Thursday, July 10, 2008

Trailers


Trailers. Sometimes all the nostalgia you need is in the movie trailers. You don’t really need to see the whole film. Just the preview. Maybe that’s why I so enjoyed the eighties trend of taking old movie trailers (many of which no one bothered to copyright) and doing VHS compilations on certain themes. They were cheap and often poorly recorded but they were fun damn it! As I say, they were often even more fun than sitting down and watching hours and hours of the movies themeselves!
Seen here are JERRY LEWIS AT THE MOVIES, DRACULA IN THE MOVIES, ABBOTT AND COSTELLO IN THE MOVIES and MONSTER MANIA. Also in the collection here are trailer compilations from James Bond films, Bowery Boys films, the CARRY ON series, Godzilla films (in the original Japanese!) and a surprisingly dull collection from late sixties/early seventies adult films. For the most part these were usually under-the-radar bargain bin items that you were lucky to find at all but they usually were actual releases, not just somebody’s mail order dubs.
I recently saw a couple of new grindhouse trailer compilations on DVD in stores so maybe the trend is coming back! I’d love to see MGM musicals, Doris Day films, Hitchcock pictures, spaghetti westerns, Cary Grant films, Bob Hope comedies and Disney trailers! Wow! The possibilities are endless and the entertainment value high. Not only that, if you work it right these collections could still be used to sell the actual pictures themselves on disc!

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous5:05 PM

    well, you can do some of that yourself if you look at www.archive.org they got a subsection on old classic trailers to downolad for free. i did that and it looks good.
    not many trailers that´s the problem

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous12:36 AM

    I have one on VHS that Goodtimes Home Video put out back in the 80's that is all super-hero trailers... has several serials (Phantom, Captain America, Dick Tracy, Green Hornet, etc.) and plugs for the Batman TV show, Superman, Lone Ranger and many others plus some commercials starring heroic stars of the past-- LOVE it...

    ReplyDelete