Trailers

[CalMeacham]

http://straightdope.com/mailbag/mtrailers.html
1.) Great report, Gfactor

2.) Hey! The first trailer is for the same movie that spawned the first novelization, The Adventures of Kathlyn, (The Adventures of Kathlyn - Wikipedia ), as reported in bonzer’s reply to my query about the first novelization (and in a link by wendell Wagner):
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=442584&highlight=novelization
3.) Greetings, amorphous SiO[sub]2[/sub].nH[sub]2[/sub]O!

4.) The oldest trailer I, personally, have seen was for the 1925 The Lost World. It’s on the Eastman House version on DVD.

[Galwegian]

@CalMeacham

http://straightdope.com/mailbag/mtrailers.html

3.) Greetings, amorphous SiO[sub]2[/sub].nH[sub]2[/sub]O!

[RiverRunner]

@Galwegian

Yeah, I got a kick out that, too.

RR

[kaylasdad99]

WELL? Did Kathlyn escape from the lions’ pit?

I’m in the edge of my seat here! Throw me a bone.

Unless it’s one of Kathlyn’s, of course. Eeeww.

[Gfactor]

@CalMeacham

1.) Great report, Gfactor

Thanks.

@kaylasdad99

WELL? Did Kathlyn escape from the lions’ pit?

I’m in the edge of my seat here! Throw me a bone.

Yes. But then she got tied to the tracks!

[filmyak]

One note missing from the report on trailers – nowadays, no one sticks around to the end of a movie’s credit list, so putting trailers afterwards would practically ensure no one saw them. But in the early days of movie making, when credit lists were much shorter, they ran at the beginning of a movie.

So, when the film ended, the trailers would start right away… you wouldn’t lose eyes to advertise to just because they got up and left during the credits.

[Gfactor]

@filmyak

One note missing from the report on trailers – nowadays, no one sticks around to the end of a movie’s credit list, so putting trailers afterwards would practically ensure no one saw them. But in the early days of movie making, when credit lists were much shorter, they ran at the beginning of a movie.

Good point. Do you know when that switch happened?

[CalMeacham]

Good point. Do you know when that switch happened?

What switch? Credits were still very short into the 1970s. Look at Diamonds are Forever – 1971 release, with the end credits consisting of the players, the Monty Norman theme, and saying James Bond Will Be Back.

By the time Star Wars came out in 1977 you needed an emntire recessional concert to cover all the credits. I;m not sure exactly when in the 1970s credits ballooned to become so long, but it was in there somewhere.

In the 1960s and 1970s they ran the movies pretty much continuously, so if you missed the beginning of the movie you could stay after the show was over and watch it when they ran the next show – they didn’t kick everyone out at the end of the movie. So did the trailers run before or after the movie? Who can tell?
It seems to me that trailers continued to be trailers in effect, because they DID run at the end of the movie, which was indistinguishable fro m the beginning.

Although on those rare occasions when they only ran a single showing, they did run the trailers BEFORE the movie (and even though the credits were short).

[filmyak]

@Gfactor

Good point. Do you know when that switch happened?

Not sure. I have zero cites for this, but I once learned that the unions started insisting everyone get credit for their work. The shorter credit lists clearly didn’t list massive amounts of people who worked on the film, so moving the much longer credits to the end of the movie was the obvious way to solve the problem. Though most movies have the major players credited up front still (except for some films that allow the audience to move right past all that crap… Die Hard. Gotta love how quick they get into the film!).

Anyway, once you had the super long credits at the end, and movies were no longer run continuously, trailers had to move up front if you wanted to advertise your film.

[Gfactor]

Thanks. Yeah, I didn’t really dig into the credits issue, and perhaps I should have. That said, I’m still not sure exactly when the trailer got switched from the end to the beginning. As CalMeacham notes, the distinction might be difficult to make. You’d know if the trailer was at the beginning if you caught the first show of the day; or at the end if you caught the last show. Other than that, it was more like the middle, right?

Anyway, I have a bigger problem with connecting short credits and trailers at the front–while I can’t pin down a specific date, I’ve got *some * evidence that trailers probably started running at the beginning of the film before 1940, and probably earlier than that.

That’s why I asked about the timing of the switch.

[filmyak]

Wish I had more info, but nada, sorry.

But as you pointed out, there was no standard, and there are still no hard and fast rules. And, as a VERY minor (but still moderately notable) exception, at some movie theaters the very first run of a new movie will have no trailers at all.

On a typical schedule, we’re talking about the Fri noon show on a film’s release. No big mystery, just has to do with how the projectionist has to run the trailer reel through the projector, stop when just the last few feet are sticking out, and splice the last trailer onto the first frame of the new film. So when the film starts playing, it goes straight to the beginning of the new movie.

So it doesn’t really count, but the Straight Dope is all about the nitpicking details, is it not?

(And let’s not even bring up the disgusting practice of running commercials before movies at some theaters nowadays.)

