Editorials
[BEST & WORST ’11] The Best Trailers of the Year!
Even if the movie it’s advertising isn’t so great (though many of the trailers on this list are for great films) an effective teaser can often be an inspiring piece of work that you watch again and again.
While I only feel that way about a few trailers every year – and not everything on this list elicits that kind of reaction from me – there’s also something to be said for the rare clip that fully and honestly embraces the movie it’s selling. Especially if that movie’s great (and dangerously if that movie’s bad).
Hit the jump to find out which trailers made the cut! 
Micah (Best/Worst) | Lonmonster (Best/Worst) | Evan Dickson (Best/Worst) | Lauren Taylor (Best/Worst)
Posters (Best/Worst) | Trailers (Best/Worst) | Performances (Best)
This trailer perfectly sets up The Innkeepers for me as the ultimate haunted house movie, which means restrained and stylish but not so demure as to have nothing happening. I’m kind of in love with the marketing materials for this film, even if they’re remarkably scant in quantity. The poster and the trailer have me foaming at the mouth a bit to see this. An urge I’ll hopefully have sated by the time you read this.*
*Edit – I’ve seen it. It’s pretty great.
“Wut man u sell out bastard u guyz like made this movie and it’s on your list unfair unfair I hate watermarkzz!”
Yeah, this is a Bloody-Disgusting selects title. But I wasn’t asked to include it here. The truth is, I was intrigued by this film, and this trailer, long before I was ever employed by BD. I’d heard the rumbles out of Sundance and then when I saw this it actually looked like the exact opposite of the film I was expecting. The Woman, as dark and thematically heady as it is, is actually a fun piece of satire and this trailer really helps get that across (with a little help from that rocking Sean Spillane ditty).
I find this commendable only because it hid how bad the movie was. Even though I was a fan of the original film I wasn’t really up in arms about the remake. And this trailer kind of played to my expectations. I was expecting a polished, inoffensively bland but fun enough homage to the 1985 original. That’s what this trailer sells.
It wasn’t until I saw the move and realized how aggressively inept it was, from the script to the awful special effects, that I began wishing the movie was as good as its sort of safe, bland trailer. This makes me nostalgic for early summer 2011 when I still held out hope for Fright Night.
This trailer takes a fairly standard, plot encapsulating approach to selling Attack The Block. But when you’ve got a film as fun, kinetic and well structured as this one, the best move is to actually use the “truth in advertising” approach and just tell us what this wonderful movie is. I’ve seen ATB three times and watching this just made me want to see it again. A transparent trailer for an impressive film that didn’t need to be “saved” by a misrepresentative marketing campaign.
YIKES. This kind of looks like a non-supernatural The Omen which could place it in the running for one of the most scary depictions of the real-world risks of parenting that I’ve seen in quite a while. The ultimate nature vs. nurture argument, what if you had a baby and refused to love it? Is this what would happen? The ultimate punishment. Mommas and daddies, love your kids please.
What an ethereal, gorgeous trailer! I’m not a Lars Von Trier completist, though I’m always intrigued by him there are certain films of his I don’t care for. Melancholia, however, has all the makings of a classic. Beautifully representing a horrific emotional disintegration (and reconciliation) in the face of the apocalypse it’s a trailer that practically has you begging to see a film you know will devastate you.
The general consensus on Super 8 seems to be one of mild-to-moderate disappointment. People were felt a little stiffed that it didn’t live up to the promise of a Spielberg/J.J. Abrams collaboration and the Amblin brand. Nor did it live up to this trailer, which sold that Amblin mixture of wonder, amazement, innocence and threat in far better proportions than the film itself.
The trailer that kind of made you see the movie that would make you not want to touch anything, except you already didn’t want to touch anything after seeing the trailer. So instead of going to a crowded theater with a bunch of disease ridden people coughing and breathing all over the place and maybe even touching you for some reason – it’s just best to stay at home and watch this trailer.
Remember my “truth in advertising” bit from Attack The Block? Same goes for this. While I’m fairly sure it’s not nearly as good of a film, it definitely lets you know right up front what the deal with this movie is. It also has the balls to admit that a film called Shark Night kind primarily takes place in the daytime. A wise choice, considering that half of all ticket sales were likely predicated on the bikini factor alone.
Liam Neeson is enjoying a nice late career shift in the action star trajectory. And The Grey, which sort of looks to me like a more badass update of The Edge only with less whining, promises to deliver an upward lift to that trajectory. Nearly everyone I know who has seen the trailer has expressed interest in seeing the film. I mean, I’m pretty sure Neeson punches a wolf in this movie. That’s pretty great.
I saved the best for last. If you even have to ask for an explanation as to why this is on the list, you’re dead and don’t know what a great teaser is.
