You've heard all the arguments. These two trailers represent two different approaches to selling the same movie. Which plays better for you, and why? Here's the original:
The Dilemma Trailer - Watch more Movie Trailers
Here's the substitute:
The only thing I'm going to say (that I haven't already said here and here) is that neither of them makes me terribly excited to see the movie, which I feel like I've already seen several times before.
"I don't think you go to a play to forget, or to a movie to be distracted. I think life generally is a distraction and that going to a movie is a way to get back, not go away." -- Tom Noonan
"Cinema is a matter of what's in the frame and what's out." -- Martin Scorsese
“An idea does not exist apart from the words that express it. Style is not an envelope enclosing a message; the envelope is the message.” -- Dwight Macdonald
"There's nothing I like less than bad arguments for a view that I hold dear." -- Daniel Dennett
29 Comments
In the first trailer, the way Vaugh pauses before he says "...are gay," is ingenious, showing him reveling in the shock he's about to give his audience. Kevin James' overly serious, almost taunting facial expressions at 10 and 17 seconds are him saying, "Are you man enough?" And then Vaugh goes on to strengthen his pitch with phrases like "rock 'n' roll attitude" and "muscle car," and his air/mouth-guitaring to "Barracuda" (I think that's the song). Since he's using this macho attitude to denigrate the sissified image of electric cars, one could even argue that the scene is politically loaded.
This isn't focused on in the trailer, but it's there: after Vaughn says "...are gay," at 12 sec, two of the businessmen (the older white one looks like the boss) look at each other with dubious expressions. After the "not homosexual" clarification, and a stare-down between the boss and James at 16-18 sec, the businessmen seem more accepting of Vaughn and James' proposal (look at the black one raising his eyebrows at 20 sec). So you could say the scene even comments on its own PC clarification that way ("GAY? You don't mean...Oh! Not homosexual, you say?").
I don't think anyone wants to be offended, I think they just are, but in the context that the word "gay" is used in this trailer, I'm not. At all. Now, whether it's funny, that's up to you.
It was the second, oversold "gay" that went over like a lead balloon with the full house for "The Social Network" when I saw it. It's like there's a puase where a laugh is supposed to be, and even with all those people in the theater, there wasn't one. Just a few giggles. That may have made it seem even worse. I think his scene in the car at the beginning of the second trailer is funnier, and at least tells me that they're going into a meeting. Seeing the first trailer cold, I didn't understand why it emphasized the conference room scene, or what was supposed to be happening in it. Were the Dodge executives buying it? Were they skeptical? There's no clear reading -- well, until Queen Latifah's "serious lady wood" comment. (BTW, What does "I gotta go -- mommy and me," mean?)
I think the conference room scene is supposed to set Vaughn and James up as a couple of hotshots. The executives seem skeptical at first, as I detailed, but the gradual shift from deadpan glares to smiles, and the shot of them all smiling at 27 sec convinces me that they've been convinced. I'm equally confused about the, "Mommy and me" line. Queen Latifah is hilarious (and sexy) with her "vroom vroom" line in the second trailer, though.
As for the two trailers, I think they're both about equally good (which is to say, kinda "meh"). I like the details of Vaughn's reaction to the poison ivy, and I like the crazy Winona Ryder. But it seems to have the same comedic pitch and tone as "EdTV," which does not bode well. If it gets good reviews maybe I'll see it, Howard is at the very least a competent director, and the big budget, big star studio comedy is on the decline. Or off the decline, and in whatever nega-world you go to once you've completely declined.
The two trailer comparison is fun, you should try it with the two (very different) trailers that've been released for "True Grit." It's interesting how they use the famous scenes anyone familiar with the story will recognize.
Neither trailer for me works very well. Both make the movie look like a bad hour of television comedy. The premise sounds like it could have had potential as a well observed comedy about marital infidelity and the questions of loyalty to your friends, but only if they had dropped the slapstick and gone for a more cerebral form of comedy. Unless the trailers here are pulling a huge practical joke on us as viewers, I think I can confidently say I will never have the need to watch this movie in my lifetime.
