With the fans’ wait for a new A Star Is Born trailer reaching fever pitch following the film’s recent premiere at Venice, Warner Bros. released four (!) brand new ‘sneak peeks’ of Bradley Cooper’s directorial debut last night. The pieces – starting out as four unique clips from the film which each flow into teaser-style sizzles – were warmly received when initially released online earlier in the day. However, by the time the first North American screenings of The Nun began later that evening, the tune was quite different.
Tweets from American moviegoers reveal that the studio attached all four of these minute-and-a-half peeks – interspersed between the other trailers shown – in front of, of all things, this weekend’s Conjuring spin-off. And the reactions were not pleasant to say the least. Check out a number of them below:
Although there have been a couple of more positive reactions, particularly from fans of Lady Gaga:
As others have noted, this isn’t the first time Warner Bros. has pulled such an aggressive marketing stunt. Last year, in similar fashion, several spots for Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk were placed in the trailer reels preceding Transformers: The Last Knight. Only then, the individual spots themselves were only 15 seconds long (see them back to back below), certainly much shorter than the almost-full teasers that played this weekend. One can see why audiences sitting in for a movie like The Nun could be very much annoyed by this move, no matter how good this Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga team-up looks.
What do you think of this strategy? Good, bad, overkill? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter!
Jackson Maine is a country music star who is on the brink of decline when he discovers a talented unknown named Ally. As the two begin a passionate love affair, Jack coaxes Ally into the spotlight, catapulting her to stardom. But as Ally’s career quickly eclipses his own, Jack finds it increasingly hard to handle his fading glory.
Starring Bradley Cooper, Lady Gaga, Andrew Silverstein, Dave Chappelle and Sam Elliott, the film is released in the U.S. and the UK on October 5.
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Anton Volkov
Founder/EIC of TrailerTrack and Marketing/Distribution student at the UK's National Film & TV School.
