Matthew says: Last week the Fifty Shades of Grey movie trailer was released into the world like a physically disabled fledgling bird being tossed out of the nest. Bringing you all the Fifty Shades of Grey movie news in a timely manner, okay fine let’s talk about this trailer:
On the Actors:
Ariel says: I think they made a good choice with Ana, but not so much with Christian. I get that no one in the world is attractive to everyone, but I don’t think Jamie Dornan captures the enthralling, insanely handsome man that Christian is supposed to be. I know, I know that Universally Beloved Ryan Gosling wouldn’t have been caught dead in this role, but Jamie Dornan is just…okay. When Ana describes him as intimidating, I just don’t see it as he blandly delivers lines like, “I am” or “I exercise control over all things, Miss Steele” which are very clearly meant to be intense and sexy.
Matthew says: Was this shit ever intense and sexy? Fifty Shades has always been an exercise in laughing at how bad people’s taste can be. Okay, having said that I guess I’ll actually watch the trailer. (Fifteen seconds later) Oh my God, I just can’t with this shit. I can’t even hear them say three sentences without pausing it. What the fuck’s up with that piano? That’s straight up horror movie piano. If I hadn’t read the book, I’d be 100% convinced this Mr. Grey fellow has already died due to mysterious circumstances and Ana was getting into some supernatural spooky murdertimes. (Clicks “play” button again) Oh, I see I stopped it just before the snare drum. I clearly misunderstood the tone. (Watches another thirty seconds) Oh my God, I’m getting into the real meat of the acting and I’m getting flashbacks to how terrible this book was. “There’s not much to me! Nervous laugh! I mean, look at me! Nervous laugh! I’m uncomfortable with myself even though I’m apparently comfortable enough to draw attention with a baiting line like that! Nervous laugh!” You guys don’t really want us to watch this movie, do you? I haven’t even seen Christian Grey yet and Ana’s already made it impossible to watch this trailer.
Ariel says: Okay to be fair I’m a bit concerned about Ana too. When she says, “It must be really boring,” there is not even a hint of…anything in her voice. I’m worried that the whole film will consist of one tone of voice for her. On the other hand, I’m relieved that they seem to have stripped the film of any of her inner thoughts. You know, the ones that only consist of, “Holy crap,” “jeez,” and, “my poor Fifty.”
Matthew says: If there’s anything that will save this movie, it’ll be eliminating as much of E.L. James’s writing as possible. It’s interesting that Ariel initially commented that they cast Ana well, and then took it back. Possibly because she remembered that a broom wearing a wig would have been an equally convincing casting decision for Ana. (Has finally watched enough of trailer to see Jamie Dornan’s Christian Grey) Okay, you know what? I’m going to take the unpopular route and say that Jamie’s doing a way better job than Dakota Johnson is. Dakota clearly took so many lessons from the Kristin Stewart/Bella Swann class of acting that I’m having a genuinely hard time noticing when she’s actually in the shot. I get that her character is shy, but there’s a difference between “I am shy” and “I find your carpet fascinating.” At least Jamie is… making the same face in every scene. Yep, I guess that’s actually what it took to exceed my expectations for this trailer. People making faces. Sorry. Face.
On the Selected Scenes:
Ariel says: It was a really good call the open the trailer with their meeting/the way Ana described their meeting, I thought that was a nice touch. In a way, though, it added to the overall sinister vibe I kept getting from the trailer. Even the people who made this movie subconsciously realized this was just a horror film waiting to happen. To the point where this version of Crazy in Love isn’t seductive or sexy but foreboding. Like he’s so crazy in love he’s gonna kill her. Not got me looking so crazy in love I’m happy and our relationship is enviable.
Matthew says: I think that was less of an artistic decision to start with that scene and more their only option, because nothing ever happens in this book.
Ariel says: I also laughed out loud (loled if you will) when I saw that they’d chosen brief glimpses of the Jose-attempted-kiss-and-or-rape scene and one of the many Christian-plays-piano-in-the-moonlight scenes. Thus reminding me that somewhere out there are fans who legitimately adored those scenes.
