What makes a successful film trailer? • The chief purpose of a film trailer is to advertise the film to its target market and getting them to see the film in

cinemas.• The success of a film trailer can therefore be judged on how many people saw the film in theatres and how

much money it made, either over its lifetime or on its opening weekend.• This is relative to genre, budget, and target audience. For example, a mid/low budget independent film would

need to make a lot less money than a Hollywood blockbuster to be considered a success. A film with an older target audience and hence a 15 or 18 BBFC rating might not be able to make as much money as a PG film as more people are allowed to see the film when it comes out. Children are also likely to need a guardian when going to the cinema , meaning larger parties of people see the film and it makes more money. However, a lower BBFC rating could backfire in some genres of film; if a horror film was given a 12A rating it may not do as well at the box office because people may assume the film won’t be scary.

• The main aim of this presentation is to see to what extent the trailer for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug was a successful film trailer.

Genre• The genre of the film I am analysing , The Hobbit: The

Desolation of Smaug, is fantasy. This is evident from the trailer due to a number of factors, such as characters and setting. This will be further explored throughout the rest of this presentation.

• The film could also be classified in the sub-genre of fantasy epic, because of the large scale of the environments in the film (e.g. The Lonely Mountain), and the scale of the journey and narrative undertaken by the main characters, as they take three films to complete. The Desolation of Smaug is the second part of that trilogy.

Title• The film’s title, “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug” only

appears once in the trailer, at the very end before the institutional information is shown. This means it will be fresh in the viewers mind after seeing the trailer.

• The word “Hobbit” is very large in comparison to the other text on screen. This makes a very clear link to the other films in the Hobbit franchise, itself a part of the Lord of the Rings (LotR) franchise. This will help attract an audience in the form of the fans of this particular franchise, whether they have read the Hobbit or LotR books, or just seen any of the 4 previous films in the franchise. This font was also used on the front cover of the Hobbit book, anchoring the film to the book even more.• The serif font on the words “The Hobbit” anchors the film to the fantasy genre, looking as if they could have been

written by hand. There is also a rock effect on this word, making it look like it has been carved out of stone.• The other pieces of text are in a different, still serif font, which looks much simpler and is just coloured gold,

which relates it to the golden ring shown in the trailer , which is central to the plot of the LotR films this film is a prequel to. The relative simplicity of the font makes the smaller text easier to read, which is important to the producers of the trailer, as potential viewers will need to know this subtitle to differentiate this film from the previous Hobbit film.

• This title is not overlaid over any scenes from the film, instead the background is similar to grey/black storm clouds, which connote danger and trouble ahead, as these types of cloud can be seen before the starts of thunderstorms. There is also a light in the centre of the screen, which fades in and fades out, obscuring the bottom text for a few seconds. This provides some suspense as to what this instalment of the story is called. Also, the light shows that there is still hope for the characters in the story as it comes through the dark cloudy background.

Characters• This trailer, as it is for a film in a franchise including 4 previous films and 4 books, does not have to establish

many of the characters, as most of them appear in these films and books, which will have been viewed by most of the films prospective audience.

• However, this trailer does show characters which can be easily defined by Proppian character types. This is partly due to the film’s genre. Propp based his character theory on folk tales which are typically classed as fantasy, which is the genre of this film. Character types like heroes, villains, often magical helpers and princesses are especially common in fantasy films. The character types featured in this trailer are:

• Hero: The eponymous Hobbit character of Bilbo (Martin Freeman) is shown to be the hero, as the trailer focuses mainly on him, and he is shown confronting the eponymous Smaug, a dragon. However, he is not a typical macho hero, as he is scared of the dragon, and is not as strong as other characters e.g. the dwarves, or as wise as other characters e.g. Gandalf. These characters, could however be defined as heroes too, due to their heroic actions.