[Gfactor]

Here is a good article on changes in film credits over time: BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Film | Hollywood's lengthening film credits

and the beggining of another article that talks about how technology people needing credit made the credits even longer: http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20717F83C5D0C7B8CDDA80994DA484D81

[Gfactor]

This is a good read about the content of movie credits: http://www.salon.com/ent/feature/1998/10/09feature.html
Filmyak’s point about demands for billing causing credits to expand and move:

During the era of the studio system, on-screen billing was presented at the beginning of a film; only a restatement of the cast and possibly additional players appeared at the end, because the studios had actors under contract and could decide billing. However, after the studio system’s collapse, actors and their agents fought for billing on a film by film basis. This, combined with changes in union contracts and copyright laws, led to more actors and crew members being included in the credits sequence, expanding its size significantly. As a result, since the late 1960s a significant amount of the billing is reserved for the closing credits of the film, which generally includes a recap of the billing shown at the beginning.

Billing (performing arts) | History

[Ike_Witt]

@CalMeacham

By the time Star Wars came out in 1977 you needed an emntire recessional concert to cover all the credits. I;m not sure exactly when in the 1970s credits ballooned to become so long, but it was in there somewhere.

Star Wars didn’t have any opening credits. Lucas had to get special dispensation from the Directors Guild to do it. When the Guild wouldn’t let him do it for the other SW movies, he quit the guild.

[Baron_Greenback]

You should send your cite for the first appearance of “trailers” in print to the OED. They’ll add it to their database, and it might end up in the 3rd Edition - due 2037!

[bonzer]

@kaylasdad99

WELL? Did Kathlyn escape from the lions’ pit?

As I noted in the other thread, the novelisation is available online. Thus …
SPOILER SPACE

But one of the hero’s native friends has had an idea the night before!

“Put the mines in the center of the arena. What we want is merely terror and confusion. Pouf! Bang! There’s your miracle. And a little one under the royal pavilion. And Umballa and the council sleep in Shaitan’s arms. Welcome, my lambs!” And Ahmed laughed noiselessly.

“By the lord!” gasped Bruce. “But the fuses? No, no, Ahmed; it can not be done.”

“In the house of my friend Lal Singh there is a cellar full of strange magic–magic with copper wires that spit blue fires. Eh, Sahib? You and I know; we have traveled.”

“Batteries, here, in this wilderness?”

“Even so. To you, Ramabai, the powder; to me, the spitting wires; to you, Bruce Sahib, patience. Umballa shall yet wear raw the soles of his feet in the treadmill. He shall grind the poor man’s corn. I know what I know. Now I must be off. I shall return to-morrow night and you, Ramabai, shall gather together your fellow conspirators (who would blow up the palace!) and bring the mines to the arena.”

Thus Kathlyn comes face-to-face with the noble, savage beasts in the sordid heat of the arena!

The great, tawny African brutes blinked and turned their shaggy heads this way and that, uneasily. Kathlyn stood very still. How, how could they save her? At length the lions espied her, attracted by the white of her robe. One bounded forward, growling. The others immediately started in pursuit.

Suddenly the center of the arena opened and a tremendous roar followed. A low wail of terror ran round the arena. Surely this Mem-sahib had all the gods with her. A great crevice had opened up between Kathlyn and the lions, one of which lay dead. Then came the rush toward the exits, a mad frantic rush. Not even Umballa, who knew that not the gods, but man had contrived this havoc, not even Umballa waited, but fled, beating down all those who blocked his path.

Bruce and Ramabai dropped over the railing to Kathlyn’s side. But the key upon which their escape depended would not unlock the door.

TO BE CONTINUED
In the next post … Thrill as Bruce tackles a lion! Swoon as Kathlyn has to fire a gun! Be amazed as the main thing she can think about as she flees for her life is her father having a nap and their pet leopard!

[bonzer]

Can Bruce and Kathlyn escape the pit of the mangy leonine curs!

When Bruce dropped down into the arena to Kathlyn’s side he had never given a thought to the possibility of the key not being the right one. Trapped!–and Ahmed but a few yards away with a zenana gharry, ready to convey them to the camp, freedom! It took the heart out of him for a moment. The confusion all about, the pall of dust, the roaring of the frightened lions which had escaped destruction, the shrill cries of the panic-stricken populace, who now looked upon the white Mem-sahib as the daughter of Shaitan, these dulled his inventive faculties for the nonce. Here was the confusion, properly planned, and he could not make use of it. Possibly, when no further explosion shook the air, the mob and the soldiers would return out of curiosity. And then, good-by!

But the sight of a lion emerging from the murk, the wrong side of the crevice, roused him thoroughly.

“Save yourself!” said Kathlyn in despair: “there is no possible way of saving me. I have never in all my life injured any one, and yet God makes me go through all this. . . . I am mad, you are, the whole world is! . . . Run!”

Bruce laughed; it was that kind of laughter with which men enter battle. He drew Lal Singh’s revolvers and thrust one into her hand.

