# Why do they make "fake" conversations in ads for movies? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 17, 2005, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119 "2005-09-17T16:56:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Silentgoldfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Silentgoldfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silentgoldfish)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119/21 "2005-09-18T06:10:48Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > “It smells like . . . victory.” Aaaand you wrong. Sorta proves his point. I think occasionally in trailers it improves a joke when they have to cut it down. In Jim Carrey’s _Liar, Liar_ there’s a scene where he gets in an elevator with a busty lady who comments that everyone in the building has been really nice to her. He, only being able to tell the truth and says “Well, that’s because you’ve got big jugs. I mean your boobs are huge. I mean, I wanna squeeze 'em. Mama!” Cut to the elevator door opening with him looking like he’s just been punched in the face and her looking angry. The trailer cut straight from “big” to the door opening and was much funnier for it. ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119/22 "2005-09-18T06:33:18Z")
> [@mobo85](#): > > In the case of _The Incredibles_, the scene was created specifically for the teaser trailer. Every Pixar film since _A Bug’s Life_ has had a special teaser trailer introducing the films and the characters by using original footage that is not intended for the actual film. Well, with Pixar, that’s because they create those teaser trailers so far ahead of the rest of the movie that there’s usually nothing else they _can_ show at the time. It’s amusing to watch that _Incredibles_ teaser in retrospect and realize it depicted everything Pixar had camera-ready for the movie at the time – just four walls, a red costume, and an overweight guy. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Mississippienne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d2c977/32.png) [@Mississippienne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mississippienne)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 9:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119/23 "2005-09-18T09:40:13Z")
Well, on the other side of the spectrum there’s the trailer for the sadly underrated techno-noir, _Strange Days_. The trailer has no footage of the actual movie, just Ralph Fiennes talking to the camera about how he’s the “magic man”. It was a neat idea that bombed. People hated the trailer, the movie’s business wasn’t that great, either. Perhaps if they’d shown some of the car chases and gunfights with spliced dialogue more people would’ve come. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119/24 "2005-09-18T16:24:14Z")
From The Trailer Guard-“Are you talking about a miracle?” Tom Hanks-“I just about believe that very thing.” In The Movie Inmate about to be executed- ‘Is Heaven a place where you get to go back to the happiest time in your life and have it forever?’ Tom Hanks-“I Just about believe that very thing.” unrelated conversation in a later scene Guard- “Are you talking about a jump-up-praise-Jesus-miracle?” Tom Hanks-“I am.” ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119/25 "2005-09-19T14:47:14Z")
Sometimes the pieces of fake conversation are so blatant it’s laughable. There was a TV ad for 'Maid In Manhattan" where first there’s an indoor scene of JLo as a maid making a bed, saying something like “What am I supposed to do, make the bed with me in it?” and then there’s the lead actor, very clearly outdoors, saying “please!”, with the sky and clouds behind his head. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119/26 "2005-09-19T16:15:19Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > I consider it false advertising and it should be stopped. Fah. I, for one, am increasingly irritated at movie trailers that give away major details of the plot, to a point at which I don’t even need to see one of the interchangable so-called thrillers interchangably starting Angelina Jolie or Ashley Judd to be able to recite the plot developments, practically down to the minute. It’s one thing if the trailer gives exactly the wrong impression of the film, I suppose, but it’s quite another if the trailer recreates the mood or theme of the film even if using unique footage. The teaser (but not the full trailer) for _The Incredibles_ did a mediocre job of this; based on the trailer, I’d assumed the film was much sillier and infantile that it actually was. (Thankfully, the trailer was much better.) The trailer for _Adaptation_ did a good job of conveying the idea, such as it was, without giving away major details. I doubt anybody remembers this, but there was a trailer for the Steve Martin/Michael Caine film _Dirty Rotten Scoundrels_ which did this perfectly. It used a trailer sequence which was created specifically for the trailer, with Martin and Caine walking down the Rivera with some narrated voiceover about honest, decent men and a good family movie or somesuch, then stated that this was not that kind of movie, as Martin knocks an old lady into the water and Caine smushes an ice cream cone into a kid’s face. It was really hilarious–far more entertaining than the film it proceded–and conveyed the sense of the film perfectly despite using no footage from the actual film. Stranger [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-they-make-fake-conversations-in-ads-for-movies/322119.md?page=1)