In a break from our consideration of the audience survey, here at Watching the trailer we want to branch out towards the wider debates of studying trailers. In preparation for fortnightly guest blog posts from February onwards, we want to start with a post considering the role of TV credit sequences and Trailers, enjoy! 


At the Popular Media Cultures Symposium in London in 2012 Stacey Abbott presented a paper entitled “I want to do bad things to you”, in which Abbott presented a case for considering the role of credit sequences on television. In part, this excellent presentation stuck with me because of the ways in which the credit sequence can be considered theoretically but I found myself thinking about the parallel implications for the study of the trailer. This blog post is a tentative attempt to put forward some thoughts on the connections between the trailer and the TV credit sequence, while not wishing to step on any toes. Abbott’s paper is due out in a forthcoming edited collection, details of which can be found here. Any quotes that appear here in this blog are from the presented version of the paper in 2012.

While TV credit sequences and trailers are two different elements of two different industries, they can both be considered in Gerard Genette’s terminology: a paratext, a framing devices that are not always considered the primary object of attention but that form a network of elements that combine to inform and shape the interpretation of the text. It must be noted however, that a much broader discussion as to the usefulness and implications of paratexts and paratextuality on contemporary digital media, but this would detract from the purpose of this blog post.

So let’s get some context here: credit sequences can be seen as a disruptive element symbolising the start of a new show on TV alerting viewers to the start or end of a programme. Alternately credit sequences can be seen as cohesive element within a wider schedule of events, say a group of programmes that are viewed together (either on the same channel in succession, or through switching channels as one programme ends to catch the start of anther). This understanding broadly echoes that which Nick Couldry suggests in his book Inside Culture: that in contemporary media ‘the text’ (whatever it may be) should be considered from the perspective of the audience rather than separate entities or elements.   

Considering the TV show in isolation from the context of programming, which it needs to be acknowledged is an idealised form for the purposes of discussion, it becomes apparent through Abbott’s work that TV credit sequences function in a similar manner to that of the trailer. Consider that for many the credit sequence may alert viewers to the start of a wanted (or unwanted) programme much in the same manner that film trailers posit a film as desirable to one audience demographic while keeping other audience demographic  groups away. The industrial purpose here may differ however; word of mouth and negative reception function differently across the two media form and it may be worth exploring the reception of both empirically, in the future. Moving away from the issue of positioning within a programming schedule to one of audience engagement, Abbott draws attention to the variable and changing nature of the credit sequence that may change series to series providing context to the nature of the series at large: as Abbott notes, the credit sequences use of images from the show or sequenced images created specifically to ‘evoke the content of the series’. In echoing the elements of the series the credits function in a similar manner to trailers; framing visually an idea of a narrative. Just as within the trailer, within the credit sequence we can see a whole host of production information providing an orientation to the various contributors involved such as; 

when recurring characters are elevated to the position of regular cast by being included in the opening credits (Amber Benson in Buffy, Andy Hallet in Angel) or the special guest star credits in Dexter inform us of who the villain of the season will be: John Lithgow, Edward James Olmos etc. (Abbott 2012)

In addition to the visual depiction then, written information may be present often the creators; guest writers and directors, as well as regular favoured or hated production personnel in longer credit sequences.  All of this information serves to shape the manner of engagement with the series itself and functions in a similar manner to that of the film trailer – albeit in a different context. Yet such series information may change briefly for that which Abbott calls ‘event episodes’. Such episodes may differ significantly from the narrative of the show: such as the musical episode of Buffy entitled Once More with Feeling.

Abbott highlights the break from the format of the series in the opening credit sequence in which the break from prior credit sequences signify a narrative turn. In such an event the credit sequence here acts as a framing device, demonstrating a shift in the episode format (that is explained within the episode and/or wider series itself), while simultaneously providing indication of narrative change. Abbott notes that these happen in the case of the TV show Fringe, in which the

credits involve a transaction between the audience and the creators, as the audience is tasked with reading the imagery to know where they are within the various timelines. (Abbott 2012)

This to me, echoes the earliest understanding of the trailer in which Mary Beth Haralovich and Kathy Root Klaprat suggest that the trailer, through taking elements of a film in a different order; frames and posit questions that only watching the film can answer. The initial jarring effect of seeing a change to serial’s introduction, suggests that questions are raised for viewers. Haralovich & Klaprat’s conclusion however, is based on knowing the narrative of the film at the point of viewing the film’s trailer, and thus only works for retrospective viewing of the film trailer in relation to the film itself. For the case of TV shows though, where some narrative familiarity exists from prior shows, this break from serial normality in the case of event episodes, may well posit questions that only viewing the episode (or rest of the series) can answer. So while Haralovich & Klaprat’s contribution to film trailer studies has been critiqued for this reliance on a known narrative, this work readily applies to credit sequences in which audiences are familiar with narrative elements and it would appear at this initial stage, to be linked with the kind of discontinuous editing that exemplifies many contemporary film trailers.

