Dark Matter

The Last Kiss. Not at all what I expected. Everything I had read about this movie (admittedly, not a lot) classified it as a romantic comedy, and with Zach Braff listed as the lead, I figured it would be some goofy love triangle thing. Instead, it turned out to be almost an ensemble piece, and a pretty harsh indictment of marriage and relationships, with a few humorous moments thrown in here and there. That's not to say I didn't enjoy the movie. I just wouldn’t exactly call it romantic, and if it’s a comedy, it’s a pretty black one.

Selling the drama

I see a lot of movies, and I hate to get to the theater late, because I love the previews. I’m always interested to see how movie studios choose to market their films. Even if I skip all the other special features on a DVD, I will always watch the trailer to see who the studio thought their target audience was. It always interests me to see if they give away too much of the movie (as in the case of most comedies or movies marketed at teens), or not enough, which usually ends up confusing people and tends to hurt the chances of a wide audience seeing the film. After paying attention to this for so many years, I think I may have found the perfect movie preview. The movie is Garden State, a small critically acclaimed film from Zach Braff, who you may recognize as the lead from the TV show Scrubs. I’ve seen this preview three or four times now in the theater, and as all good previews should, it has gotten me very excited about seeing the movie. What’s so great about it is that the editors of this preview have created a hauntingly beautiful 60-second film that leaves me wanting more every time, without using a single word of dialogue. It basically amounts to a short music video, but the choice of music is perfect. In this short amount of time, the amount of information the preview conveys about the film is amazing. I’ll warn you, it does tend to lose some of its effect when viewed on your computer screen, but here’s the link.

Choose the Teaser Trailer, and lose yourself for a minute. Then watch the regular trailer and compare the two experiences. I’m still interested after seeing the second one, but it doesn’t come close to moving me in the same way as the teaser.