It just saddens me that this is the same director who once did the terrific comedy Night Shift.
How the hell did they get Winona Ryder and Jennifer Connelly???
JC won her Oscar for being in "A Beautiful Mind," un film de Ron Howard.
I just saw the original for the first time, and I just assumed they went with the gay-panic joke right off the bat because it's a mainstream movie about a friendship between two men (one that doesn't involve guns), so they need to immediately inform the audience that there's nothing homosexual here. Just two best friends expressing their admiration for each other and discussing difficult feelings.
Anyway, am I the only one who finds the phrase "Academy-Award winning director Ron Howard" to be highly offensive? Can't they strike the first three words from that phrase to protect my sensibilities?
You guys obviously have no experience with "Mommy & Me" preschool classes. :-)
As for the trailers, I found the gay joke less offensive in the context of the situation, but I still think it was meant to raise a laugh from the audience (and failed) rather than give us insight into what a jerk the guy is. If he's even SUPPOSED to be a jerk. If he's not, that says even more about the statement.
The only time I laughed at either trailer was the moment when the boy asked, "Mommy, why is that man hugging himself?" Otherwise--total dud. Unfunny all the way through.
Thank you, Lynn! I was so thrown off by the "lady wood" I had no idea what to make of the phrase "mommy and me" (as I heard it). For all I knew it could have been a sexual innuendo about QL and her mom! I'm glad it's not.
Well, I think the "gay" joke is lame and vaguely offensive--but, then, the word "lame" is potentially offensive as well, so maybe "gay" will go on a similar arc of eventually becoming so disassociated from the people who spawned it that it becomes broadly acceptable (as many people apparently already believe it is.) Of course, the difference is that the disabled don't generally refer to themselves as "lame" anymore, while gays still use "gay" as their primary self-identifier. And, of course, the negativity in "lame" comes from a judgment on the object of the descriptor's abilities, while with "gay" the criticism comes purely from some kind of moral/aesthetic judgment.
All that said, I prefer the first trailer for the simple reason that it appears to give away fewer plot points from the film, something I always appreciate. Not that I have any real interest in seeing the film, or expect anything particularly unpredictable from its plot, but it's the principle of the thing.
To be perfectly honest, the first time I saw the trailer, I thought the two main characters were going to start having a relationship. That would explain the use of the word "gay" and all of the bromance that occurs in the trailer.
They both look pretty bad. I'll pass.
I didn't find either trailer particularly funny, but I also was not offended by the "gay" joke (to be fair, I'm not easily offended).
I'm surprised some of the people offended by the use of "gay" in the original trailer aren't also offended by the whole "someone could have sex with their second cousin, and the kid would most likely still be normal" joke in the second trailer. What does he mean by "normal"? I'm being kind of tongue-in-cheek here; I do assume he is implying the child is less likely to be born with some kind of congenital disorder. But isn't it offensive to say somebody with a congenital disorder is not normal (that one I'm asking sincerely. I still use the word "retarded")?
The most offensive thing about either trailer is the lack of any comedic sensibilities. One joke made me chuckle through my nose a little (Vaughn berates the second cousin and uses his frankness to tie back to his earlier point about honesty), but otherwise nothing.
A shame, too, because in the right hands, this could be a masterpiece. Is it crueler to ruin what little happiness his friend has carved out for himself, however deluded its assumptions are, or to let him be deceived? I salivate at the thought of Woody Allen making this film in the 80s.
As for the joke in question, I don't think its execution is malicious or even insensitive. I see it as a parody of macho corporate culture. The reaction shots are what really sell it, or would've sold it if it had been sold. It's definitely a bad way to establish the film, though. (Someone should refer the editors to the Opening Shots Project.)
I'm assuming Bob meant: How did those two male characters get those two girls?
Everything about the first trailer seems dated. From the Mean Joe Green reference to the air guitar to the sad, lazy, and embarrassing gay "humor" -- it would have been irrelevant in the late 90s, much less in 2010.
I smirked at the opening car scene in the 2nd trailer and the toast scene, but even the premise of this film is too unsettling to take lightly.