Finally, when we can watch a TV show’s credit sequence as separate from or connected to the show itself, through the various means of viewer agency afford to us, and we can watch movies with or without the trailer, again through viewing agency, what we are left with is production and narrative framing of a second (often assumed to be ontologically dominant) text – the show or the film. Understanding both the credit sequence, and the trailer in this manner then broadens the boundaries of the trailer and blurs the distinctions between the two forms.

These are just some initial thoughts and of course feedback, thoughts, agreement, and disagreement is strongly encouraged. 


“[I have been disappointed by a film whose]... trailer already shows all the best parts or reveals plot twists and distracts me when I'm watching the movie because I look out for what was in the trailer.”

            - “Yes” response #367 to Survey Question 12
 
“I don't pay much attention to trailers. If I want to see a film, my choice is based on a much wider set of considerations.”

            - “No” response #34 to Survey Question 12


“I don't trust trailers enough to let one set my expectations.”

            -  “No” response #91 to Survey Question 12

 In an influential 1989 article on the semiotic and economic work of movie trailers, Barbara Klinger critiques the commonplace notion of errant spectators and incompetent viewers.  Arguing that while classic Hollywood films (“texts” is the term she favors) can be said to construct their ideal audience (summoning, training and shifting its gaze “appropriately”), trailers are unable to achieve a similar channeling of the desire, expectation and spectation of their viewers. Chiefly, this is a function of trailers “poly-semanticity,” their plurality of messages and meanings, and their susceptibility to multiple decodings because of narrative, causal and editorial discontinuities constituent of the form.

Rather, when trailer audiences respond in ways that appear inappropriate, idiosyncratic, transgressive or inattentive according to this problematic standard of spectation, they may actually be fully, meaningfully and appropriately engaged with the marketing of the feature that inspires the viewing. 

What Umberto Eco describes as a digressing viewer of film and the Frankfurt School identifies as a distracted one, Klinger considers to be paradigmatic not pariah viewers  To see them as errant or incompetent audience members is to ignore their engagement –however peculiar-- with the feature “product” and their implication in the multi-media juggernaut of movie marketing. Their –as well as our-- consumption of film and film epiphenomenon (trailers, posters, journalism, etc.) involves exposure to multiple, intersecting and interacting stories, messages, images and appeals. What the film industry calls a marketing, publicity and promotion campaign is the event that socially oriented film scholars examine under the name of reception studies.  

Moreover, a likely audience member always already navigates a web of film promotional discourses with which she is fluent. Every word, image, star or spectacle is hyperlinked to other representations; every shot, story and sequence is interrupted by references to other tellings in other media. As Klinger puts it, the typical “spectator is momentarily diverted from the linear flow of elements” into other stories, other emphases and other meanings. Indeed, an effective trailer can rightly be said to depend on just this dispersion of its saleable and attractive elements and qualities into other registers and referential systems than that of film art, especially discourses such as celebrity, history, literature, popular culture and news.     

Indeed, film advertising and marketing depend on this extension of a film’s “best bits” (what are perceived to be its attractive and appealing qualities) into alternate, intersecting and oppositional media, social forms and interpersonal experiences. The fragmentation rather than the assemblage of a film narrative (or construction of an authorized and accepted interpretation) is the result. This is not an accident, but an imperative of the need to expose an audience  to the various qualities that are deemed valuable and saleable in the feature that is thereby represented partially, impressionistically and even inaccurately. As a audio-visual synechdoche, trailers represents a collection of parts standing in for the whole. 

Another way to approach this prominent insight in our data is to notice that a trailer tells another story than the film does.  While the images, conflicts and moods that a trailer foregrounds and deploys may not be coherent or entirely assimilable to the feature that inspired them, they may nonetheless effectively participate in a “network of cultural signification” that appeals to audiences and promotes the consumption of the film. As Eco puts it, marketing distorts and advertising disseminates content into units of meaning that are incommensurate with the “unadulterable specificity” of the feature. In this blog, we come to celebrate and examine that alterity, not condemn it. 

 Indeed, this is not a problem with marketing, but its very dynamic.  Consequently, competent audiences and inerrant ones (who can’t be wrong by virtue of being present to watch a trailer and make a purchase decision thereupon), are far from the idealized, attentive and film-literate viewers conceived by or (de)constructed within classic reception theory. The spectator who talks back to the trailer or who understands stars, events and spectacles in relation to other trailers & films, who interprets the content through a skein of celebrity gossip, journalistic publicity and pop culture reference, who actively dislikes trailers and presumes to see through them is an audience member who competently performs the intertextual and meta-textual work that a trailer elicits, elaborates and exploits in pursuit of engagement, investment and involvement. Even an audience member who hates trailers and is frustrated by their deception, their spoilings and their calculated emphases is (however negatively) engaged and invested, informed and edified, solicited and sold by the trailer. The trailer absorbs audience animus toward the film’s marketing, leaving the feature unsullied. And for those who aren’t among the target audience pool, the deplorable and despised trailer completes its vital mission of diverting a potential ticket buyer from an entertainment he or she may not be able to appreciate. 