• Villain: Smaug (Benedict Cumberbatch) struggles against the hero, Bilbo, and is shown in the trailer confronting and attacking Bilbo. He is not show fully in the trailer, to increase anticipation for the film, but his voice is heard. Atypically, there are other villains shown in the form of the orcs, who wage war against the dwarves, Bilbo and Gandalf.

• Helpers: Both the Dwarves and Gandalf (Ian McKellen) are shown helping Bilbo, both by travelling with him and defending him.

• Princess: As the princess is defined as the heroes reward for completing his quest, the princess in this case could be argued to be the gold shown in Smaug’s chamber. If the dwarves are considered as heroes, the princess could be the kingdom in the mountain Smaug lives in (Erebor).

• The roles of dispatcher and donor are not explicitly featured in this trailer, probably because they were established in the first Hobbit film, in the form of Gandalf and the dwarves who told Bilbo his quest, as well as giving him a sword. There is also no false hero in this trailer.

• This trailer is also using the appeal generated by well known actors such as Ian McKellen, as well as Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch, who have increased in popularity very recently through the success of the BBC series Sherlock, in which they are both main characters.

• Some other characters which will increase audience expectations for this film, are characters such as Legolas (Orlando Bloom), who adds not only star appeal but the appeal of being in the Lord of the Rings (LotR) series of films, which the Hobbit series is a prequel to. The LotR films were popular with both fans and critics, whereas the Hobbit film preceding The Desolation of Smaug was met with a less positive response. As a result, it was very important for this trailer to show off characters like Legolas, who had not been in the first Hobbit film, but were in the LotR films, which could convince those disappointed by the first Hobbit film to see this one.

• The characters shown are predominantly only seen in the fantasy genre, for example elves, dragons and dwarves. This further anchors the film to the genre of fantasy.

• The characters are also of different ages, and this is an example of Claude Levi-Strauss’ binary opposites in the form of young vs. old. The scenes shown in the trailer featuring dialogue between Gandalf and Bilbo, and the conflict shown between an older and a younger dwarf are examples of this. These differences in characters mean that different people will identify with certain characters, so the trailer features more identifiable characters, increasing the films prospective audience.

Setting• This trailer focuses mainly on three locations from

the film, which are:– The forest in which the elves live– Laketown, a stop on the dwarves journey– Erebor, where Smaug lives, which the dwarves want to

reclaim

• All these locations are primarily CGI environments typical of fantasy films of this budget and scale.

• The frequent use of CGI makes viewers want to see the film due to the spectacular environments created. It will also make viewers more likely to see the film in a cinema, as they would want to see the effects on a big screen. This increases box office takings for the film and makes the production companies involved less reliant on DVD /BluRay and merchandise sales to profit from the film.

• People who have read the Hobbit will be able to tell from these locations in the trailer roughly what will be in the film, establishing a clear narrative and therefore making these people want to see the film.

• Locations like this anchor the film into the fantasy-epic genre, because of the scale of the environments, and their unbelieveability in a real world context.

Lighting and Colour• The lighting in this trailer is a mix of high key, low

contrast and low key, high contrast (chiaroscuro).• The chiaroscuro lighting is used to show the viewer

that the film contains danger for the protagonists, and they will have to struggle to succeed. They also hint at possible disruptions to the equilibrium.

• Blue camera filters are also used in some low key shots to make the surroundings look darker and more gloomy, heightening the sense of disruption and threat.

• The trailer contains high key lighting in some scenes to reach a wider audience, as younger audiences would not want to watch a film with a trailer containing low key shots throughout.

• The different types of shots are an example of Claude Levi-Strauss’ binary opposites, in the form of light vs. dark. This suggests to someone viewing the trailer that the film will contain a struggle between good and evil, another binary opposition.

• A colour frequently seen in the trailer is gold. This is because it links with the Lord of the Rings franchise, which centres around a golden ring.

Shots and Editing• Primarily, the shots used consist of establishing-

type long shots which show off the CGI settings which are typical of the fantasy genre, showcasing a major selling point of the film; it’s aesthetic , which includes impressive CGI and faithfulness to the Hobbit book in terms of appearance.

