Movie trailers have long been an essential component of cinema and have been evolving for some time now. A movie trailer’s purpose is to motivate the viewer to see the film when it is released in theaters, typically by showcasing the most exciting moments that will occur in a film. Trailers will often abbreviate or manipulate the order of events shown as a means of avoiding spoilers, which could obviously ruin a viewer’s enjoyment of a film. In recent years, however, it seems as though this wariness of spoiling crucial events is no longer as valued by movie studios.
Take for instance recent trailers such as the theatrical trailer for 2016’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice which showcased practically every aspect of the plot, particularly the culminating team up between the title characters against the surprise antagonist, Doomsday. Since the film was positioned to follow the conflict between Batman and Superman, by revealing that the two will join forces, there is no longer any suspense regarding how the film will conclude.
In comparison, the Cloverfield franchise films utilized cryptic marketing, whereby the premiere trailer didn’t even offer a title for the movie and as the release date neared it was still unclear from the promotional material what the premise of the film even was. It should be noted that Cloverfield was a huge financial success, while Batman v Superman was a disappointment, which raises the question of whether spoiler-filled trailers are the best choice to maximize the likelihood that moviegoers will seek out a film. It’s possible that this practice could in actuality hurt a film’s long-term profitability.
On the surface it seems that studios should be inclined to present as much of a film as possible since by revealing the most interesting parts of the film the viewer will intuitively be more enticed to see the film. According to Entertainment Weekly, many studios in the past have cited that during focus group sessions, moviegoers generally report being more motivated to view a film if more plot details are revealed in comparison with trailers that reveal very little.
This idea of releasing trailers that layout almost every plot point is also supported by the psychological principle of the mere exposure effect, which states that individuals are prone to form positive attitudes towards objects or brands that they are constantly exposed to, as the stimuli becomes easier to process in the mind. In other words, when a potential moviegoer is exposed to every significant plot development of a movie during its promotion, the story will become more familiar to them. When this individual will make a purchase decision regarding this movie they will associate their familiarity with the story as a favorable attitude toward the film, and will therefore be more inclined to purchase a ticket. Additionally, due to their familiarity with the story, this same individual will theoretically associate the ease of processing as a positive appraisal towards the film and will be more likely to recommend the film to others, thereby bolstering sales even further.
While the mere exposure effect makes it seem clear why spoiler-filled trailers are always the best practice in the financial sense for movie studios, one could make a case that this practice is adversely impacting how viewers evaluate their movie-going experience. For instance, consumer psychology research has revealed that attention, the amount of mental activity a consumer devotes to a particular stimulus after being exposed to this stimulus, is most likely to be gained through the use of presenting novel and surprising stimuli. If the trailer includes every interesting element of the film, according to attention theory, this would result in the viewer being more likely to purchase a ticket for the film once it’s released.
However, with every intriguing element of the film already unveiled, the viewer would most likely lower their level of attention when watching the film unless there were even more novel stimuli they weren’t already familiar with. The lack of attention would be interpreted as finding the film boring, which could result in poor word of mouth, thus hurting the box office sales more than helping them. This very well may have been the case with Batman v. Superman as Slash Film reported that the film had one of the steepest second weekend drops of all time in the form of a 68% decrease from the first weekend.
Overall, studios should be cautious about being overly reliant on providing spoilers in trailers as an easy way to make the film profitable and should utilize market research on a case by case basis. Several factors that should be accounted for with whether a more revealing trailer is in the film’s best interest are the genre of the film and the target audience, as it’s possible that different aged viewers will be persuaded differently. Additionally, whether the film has a pre-established fan base is also important, as certain series such as Star Wars or most Marvel films have fans who are already interested in seeing the film, and revealing story details are unnecessary in motivating their behavior.
Finally, it should be noted that advertising campaigns are complex and are composed of multiple components that are independent of a trailer. If other aspects of the marketing are lacking, the content of the trailer could potentially be inconsequential. The rationale for which path to persuasion will be most effective is multidimensional and deserves further analysis in order to better address this issue going forward.
