and too silly in my view, but this teaser showing the impending alien invasion was all kinds of awesome with its White House money shot to top it off.

7. The Matrix Reloaded (2003)

Expectations were sky high for the sequel to 1999’s watershed science fiction pic and the trailer for Reloaded delivered on every front with its eye popping visuals, even if the film itself was seen as a letdown by many.

6. Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menance (1999)

Yes, I could have listed the trailer for the upcoming Force Awakens here. Yet for those old enough to remember, whether the picture itself turned out well (and it really didn’t), this teaser for Episode 1 was and is probably the most breathlessly awaited teaser ever. It succeeded at stoking the anticipation for the world’s most famous franchise to return.

Tune in tomorrow to check out my top 5, ladies and gents!

Top 25 Best Movie Trailers (1990-2015): Nos. 15-11

We have moved to day 3 of my personal top 25 best movie trailers of the last 25 years and that means numbers 15-11 before we get to the Top Ten tomorrow!

And here they are:

15. There Will Be Blood (2007)

Director Paul Thomas Anderson has made some of the finest pictures of the last couple of decades and that greatness extends to his trailers. His last two efforts, The Master and Inherent Vice, were both considered for this list but I went with the trailer for There Will Be Blood with its first menacing glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis’s amazing Oscar winning performance.

14. Cloverfield (2008)

While the movie itself was a bit of a letdown, this spot for this sci-fi pic rightly generated considerable buzz for the mysterious project and is a major example of a trailer contributing to considerable box office success. And it has the coolest Statue of Liberty shot since the original Planet of the Apes.

13. The Blair Witch Project (1999)

Once again, I was disappointed in the eventual final product but the trailer for 1999’s out of nowhere financial smash Blair Witch had audiences wondering whether what they were going to see was real or not.

12. Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

Stanley Kubrick’s final motion picture with at the time real life husband and wife Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman had a dandy of a sensuous and effective trailer set to Chris Isaak’s “Baby Did A Bad Bad Thing’.

11. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Truth be told, I could have listed any of the trailers for Peter Jackson’s massive trilogy, but I went with the original which gave audiences their first stunning glimpse of the director’s Tolkien created universe.

Top Ten tomorrow, folks!

Top 25 Best Movie Trailers (1990-2015): Nos. 20-16

We continue to day 2 of my personal favorite movie trailers of the last 25 years and this brings us to numbers 20-16.

Let’s go:

20. Mission: Impossible (1996)

For a budding film franchise starring the biggest movie star in the world at the time, the trailer for Mission: Impossible sets expectations very high with this electric spot and it’s delivered in the form of five pictures and counting.

19. Godzilla (1998)

I actually considered the very effective trailer for the superior 2014 version, but this true teaser doesn’t use a minute of footage from the eventual (highly disappointing) 1998 flick and it manages to be an example of expert marketing for getting an audience’s anticipation sky high.

18. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)

Using Trent Reznor’s killer version of Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song”, the teaser for David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo promises the “feel bad” movie of Christmas in a glorious and fast paced ad that serves as one example of many wonderful Fincher trailers.

17. Jurassic Park (1993)

We may forget now after four entries in the franchises, but the trailer here gave us our first glimpse of Spielberg’s dinos in all their glory and that alone merits inclusion.

16. Superman Returns (2006)

I struggled with whether to include the fine trailer for the 2013 Man of Steel reboot instead, but this one hearkens brilliantly back to the 1978 Superman with its Marlon Brando voice-over and rich visuals.

And tomorrow – we’ll get to numbers 15-11!

Top 25 Best Movie Trailers (1990-2015): Nos. 25-21

This evening brings us to a new best of list covering the last 25 years of motion pictures. And this time, instead of the best movies, we’re covering my personal list of greatest movie trailers of the last generation.

Let’s be clear: making this particular list was quite difficult. There are lots of criteria for what makes a brilliant trailer. Frankly, it frequently has little to do nothing with whether or not the finished product is any good. There are movies contained in this list that I was no fan of, but that doesn’t mean its teaser or trailer wasn’t pretty sweet. And the teaser and trailer designation is key. I’m including both on this list. There are some teasers that actually had little to do with the eventual picture. And there are some full trailers that effectively captured how terrific the eventual picture turned out to be.

Obviously this list is all in the eye of the beholder (meaning me) and there are several spectacular ones left off. Here’s just a dozen of them: Spider-Man, Zero Dark Thirty, Man of Steel, The Dark Knight, The Day After Tomorrow, Star Trek, Heat, Guardians of the Galaxy, Pearl Harbor, Fight Club, Kill Bill – Vol. 1, and Suicide Squad. I’m also glad I limited myself to the past 25 years because there’s some of the best ever prior to that period – namely Psycho, Alien, and The Shining.

As is typical with these lists, I’ll count down from 25 to 1 in five part installments every day. Here we go:

25. Taken (2008)

It’s not often you can say that one trailer spawned a film franchise, but Taken did just that with its trailer focusing on that famous Liam Neeson speech to his daughter’s captors.

24. Black Mass (2015)

Johnny Depp had starred in a string of commercial and critical disappointments, but one look at this chilling dinner table trailer and you knew he was back in his element. A likely Oscar nomination may well follow early next year.

23. Unbreakable (2000)

It may be hard to recall now, but Unbreakable was M. Night Shyamalan’s supremely eagerly awaited follow-up to his phenomenon The Sixth Sense. This mysterious trailer raised the bar of expectations and though some would disagree with me, I believe the actual film delivered.

22. Red Eye (2005)

The late Wes Craven’s pic has one of the cleverest trailers on the list. The first portion of it makes it seems like a lame romantic comedy (with Rachel McAdams no less, making that prospect more believable). The sudden tone shift makes you realize what you’re really in for…

21. Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

It had been 30 years since director George Miller was behind the camera for this franchise and legitimate doubts persisted whether his reboot that replaced Mel Gibson with Tom Hardy would work. Once the first trailer hit, there was little doubt at all in this visually breathtaking work.

We will get to numbers 20-16 tomorrow, folks!