MCN Press Release: “Hollywood Genre Directors Tackle the Small Screen With Trailers From Hell”

(Los Angeles, CA) July 9, 2007- Trailers -- you know -- those fast-paced 2-to-4 minute theatrical promo shorts that have preceded the Feature Attraction since the dawn of sound? An exciting montage of all The Best Parts of a movie the exhibitors want you to need to see! Full of swirling letters screaming hyperbolic promises of THRILLS! ACTION! MYSTERY! ROMANCE! Packing all the highlights of a whole picture into its own mini-movie in just a few minutes!

Joe Dante's Metaluna Productions, The Nickels Group and Elizabeth Stanley Pictures, proudly announce the kick-off of Trailers from Hell (TFH), a new series that will be delivered online and via mobile devices throughout the world. TFH is a series that showcases classic-era movie Previews of Coming Attractions with particular emphasis on the lurid, the extreme and the outrageous.

Viewers can opt to watch the original trailers intact and/or enjoy the previews punctuated with pithy and humorous commentary by iconic genre filmmakers.

The premiere episodes include Joe Dante (Gremlins) dishing about the multi-directed horror film The Terror and the last gasp of the old-fashioned monster movies, The Unearthly.

Meanwhile, John Landis (American Werewolf in London) basks in the pop music glory of The T.A.M.I. Show, Mick Garris (The Stand), shivers at the memory of House On Haunted Hill and Edgar Wright (Shaun Of The Dead) praises one of his seminal influences, Danger: Diabolik.

Dante notes, "The bromide about these old trailers is that they were better than the movies they promoted. That's only true in some cases, but they did deliver in-your-face excitement and breathless hyperbole at a pace the movies never could. I got my start in the movie biz cutting trailers at the tail end of the so-called Golden Age, before the ad agencies and focus groups took over. I love trailers. So join us in revisiting, or discovering for the first time, how much fun these sensational, absurdist slices of shameless cinematic hucksterism can be!"

Masters of Horror creator Mick Garris adds, "A master trailer cutter can take the worst of films and tool two minutes of breathtaking cinematic mastery out of it. At its best, the movie trailer is an exclamation point, a ringing alarm to alert the hungriest of Pavlov's dogs."

Trailers from Hell is tailor-made for new media outlets because it targets easily-identifiable, pro-active niche markets of genre movie-lovers. As Jonas Hudson of The Nickels Group says: "Over the past 18 months, mobile distribution and on-line sites have enabled fans to view short-form content while providing real revenue models for its providers. We can now go outside the user’s “cocoon” and allow people to watch shorts while they are on the go. TFH can even be accessed by the iPhone.”

In future episodes director Mary Lambert (Pet Sematary) will weigh in on the ultra-low-budget shocker, Carnival of Souls and Roger Corman's influential gothic Poe-etry, House of Usher. Larry Cohen (It's Alive) will also provide commentary on the films that influenced him.

Viewers can watch Trailers >From Hell on the www.trailersfromhell.com website or via the Fun Little Movies premium channel on Sprint mobile phones.

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