We're all used to seeing the bright green screen before a movie trailer. Indeed, some moviegoers probably think that the phrase "approved for all audiences" anticipates every coming attraction. For fans that think that most mainstream trailers are far too tame, though, they can trade in the green screen for a little dose of red.
"Red band" trailers are those that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the trade organization that determines what movie content is acceptable, has deemed inappropriate for the viewing public. These trailers include foul language, raunchy innuendoes, gratuitous violence and no shortage of sex.
It's no surprise that most movie theaters refuse to play these trailers before their main features. The vast majority of these trailers are thus viewed online. Herein lies the root of recent controversy: how does one monitor these trailers once they've hit the web?
The MPAA is careful to make sure that they only release red band trailers to websites that have age-verification features built-in to them. This is their way of "ensuring" that no one under 17 years of age views them.
The truth, though, is that red band trailers quickly leak to other websites that do not have such stringent verification measures. These trailers go viral in an extraordinarily short amount of time, and once they do, there is no way to protect virgin eyes and ears from absorbing the inappropriate material.
Indeed, even if red band trailers were confined to acceptable websites, many of these sites merely require one to enter his or her birth date. Any reasonably intelligent minor can bypass such a passive system with astonishing ease.
So what red band trailers are gracing the World Wide Web these days? See one Kick-Ass, a new action-comedy due to be released in April. The film tells the story of Dave Lizewski, an unremarkable high school student who spends his time "making deposits in the spank bank."
When Dave decided to don a costume and masquerade around town hunting bad guys, he sets off a chain reaction of faux super heroes coming into existence.
This group includes an 11-year-old girl named "Hit Girl" and her crime-fighting guardian, "Big Daddy." While Dave mutters some pretty risqué phrases, it is definitely Hit Girl who warrants the red band rating. The prepubescent vigilante shoots a criminal, chokes another with a whip, and has a mouth that would make Popeye blush.
Lionsgate, a prominent film studio, released this trailer under every MPAA regulation. Even so, the more conservative voices in the entertainment industry have voiced their concern over such explicit content being available at the click of a mouse.
The studio - most well known for introducing the world to the Saw franchise - has maintained the stance that red band trailers help educate the public about what the movie contains.
If audience members saw a tame, harmless trailer for a movie like Kick-Ass, they may not realize the degree of violence and foul language inherent to the movie. It's certainly true that no one's mistaking this film for Finding Nemo.
Not all red band trailers feature murderous young girls, though. A new, very explicit trailer for She's Out of My League has hit the web. Starring Jay Baruchel of Superbad fame, the film tells the story of a skinny, timid security officer who falls for a smoking hot blonde (Alice Eve).
The trailer is red band almost exclusively due to language and sexual content, but it paints a good picture of what the real film will be like. Indeed, because this film doesn't depict a crime-fighting middle-schooler, almost no controversy or drama has surrounded its raunchy trailer.
The problem, it seems, is not that young kids will be exposed to explicit content, but rather that they will witness their peers committing explicit acts.
Case in point: a new trailer for the Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan buddy comedy Cop-Out features a young child cursing quite a bit. When even the "green" version hit the air during a broadcast of the Olympics, parental types all over the country voiced their concern and outrage over inappropriate content.
What's perhaps most ironic is that controversy only fuels the flame even more. In the case of red-band trailers, the more hype and outrage that surrounds them, the more viewers will flock to the web to see what's so interesting. Whether or not this is a good thing is a normative statement and thus outside the realm of this article.
What one does seem to notice, though, is the increasing frequency of such trailers. Certainly movie studios aren't stupid. The more they realize such controversy helps ticket sales, the worse their advertisements will get. Perhaps members of the FCC should take a step back and realize that, in this case, less action may garner better results.