Also, I found the "Why do you sound like you're on medication" line to be as insulting as the gay bit. Not to mention that the lead-in to that punch-line is so overt it actually made me cringe. Vaughn says "...with all of the nice people" for no other reason than to hear James' retort. That moment sinks to Rob Schneider level comedy.
I am far more offended by the sad abuse of Queen Latifah in both trailers.
Me too.
I thought the first part where (well, we know what he said) was funny because it seemed like it was taking a satirical jab at the soulless corporate types; like the fact that he THOUGHT that coming to the business meeting to say THAT was how being successful in the marketing world works. It kind of ended up not being that though, because everyone in the room was playing it straight (or not being kind of a packaged corporate joke); well, Queen Latifah's character seemed to enjoy the presentation, saying it gave her "lady wood."
In the recent Will Farrell movie "The Other Guys", Mark Wahlberg's character says to him while driving in his Prius, "I literally feel like I'm driving in a vagina."
Well, what I was going to say was "The Dilemma" is probably not going to be a smart movie with its jokes.
I didn't really like the music in the second trailer, so I liked the first one better. The music was really horribly done in the second one. In the first one, they used the music as part of the story; the actual music he air-guitars in the meeting room is cued into the trailer right after he does the air-guitaring, which becomes the music of the trailer.
Wasn't this film and it's trailer made long before those kids killed themselves. I wouldn't consider it intensive at all. And isn't laughter the best medicine to grief. This just feels like something cooked up by politicians so they sound caring but are really just diverting attention away from the gay rights issues.
I'm always going on about the brainwashing of advertising, but in the second trailer, the music in one part, the lyrics emphasized I mean (and the only ones emphasized), are literally "How ya like me now?"
So, not only is the music annoyingly trying to chirp up the mood to the detriment of the trailer, but they are literally trying to brainwash that into everyone's brain by saying "How ya like me now?"
Pandering by brainwashing.
I think the first trailer was the strongest. The second one revealed too many turns of the screw like the whole cat-and-mouse game between the Vince Vaughn character and the Winona Ryder character.
That could have been left as a surprise. It would have shocked audiences that he would approach her and then shock us even more when she shows a). no remorse and b). threatens to sabotage their friendship.
For my sake, I hope that there is more to the Queen Latifah character than both trailers show.
Except in the early days when Ron Howard was scraping and fighting to become who he is, I've found his comedies to be lame ducks.
Aside from this being completely devoid of laughs (both trailers sucked for me), I'm not a big fan of movies which wouldn't need to exist if the main character wasn't a moron. In fact, I find them nearly unwatchable.
In this case, there's no Dilemma. Tell your friend and spare us the hijinks.
Mommy and me is an appointment she must keep with her child, like a drop in to a daycare.
For crying out loud, what is wrong with you people? Politically correctness on the stupidest level. Is the joke funny? No? Ok, move on, instead of arguing over and over it.
Personally, by the editing and rythm of the trailer, I was reminded of Ron Howard's brilliant The Paper, with it's multiple, well-developed and fast-talking characters. Or course Vince Vaughn makes for a dumber Michael Keaton and Kevin James is just dumb, and you've got no Glenn Close or Robert Duvall, but still...
Deserves a shot.
I can't read Jim's mind, but from his statements I am assuming this has to do with analyzing why does the distributor think it is okay to have a homophobic joke as one of its strengths. (from a response Jim gave) We do things for reasons and it would be odd for the distributor to randomly choose jokes to sell.
By analyzing the trailer, hopefully we can gauge how far we have come in accepting homosexuality
To be honest, when I first saw the trailer for this movie I didn't even really notice the gay comment. I find it sad that we live in a world where people are still being harassed for being homosexual, and even more so that we feel like we have to censor everything that stirs up controversy instead of educating people on the basic principles of right and wrong. The definition of censorship should be: hiding from the public what we think the public is too dumb to figure out on their own. I'm not pretending to know how to get through to the blowhards who are still harassing homosexuals but I do strongly believe that censoring has got to be one of the most unintelligent responses to the problem.
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