Matthew says: I liked the quick shot of the sexual assault scene, because it gave me faith that this film will be as badly choreographed and staged as I ever hoped it would be. It wouldn’t do James’s rudimentary writing justice if we couldn’t get amateurish camerawork to match it! Christian runs in, but comes in too quickly and awkwardly shuffles onto his mark. That poor actor who plays Jose. I still can’t believe that the one not-white character in this fucking story sexually assaults the main character and then leaves the plot forever, and no one talks about this.
Ariel says: The fact that I immediately recognised these scenes also serves as a sobering reminder that I read and blogged about each and every chapter of these books.
Oh. And of course the fucking helicopter scene made it in there despite the fact that it doesn’t fit the background music at all.
Matthew says: I can’t even tell these stupid scenes apart after the interview because these books are the same thing over and over again. There’s the piano scene. Okay. Which piano scene? I really wanna know how long this movie’s runtime is. I just know it’s going to go over two hours, and I’ll just sit here, baffled, thinking, “Two hours of what?” The book was never edited. I don’t see why the movie would be.
Final Thoughts:
Ariel says: It’s really hard to look at this objectively, but if you erased my memory and I went into this knowing nothing about the book, I wouldn’t take a second look at this movie. There would be nothing about it that intrigues me or that stands out. The only thing it has going for it is the hype around the book.
Matthew says: Hey, guys, have you picked up on my utter disdain for this entire thing yet? Rather than just launch into my final thoughts on the Fifty Shades trailer, I’d like you guys to watch (or skim) this trailer first:
That was the trailer for the movie Endless Love, which came out earlier this year. Notice anything similar about it? The creepy, haunting piano music, even though it’s a love story? The male character wearing his emotionally tormented past on his sleeve in comparison to a female character who’s just… there? The clear confusion between “seductive” and “predatory”? White people making the same face to convey every single emotion? The first time I saw this trailer, my immediate response was wondering why Christian Grey was working at a country club.
Technically Endless Love came before the Fifty Shades movie, but it came after the Fifty Shades book. The damage has already been done. There are Fifty Shades impersonators predating Fifty Shades. That’s a really impressive degree of fucked for our culture to be at right now.
But it’s okay. Because as long as we have shitty culture, we will have people making fun of shitty culture. So bring on even more Fifty Shades and its portrayals of emotional abuse as passion, flat dialogue as seductive, and mental illness as something that love can cure. I want so much Fifty Shades of Grey, I want George Lucas to rerelease it in a few decades and change it so Ana shoots first.
Ariel says: We want to know what you guys think. Will it be better than the books (a seemingly easy feat) or will it somehow be worse than the books (a huge achievement in a way)?
You guys are hilarious. 🙂 For good or ill, I’ll be watching this thing.
Thank you!! I’m glad we’re all in for this doomsday thing together. And by that I of course mean Valentines Day 2015.
The funny thing about the Endless Love trailer, I totally thought the same thing. I swore the love interest was going to end up being the bad guy. Oh, silly me… It’s even funnier because the original Endless Love, as well as the novel it’s based on, was actually a darker story in many respects. I think the only thing connecting this remake to the source material is the names of the characters.
And my older sister, who isn’t that familiar with Fifty Shades of Grey beyond a few excerpts, keeps asking me what is supposed to happen in the movie besides sex. When I explained to her the entire plot of the novel, trying to be be as specific as humanely possible, she just knitted her eyebrows and said, “Yeah, that’s just porn. That is literally porn.”
I seriously couldn’t watch the 50 shades trailer without stopping to cringe every 5 seconds. So uncomfortable.
Endless Love was horrendously bad. Like two Abercrombie and Fitch models staring at each other for two hours and nothing else bad. And they totally dumped the premise of the book it was based on. The book Endless Love portrayed obsessive stalkery “love” as a BAD thing. Unlike 50 shades.
My fingers are still crossed that the trailer is so creepy because they made the whole movie super creepy. I would actually consider watching the movie in that case (certainly not in the theaters, though. I wouldn’t be caught dead paying money for any 50 shades thing).