When survey respondents complain that a trailer raises expectations that the feature doesn’t fulfill; that it tells a different story with a different mood than that of the film it advertises; that it presents all the “best bits” thereby rendering the feature superfluous; or that scenes in the trailer were not found in the film-- they may be evincing naïve and untutored understandings of movie marketing and trailer formulae, but they are plainly demonstrating their qualification to number among the viewing public to whom the trailer is served and from whose curious and suspicious gaze the trailer screens its feature.    

 

In a previous blog post about trailers and memory, we discussed the lack of distinct patterns in trailer choice (under ‘what was the last trailer you viewed’), given only a few trailer titles reached significant numbers. Yet while the numbers were not huge per individual trailer, another pattern could be seen. 7 of the top 12 titles, or 108 responses to ‘last trailer watched’, were in relation to a film released in 3D.

At approximately 20% of responses, that’s a significant sample and contained the following titles: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Gravity, Godzilla, Frozen, Guardians of the Galaxy and The LEGO Movie. While the titles would naturally change if we ran the survey again, we believe the percentage of films in 3D would not shift dramatically (and could potentially rise), given the place of 3D in almost all major blockbusters and franchise properties (which dominated our results). In the last few weeks alone, trailers for new films such as Avengers: Age of Ultron, Jurassic World, Terminator: Genisys, Mad Max: Fury Road and Ant-Man have been released – all those films will include a 3D release.

We have to be cautious when making this claim about 3D and trailers, however: as our research shows, around 72% of trailer viewing takes place via a medium or platform that is not available in 3D. With only 28% of trailer viewing taking place in a cinema, that reduces the chances that our respondents were actually seeing a 3D trailer for a 3D film.

The qualitative responses reduce those numbers even further: only 2 respondents out of 525 make a specific reference to 3D, when discussing the trailer for a 3D film.

So, with those provisos, what can our results actually tell us something about 3D and trailers? We would suggest that analysis of the qualitative responses received for the films listed actually reveal that when a 3D trailer IS viewed, that trailer might raise expectations for the 3D version of the feature; and that qualitative responses raise issues that may relate to 3D content. To demonstrate this, let’s take 3 examples of specific comments relating to specific trailers (the numbers in brackets refer to the respondent).:

TRAILER: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug:

• ‘All different aspects of film shown - a great taster’ (#395)
• ‘Pretty visuals, but I’m not emotionally invested in the franchise’ (#370)
• ‘Interest in the film franchise; vast CG visuals and dramatic editing…it dramatically built up the hype for the film without revealing the whole plot’ (#228)
• ‘terrible, too long, too detailed and gave away too much’ (#209)
• ‘The HD looked fake.’ (#156)
• ‘I saw it at the Odeon IMAX in 3D. The SFX (pretty rubbish in the first Hobbit film in 2D) looked better on screen - so might book tickets for the 3D version, based on the trailer.’ (#153)

TRAILER: The Amazing Spider-Man 2:

• ‘it showed you most elements of the narrative and plot’ (#171)
• ‘effects look good’ (#217)
• ‘flashy trailer, made me worry about the movie (looks like too many bad guys again)’ (#241)
• ‘Iconic Character, Strong Visuals, Comic Book Origins…Seems an impressive spectacle.’ (#402)

TRAILER: Gravity:

• ‘different plot than usual Hollywood storylines, it's happening in space, it seemed a very "clean movie"’ (#518)
• ‘Had a lot of impact, didn't list too much plot, soundtrack’ (#348)
• ‘space suits / combination of flowing actor movement and rapid ruptured edits / something about the music… it did make me curious to see the film’ (#340)
• ‘spectacular effects, great sound design’ (#187)
• ‘conveyed panic, made me feel I was there’ (#82)
• ‘exciting, visual, stimulating… it was in 3d’ (#55)

What can we take from these comments? Well, putting to one side the more general responses, certain key comments stand out. Those two responses that comment specifically on the 3D suggest that the 3D might be the key reason to see the film in the cinema – the 3D effects look good for The Hobbit, while being in 3D made the Gravity trailer ‘exciting, visual, stimulating’.

The repeated responses and references to the visual quality of the trailers might reveal “hidden” references to 3D: ‘spectacular effects’, ‘vast CG visuals’, ‘made me feel I was there’ are all comments that – with further research – might point to 3D being more of a sales message or strong creative element of the trailer than is currently understood. Certainly the existing (slim) research on 3D trailers (by one of our research team, Keith M. Johnston) suggests that it creates a different experience than seeing the same trailer in 2D.

This all needs to be followed up in later research, but it does suggest that for 3D to be a strong creative element that can be effectively marketed, for it to offer an effective ‘free sample’ of the technology and its creative application, then the main barrier to 3D trailers is the need to expand out of the cinema to other media, in order to reach the 60-70% of the trailer viewing audience who currently watch online or via televisions.