How scenes from five of the nine best picture nominees were reassembled to promote the films
Silver Linings Playbook
“Silver Linings Playbook” follows the standard model for trailers, according to Bill Woolery, a trailer specialist in Los Angeles who once worked on trailers for movies like “The Usual Suspects” and “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.” While introducing the movie’s story and its characters, the trailer largely follows the order of the film itself.
The trailer’s opening shot — an image of the family’s home — appears near the end of the film, but there are similar shots near the beginning of the movie.
A handful of very short shots are never seen in the film, although most are shown from alternate camera angles.
Shots that accompany the main actors’ names are also shown out of order.
Lincoln
The “Lincoln” trailer is more like the typical teaser than a trailer, according to Stephen Garrett, who owns Jump Cut, a trailer house that specializes in foreign, independent and documentary films. While trailers often focus on plot or character descriptions, teasers establish the mood and tone of a film. Teasers “don’t have to be chronological,” Mr. Garrett said.
The timing of the “blackouts” makes the progression of the trailer feel “stately” or “profound,” according to Mr. Woolery. But “quick blackouts can work the opposite way,” he said.
Mr. Garrett noted that Lincoln is shown only from behind or in profile during the first 40 seconds of the trailer. This decision, he said, helps “set up Lincoln as an icon.”
Amour
The only foreign film among the best picture nominees, it uses significantly longer shots than the other trailers. Mr. Woolery characterized the final 20 seconds of the trailer, where a man sits in silence, as “very brave” to use in a pitch for an American audience, but said that the final shot was powerful because of the uncertainty it creates.
Mr. Garrett said the way a piano recording is used in the final seconds means you “cannot trust what you’re seeing to tell you what the story is. It leaves you with a smart sense of intrigue.”
Argo
The trailer for “Argo” balances two different tones, according to Mr. Garrett: thriller and Hollywood satire. “Thrillers have a very fast cutting style,” he said. “It’s a way of ratcheting up attention.” Shots are longer, on average, when the trailer turns to satire.
Bryan Cranston‘s character watches President Carter give an address on television; In the film, the television shows an address by an Iranian spokeswoman.
The Hollywood sign appears about halfway through the trailer. While intact in the trailer, the sign is shown in the disrepair of the 1970s in the film.
A scene showing the Americans surrounded by a crowd is bookended with shots from an earlier scene showing a much larger crowd.
Beasts of the Southern Wild
The “poetry” of the world in the film is mentioned by one of several reviews shown in the trailer. “It’s a license to not worry about story,” Mr. Garrett said. Asked about open-ended questions in the trailer, Larry Baldauf, executive vice president of marketing for Fox Searchlight, cited discussions about how, and to what extent, to reveal the mythical beasts in the film.
One of the places the beasts, known as aurochs, appear is near the end of the trailer.
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