What
Movie?
Our Scottish Staff Member Points Out
That The Star Wars Frenzy Isn't Reaching Everywhere
Editorial by Ann McMeekin
5/31/99
Not long ago we had a big weekend for UK Star Wars fans here in Scotland. Trailer B was released to the cinemas. Not that anyone other than your average "obsessed fan" would notice. Was there huge advertising and news articles speculating about fans going into a frenzy, walking out of films after the trailers, etc.?
Nope.
Nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
So much so that I completely forgot it was coming out. Yes, I know. Gasp. Shock. Horror and all that. I only remembered after I had bought the tickets for eXistenZ and my boyfriend turned round and said "Oh, won’t we get the Star Wars trailer with this"?
Okay, we were going to the 4:35 afternoon showing, but still, I expected that there would be crowds and at least a few fans desperate to see the trailer who hadn’t gotten tickets for any of the previous evening’s showings, but no. Dave and I brought the number of people in that hall up to five, and that included a couple who I thought might suffocate if they didn’t come up for air more often.
So we’re sitting there, three rows from the front, eagerly awaiting the trailer, and finally, after several irritating adverts and a few other trailers, the Lucasfilm logo comes onto the screen. I tense my hand in anticipation of it being crushed by Dave (who nearly broke my fingers at seeing Trailer A), and wait for the rush of seeing the Trailer in it’s full glory on the big screen…. and I wait… and recite the lines in perfect time with what’s on screen, and I wait a bit more… and it’s just not there, and damnit, I’m disappointed. I really wanted to be part of an excited crowd, all charged up and waiting for the few minutes of carrot dangling that is the Trailer.
I couldn’t figure out why there was such a lack of interest for this trailer when there’d been such frenzy over the first trailer. Then the realisation dawned. Just about everyone who would go into a frenzy already had--in the privacy of their own homes, offices or wherever. Unlike the first trailer, this one was delayed much longer before it got here, driving everyone who could to download it from the Internet. Failing that, they got copies from friends, held mass viewing in offices or generally begged, borrowed or stole a copy. The upshot of this was that by the time it came out on Friday, it was old news. Just about viewed to death.
So now I’m more resolved than ever to stay away from anything that’s going to spoil the movie for me before it gets here in July. As someone who’s a "newbie" Star Wars fan, I want to take the day off work and go stand in a huge line overnight and get all excited, instead of being so blasé about it that I can practically recite the film word-for-word when I get there.