From child-eating witches to village-burning dragons, fairy tales have always had a foot in the horror genre. That’s why it makes sense that, for every The Hobbit and The Chronicles of Narnia, there are also darker and more adult-oriented stories about magical worlds inhabited by ravenous monsters and cruel villains.
Funnily enough, these sinister tales were precisely the ones that I gravitated towards back when I was a kid, and I was reminded of this while watching Netflix’s recently released I Am Frankelda, Mexico’s first ever feature-length stop-motion animation and one hell of an entertaining parable about the intersection between fiction and reality.
In honor of this special kind of horror-adjacent fairy tale, today I’d like to share this list recommending six Dark Fantasy films that horror fans might enjoy.
For the purposes of this list, we’ll be defining Dark Fantasy as fantastical stories that don’t shy away from the more macabre elements that fuel classic fairy tales. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own grim favorites if you think we missed a particularly thrilling one.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
6. Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013)
I’m fascinated by bizarre attempts at blockbuster filmmaking – especially when the resulting movies are somehow still fun despite their corporate-mandated origins. Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters is precisely one of these strangely compelling studio projects, as this surprisingly successful action-thriller boasts a lot of heart (and tongue-in-cheek humor) for a CGI-heavy creature feature.
Directed by Dead Snow’s Tommy Wirkola, Witch Hunters re-frames the classic fairy tale as an origin story for a duo of badass monster-slayers. Of course, it’s the flick’s anachronistic aesthetic and overall visual flair that make it stand out from other action-horror endeavors from around the same time.
5. The Wolf House (2018)
Made in the tradition of faux cursed films in the same vein as Antrum: The Deadliest Film Ever Made, the eerie backstory to 2018’s Chilean animated flick The Wolf House (La Casa Lobo in the original Spanish) already makes it a nightmarish experience before the flick even really begins.
After all, the movie is presented to us as a faux propaganda film produced by the leader of a death cult (heavily inspired by the real life Colonia Dignidad), with this hybrid animated feature using complex movie magic to simulate a single uninterrupted shot as it tells the story of a lazy young girl who runs away from an isolated colony and encounters a creepy old house in the woods.
4. The Brothers Grimm (2005)
Out of all the Monty Python alumni, Terry Gilliam has had the most interesting career outside of the original comedy group. From fascinating canceled projects (such as his scrapped adaptation of Watchmen) to dystopian parodies that feel more relevant by the minute (1985’s Brazil), even his “lesser” films are still intriguing in their own way.
2005’s The Brothers Grimm is one such project, with this peculiar movie attempting to combine the comedian-turned-filmmaker’s unique visual style with a more blockbuster-oriented plot reimagining the titular brothers as con-artists rather than mere writers. The end result isn’t exactly a masterpiece, but it’s still a legitimately fun ride with plenty of memorable monsters and wonderful performances by both the late, great Heath Ledger and Matt Damon.
3. Dante’s Inferno: An Animated Epic (2010)
2010’s Dante’s Inferno game may have a reputation as something of an unapologetic God of War clone, but I’d argue that the now-obscure game was aesthetically unique enough to deserve a bigger fanbase. However, while the title remains trapped on the seventh console generation, its highly underrated anime adaptation is a lot easier to get a hold of!
Animated by 6 different studios in order to make the 9 circles of hell feel unique from each other, this may not be a completely faithful adaptation of Dante Alighieri’s poem, but it’s still one heck of a great (not to mention gory) time that I’d highly recommend to fans of Netflix’s take on Castlevania.
2. Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)
My personal favorite entry in the Underworld franchise, Rise of the Lycans, is a highly ambitious prequel that actually works better if you haven’t had the story spoiled to you by the previous Underworld films.
While the rest of the series features plenty of urban fantasy elements as the movies combine machine guns and modern environments with gothic storytelling, Patrick Tatopoulos’ prequel fully embraces its fantastical origins and tells a classic tale about a doomed romance between a werewolf and a vampire amid a medieval uprising.
And the best part is that we get a lot more Michael Sheen as the fan-favorite Lucian.
1. Solomon Kane (2011)
One of my personal favorite movies on this list, MJ Basset’s criminally underseen adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s other iconic warrior is thoroughly steeped in horror ambience and features plenty of memorable monsters. However, it’s also a classic origin story for a swashbuckling hero that wouldn’t feel out of place in a tabletop RPG.
While I’ve already written about how the film deftly combines both horror and fantasy elements without breaking the bank, I’ll never pass up an opportunity to recommend the bizarre movie where James Purefoy expertly plays a puritan John Wick.
It’s just too bad that we never got the other films in this intended trilogy.
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