
Todd and Kurt liked Bruce McDonald's take on the zombie genre in his latest film Pontypool, based on the Tony Burgess novel. Very much indeed. And the good folks over at Bloody Disgusting have scored themselves an exclusive look at the first trailer. Todd's synopsis below.
Morning radio personality Grant Mazzy is having a bad month. His career from Toronto radio personality has been diminished to broadcasting small town radio from the basement of a church; a task he makes bearable by thinly veiled sarcasm and small town mockery. His producer wants him to talk about school closings and traffic hick-ups. He wants drama and controversy. With a three person crew running Pontypool’s “The Beacon,” there is already a fair bit of tension in the room. The level rises significantly when reports start coming in of some sort of mob attacks. The traffic reporter confirms that there is indeed a mob attacking the local psychiatrists office, and there is much blood and murder on the scene. Not your average day in Pontypool. While Grant, more than a bit of an egotist, at first thinks the locals are playing a practical joke, when calls from the BBC start coming in asking for details (they think it is a French separatist terrorist attack), he begins to believe that he is nearly at ground zero of a major story. Determined to keep broadcasting even when the infected come up to the front door, The Beacon is pretty much the radio broadcast that the characters in every other Zombie flick tune into for a little it of exposition. But what if the language itself is spreading the disease?
Head on over to Bloody Disgusting and check it out!

Oh my god. Thank you Canada.
Personally, I thought simply the opening monologue from Mazzy with just an oscilloscope graphic would have made a more unique trailer. Either way, This one ain't bad, and I hope the word gets out. This is a very very fun and exciting motion picture.
A standard trailer is mandatory. No movie is promoted solely with viral campaigns and show-nothing/wtf trailers. The movies that make the big initial splash with that type of campaign always inevitably follow up with conventional trailers. Either the teaser campaign is still in the works or this is all their advertising budget can get them.
Fair enough, but normally the teasers come before the full trailer. And we're still 4-6 months off from this movie's release (in Canada...who knows if it's going to be released anywhere else that soon?), which is why this strikes me as odd.
Maple is aiming for a sizable roll-out of Pontypool, or so I'm told. This trailer was made (more or less) specifically to be in front of Saw5 in Canada, so you can see the demo they were going for. Although I'll make the cloverfield in front of Transformers argument. A tease-y WTF trailer often has a stronger effect on folks there to watch something visceral.
I had no idea that the trailer was in theatres at all. I was telling a buddy at work about it today and he said he saw it before Saw 5, and it definitely makes sense that they would have a "conventional" trailer in front of that.
I guess the ideas that McDonald spoke about wouldn't get many Saw fans riled up like this somewhat maybe might do.