“Shoot at the keyhole. Leave the lion to me. With the pandemonium no one will note the shots, or if they do, will think that more explosions are on the way. I’ll get you out of this nightmare; that’s what I was born for.”

That’s the spirit!

“I’ve gone through a good deal,” she said. Without more ado she pressed the muzzle of the revolver into the keyhole and fired. She heard a shot behind her, another and another; but she kept on firing into and about the keyhole till the revolver was empty.

A firm hand drew her aside.

“The lion?”

“Gone to sleep. Let me have a whack at that door.”

“Where’s Ramabai?”

“Went back over the wall. Probably to warn Ahmed; maybe gone directly off toward camp. Anyhow, he has faith in me.”

“And, oh! so have I, so have I!”

Bruce bore his weight savagely against the door, once, twice, thrice; and pitched forward on his knees, outside. He was up instantly. He caught Kathlyn by the hand and hurried her along; and all she could think of was Winnie romping toward the canopied studio, her father half asleep on the veranda and the leopard cat sprawled on the divan!

“Sahib! Huzoor!” a voice called. “This way!”

[MovieMogul]

@filmyak

But as you pointed out, there was no standard, and there are still no hard and fast rules. And, as a VERY minor (but still moderately notable) exception, at some movie theaters the very first run of a new movie will have no trailers at all.

On a typical schedule, we’re talking about the Fri noon show on a film’s release. No big mystery, just has to do with how the projectionist has to run the trailer reel through the projector, stop when just the last few feet are sticking out, and splice the last trailer onto the first frame of the new film. So when the film starts playing, it goes straight to the beginning of the new movie.

So it doesn’t really count, but the Straight Dope is all about the nitpicking details, is it not?

I think this is probably more minor of an exception than you expect, since the projectionist has to build the film up the night before anyway, so is likely to do the build up incorporating the pre-determined trailer list as well. It’s only if the Film Office has a last minute trailer change that I can envision your scenario, but even then, we would be more likely to simply “drop in” a trailer at the last minute instead of forego the previews altogether–especially since running straight to feature would be a CS nightmare, since most patrons have now gotten used to the idea of having a ten-minute “buffer” (for concessions, bathrooms, etc.) before they can reasonably expect the movie to actually start.

I can see this maybe happening in a second- or third-run movie house, but any semi-major chain? No way.

[filmyak]

@ArchiveGuy

I think this is probably more minor of an exception than you expect.

Yeah I figured. The fri morning “no trailer” thing was 100% true of the 1st run theater I worked at from about 1989-1992, before the current mega-multiplex boom. And as digital projectors in theaters become more commonplace, that’ll be a total non-entity, anyway. No more loading filmstrips, just click a button.

[Cervaise]

Not directly related to the trailers article (which was good: congrats, Gf), just addressing a tangent that came up:

@filmyak

Though most movies have the major players credited up front still (except for some films that allow the audience to move right past all that crap… Die Hard. Gotta love how quick they get into the film!).

There is actually a rule about this, for studio/union pictures anyway. adam yax mentioned it, but is a little off on the details.

Here’s the scoop: You can do the opening titles essentially one of two ways. You can show the studio and the name of the movie, and nothing else; or you can do the full opening-credit lineup, as negotiated by the various artists. The first style is relative uncommon, but an example would be Pirates of the Caribbean. Examples of the second style abound.

So you couldn’t say “20th Century Fox presents / A James Cameron Film / TITANIC” and then not continue with actors, writer(s), producer(s), composer, editor, and so on. Ditto, you couldn’t say, “United Artists presents / Daniel Craig as James Bond in / DOCTOR NO,” and then proceed with the film without further titles. If you name one person, you gotta name 'em all, at least, again, as has been negotiated for opening-title status.

The Star Wars / Lucasfilm issue was in the interpretation of the Lucasfilm credit. The practice of “title only” was not common, but it wasn’t unheard of, and Lucas argued that since “Lucasfilm” was the company and not the individual it should be acceptable. At the time, Lucasfilm wasn’t much of a production company, and the credit was interpreted by some as a sneaky way of saying “a film by George Lucas.” That, under the rule described above, was a no-no, unless the credits continued with “starring Mark Hamill / Harrison Ford / etc / music by / costumes by” and so on. However, nobody expected the movie to make much of a splash, so the complaints were mild, and didn’t prevent the movie from coming out as Lucas had intended. Then, when Empire Strikes Back came out, the same sequence was used, except this time the WGA objected. Lucas appealed to the DGA, but they didn’t back him up; this may be due to the fact that Irvin Kershner, not Lucas, was the director of the second film, and the DGA didn’t much appreciate the way the “Lucasfilm” credit implied that Lucas was the director. Lucas paid some hefty fines and resigned from the guild.

(I did all of this from memory, so I might have some of the specifics slightly wrong. In particular, I don’t remember exactly the sequence of complaints on Empire, whether the WGA objected alone and the DGA joined them, or vice versa, or what. Other than that, though, I’m confident that it’s pretty close.)