4.05.2012

Movie Trailers: My Secret Weapon

So everyone's got their thing that gets them going, like pumped up. Inspires them. Am I the only person who can't say inspiration without feeling like a total cheeseball?
 My friend Kristin has a thing for fonts. Like, I'm not kidding, she takes joy in discussing the merit of a font. Seriously, we were on the phone last night and talked for almost an hour about business card fonts. I've got this other friend Nathan who breaths music. Without Nathan I'd probably be listening to the same music I listened to in high school. Ian, the hubs, gets his kicks from analog photography and vinyl records.

Me? I like all those things, sure. But what really gets me going is... MOVIE TRAILERS. I always hear everyone talking about their huge, ridiculous playlists. And those are awesome. I have playlists too, but they're usually in the neighborhood of 5-10 songs. I like creating one tone and sticking to it. I digress.

I love movies, of course, but trailers give me this fluttery feeling, like I'm watching someones life flash before my eyes. And I sorta kinda am. Maybe it's the voyeur in me? <--- CREEPY. Movie trailers are this quick two minute compilation of the most compelling moments of a film. Basically like movie Cliff Notes and accompanied by the best parts of the best songs. THAT. IS. AWESOME.

You guys have any trailers that just give you goosebumps? Here's a list of some of my favorite trailers as of late. A few of them are older, because sometimes oldies are goodies. I tried to keep the list to 2012 releases. I'll hope you'll click on a few and maybe find a movie that piques your interest.

Drive  (Easily one of my favorite 2011 releases! This movie was character study on crack!)
Intruders
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Brave
Jesus Henry Christ
Martha Marcy May Marlene
Blue Valentine
Apart
You Instead
Like Crazy
Warriors (One of my all time favorites!)
The Art of Getting By
Another Earth
Closer 
The Giant Mechanical Man
Never Let Me Go (Another favorite!)
Safety Not Guaranteed
Once (Several of my handful of playlist songs come from this film. Oh my god, yall. So good.)

Trailers, I love them obviously. And often times, the film doesn't live up to the greatness that is the trailer. But films... droooool... I still love 'em. Even in high school, I can remember taking trains to the indie theaters in Dallas just so I could see that one obscure movie that was only playing at 4:42 on a Thursday or something. There was even a time when I thought I wanted to be the lucky person who created movie trailers. Shit, I still want to be that person. As writers, we're always told to "read, read, read", and yeah that's totally true. None of us are ever reading as much as we could or should, but I think there's something to be said for film. I think films give us that third dimension that's hard to peg down in a book (while both writing and reading). As I was writing my last manuscript, I think I watched Blue Valentine at least 27 times. Seriously, there's this series of scenes in my book that I wrote in one night, on my couch, with Blue Valentine on repeat. If I'm being honest, I owe a lot to that film. (And also, RYAN GOSLING.)

So you guys, put down the book. Only for a bit. And watch some trailers. Watch a movie. And get swallowed up in it. And if it's amazing, tell me about it.

Writing Update: Finished my first round of revisions about a week ago and now I'm fine-tuning a few things! Chuggin' along yall!

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J