• There are also many medium to close up shots of characters important to the plot of the film, making sure prospective audiences see who the main characters are and see the famous actors playing them, which serves as a major attraction to the film. This is common in trailers to give viewers an idea of the plot and to make them more likely to see the film based on the actors it includes.

• The style of editing in this trailer is also common in trailers, as it features fast paced montage style editing where different shots are only a few seconds long, and not necessarily in narrative order. The shots are frequently separated by fading to black and then fading into the subsequent shot. This increases viewer suspense, as they wonder what part of the film or character they will see next. This keeps the audience guessing throughout the trailer, making them more likely to watch the whole thing.

• Roland Barthes’ action and enigma codes also feature in this trailer. An example of an action code in this trailer would be the shot of the one ring followed by the shot of Bilbo picking it up, as this clearly shows to the viewer that Bilbo saw the ring then picked it up, despite it not being explicitly shown that the shot of the ring was what Bilbo saw. An example of an enigma code would be when Gandalf asks Bilbo what he found in the forest, and Bilbo replies with “My courage” instead of telling him he found the ring. When this is followed by a shot of Bilbo holding the ring in his pocket, it creates enigmas as to why he is hiding the ring and what this could mean. This enigma code creates a mystery the audience may want to see solved, making them go and see the film in cinemas.

SoundDiagetic• Most of the diagetic sound in this trailer is

character dialogue.• This dialogue is used to give viewers more idea of

the film’s plot and is frequently foreboding, increasing viewer anticipation as they wonder what significance the dialogue has.

• Pieces of dialogue are often made non-diagetic in the trailer when they will be diagetic in the film. This is done by using J and L edits to overlay the dialogue onto other scenes where it is used as voiceover. This is common in trailers.

Non-Diagetic• The non-diagetic sound in this trailer is mostly

made up of an orchestral soundtrack.• This style of soundtrack is common in films of the

fantasy genre, as it is loud and high tempo, and is the sort of music that might be heard in a fantasy world like the Hobbit film is set in, rather than more modern styles of music.

• The high tempo and volume of the music enhances the trailer and makes it feel more “epic”, increasing viewer enjoyment of the trailer and therefore making them more likely to see the film when it comes out.

Audience• The desired audience for this film is predominantly

people who have seen the LotR films, the previous Hobbit film, and/or read the books. As a result, the trailer can simply serve as a reminder to fans of the franchise that the film has been made, and they may have already been sold on seeing the film through enjoying the aforementioned books and films. As a result, the trailer includes a reminder that the film is coming out in December.

• Whilst not providing a specific release date, the December period is key to attracting a good part of it’s audience. As the December period includes the Christmas holiday, the film will be able to attract younger viewers as they will be off school. Whilst the Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug has no one specific age range it is being marketed to, younger audiences will need adults to go with them to the cinema, increasing box office takings as more people will be viewing the film.

• The production companies are shown at the start of the trailer. Whilst all are major companies involved in a wide range of films, Warner Brothers is significant as it produced the Harry Potter films, and so this will appeal to fans of the fantasy genre.

How effective was this trailer?

• These tables from Box Office Mojo, show that the Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug made a significant amount of money and therefore must have attracted a big audience, which will be in part due to the trailer.

• However, these figures also show that this film made less at the box office, both overall and on opening, than the previous Hobbit film, and made less overall than each of the LotR films, despite making more on opening and reaching more theatres.

• Also, each instalment of the LotR films made more money than the last, making the diminished success of the Desolation of Smaug when compared to the first Hobbit film even more important.

• Whilst the first Hobbit film was not as well received by fans or critics than the original LotR trilogy, the trailer could have possibly been more effective at convincing audiences this film would be better, perhaps making the film more successful at the box office.

• This trailer served its purpose as the money it made is by no means small, but the trailer could have done better to improve on the takings of the previous films in the franchise. Therefore, this was a successful trailer, but it could have been more so.