How Important is a Movie Trailer?

Very important. The use of trailers to advertise Hollywood films can kick-start or derail the crucial hype machine that allows blockbusters to produce the gigantic opening weekends necessary under the modern market model, wherein films aren't given much room to breath and build word-of-mouth audiences unless they're lower budget projects that don't present substantial risk to studio profits.
James Cameron's upcoming space epic 'Avatar' is not one of those low budget films. It's a $300 million mega-movie that promises to change the way films are presented to audiences, featuring revolutionary 3D technology and the long-awaited return of a filmmaker whose last film venture made a handsome hair under $2 billion. As such, and considering its release is only a month away, you'd expect the full might of Hollywood's formidable marketing machine to be pounding the drums and making the most of every single publicity angle.
Inexplicably, that hasn't happened. The marketing of the film has been underwhelming and perplexing, with a paltry website updated for enhanced user interaction very late in the game and with a teaser trailer that left many people confused and cynical. The original 2-minute teaser seemed to be a failed attempt to lure in some of Cameron's 'Titanic' audience, highlighting some of the romantic aspects of the film without putting them into any context. The blue aliens caught many off-guard, and without setting up their nature or the nature of their tropical world, they came off as somewhat cartoony and brought back memories of the more cringe-worth CG creations of the 'Star Wars' prequels. All in all, the whole thing just didn't pique much interest, and it didn't present the film for what it truly seems to be.
The new -minute full trailer does exactly that. It's gorgeous, violent, epic, and it firmly established the intriguing "Dances With Wolves in Space" storyline that Cameron has been boiling up for 15 years now. The aliens, now presented as graceful yet dangerous natives of a graceful yet dangerous planet, look stunning in some of the short clips. It's important to note that judging the visuals in this film is hard to do without seeing them in the new 3D format Cameron and crew have designed, but even with that caveat, they look incredible. The battle scenes simply took my breath away, and they really give a sense of the sheer scale of the conflict on display here.
The release of 'Avatar' is rapidly approaching, and it's better late than never for the marketing of the film to really get people pumped. I'm old enough to remember the lead-up to 'Titanic', and I'm hearing a lot of the same skepticism and grumbling and talk of disaster that I heard then, that Cameron can't possibly pull this off. But the guy's become a legend by doing things you aren't supposed to be able to do in movies, and at the point I'm fully confident that he'll wow us again with his super-sized space epic. A game-changer might well be on the way this December.

Check out the new trailer here: