A film trailer is a short video used to market upcoming feature films. It typically includes clips and scenes from the film designed to excite audiences and highlight the genre. Trailers have become popular online, so film companies create many trailers in hopes of going viral. The first movie trailer was created in 1914 to promote Charlie Chaplin's film "The Tramp." National Screen Service later contracted with film companies to produce trailers until the 1980s. Andrew J. Kuehn revolutionized film trailers in the 1960s with trailers for famous films like "Jaws" and "Indiana Jones," pushing boundaries of editing styles accepted by audiences.

1. Film Trailers By Joseph O’Hagan

2. What is a film trailer? A film trailer is a short video, vital in the marketing of feature films. They involve clips of the film that they are advertising, and often take the genre to the extremes (such as a horror film’s dark shots and slow pace). Film trailers have become popular searches on video sharing sites such as ‘Youtube’, and film companies taking advantage of this by creating many trailers and campaign in an attempt to go viral.

3. The origin The original promotional trailer was in fact a reel for a musical as opposed to a feature length film. The promotional reel was intended to show parts of the film and raise it’s awareness. The producer, Nils Granlund, was also the man who created the original movie trailer in 1914, being used to promote the Charlie Chaplin film, The Tramp.

4. National Screen Service Film companies contracted the National Screen Service to create the trailers for their upcoming films. This was up until the late 1950s and the company ended in the 80’s. The original trailers consisted of short clips showing the key features of the film alongside a narration and a big score soundtrack and screens with text, such as a cast run.

5. Advertising The most powerful source of advertisement is the television, though commercial television advertisement did not appear until 1955, so advertisement was originally limited to print (newspapers and magazines). Also, people originally saw advertising as possessing no redeeming qualities. To many, it did not contribute to society. Boutlis (2000) described it as ‘stirring the dormant, unconscious desire of civil society’.

6. Andrew J. Kuehn In the 60’s, films began to change. Naturally, so did trailers. The more liberal age of culture came with a new breed of films, varying in genre and style, as such they would need to be advertised differently. Andrew J. Kuehn is notable for revolutionizing the American film trailers in the 1960s (He is the developer of the trailers for the films we all know such as Jaws, the Indiana Jones series and Schindler’s list).

7. Kuehn was awarded the Cannes lifetime achievement award, having been credit with over 1000 trailers. “A trailer has but one goal: to draw audiences out of their houses and into a theater. To do that you have to set up a sense of urgency. In the process of arriving at that forced pace, we advanced the styling of editing. We really pushed the envelope in terms of what audiences would accept.” - Kuehn