Oh you know what, I think the guy playing Christian looks more like he ought to be the evil/crazy half-brother or whatever. I don’t want to say he doesn’t look like he’s “leading man material” but I agree he really doesn’t seem like Christian to me.
I’m also really curious as to how well this movie’s going to end up doing. Obviously the books were hugely, inexplicably popular, but is there really going to be a lot of fans of the books who will want to watch this in a theater with other people?
And now I’m suddenly wondering if they’ll release a 3D, Imax version as well. Haha.
I haven’t read the book. Perhaps this is why I’m so confused by the film dressing a grown woman as a private school student.
Yeah, is she interviewing for a job? Because, look, I wear cardigans ALL THE TIME and I still know how to dress for a job interview (hint: it’s not always cardigans!).
My reaction was that the actress playing Ana did perfectly fine because Ana IS a floor map. What else do you want?
Guy playing Christian, on the other hand, was supposed to give off this “incredible masculinity” vibe and instead just gave me the vibe of “I don’t need to act, I’m ridiculously hot.”
Floor mop, of course. A floor map, perhaps, of the Grey office building?
I had the feeling of the acting being a little flat. They don’t really convey sexyness…
The movie here in my country will be dubbed, so probably this can give a bit more “expression” to the voices. Also, the glimpse of Christian’s shoulders/back doesn’t seem to show the scars that he has in the book. It seems a pretty smooth skin. Or am I wrong?
I think I’ll go and see the movie with my best friend, who didn’t like the books as much as me.
Alright, I’m going to be super honest… I actually thought the trailer made the movie look kind of good. I saw the trailer the day it came out, and I was so prepared to be disgusted to my very core, because I truly cannot emphasize how much I hate these books. I’ve written two papers about them, presented a PowerPoint to my office book club, and reread the series twice just so that I can hate it in even more detail. (I like to be thorough.) But regarding this trailer… I think they managed to make a laughably horrible book into a kind-of-whatever movie. That’s a pretty big leap.
I fully intend to see the movie when it comes out, but not without fortifying myself with a fully bottle of the official Fifty Shades of Grey wine. (The red one, because it’s worse than the white, and I don’t want to be happy about any part of this experience.)
What’s weird for me is that Jamie Dornan was in this amazing British series called The Fall where he was a super creepy serial killer. You got to see him being obsessive and planning to kill the women. I’m just imagining this is a continuation of his character after he escaped to America.
The first time I watched this, I picked up on the creepiness vibe. Although not as much as I had with that Endless Love trailer, yikes! I thought he was planning to kill her, holy crap. But anyway, back to my point. So while I did get the creep factor from the dialogue and Ana’s nervous interpretation of the interview, the instant Jamie Dornan turned to the camera and said “I am” I started laughing. I don’t know why but intense? Intimidating? Those aren’t words I’d use to describe Jamie Dornan. He looks too baby faced- too… iunno, friendly. I just can’t picture him as Christian. I always imagined Christian as menacing with slicked back hair and a fixed scowl on his face. I can’t imagine him as being troubled, hoodie or no. He just seems like an average good looking young guy. I can’t understand why he’d intimidate anyone. Nor could I understand every woman walking by throwing themselves at him. He’d have to have some serious charm to reel me in. And not with lines like those in the trailer.
BABY FACED. THAT’S MY PROBLEM WITH JAMIE DORNAN. THAT’S IT.
Yeah, I have to agree with Kate, the first half of the trailer makes it look like an whatever movie (though I have second hand embarassment for Ana, because she just looks so utterly silly). And this is all Jamie Dornan baby face’s fault. He looks cute, not intimidating, and not even intense. Just a handsome boyish man who happens to be rich and has some man pain going on. If I didn’t know what this was about, I’d watch this movie for him and the happy memories of him in Once Upon a Time, though not in the theaters because it would be an whatever movie. Then. the second half looks like 50 shades and it’s terrible and I cringed all the way through.
The Fall! I’ve seen the first episode of it, yeah, he looks creepy there. And sexier. He should have just acted the same and it woud look “better” (as in more like the book, which is not better because everything about 50 shades is horrible).
The day the trailer came out, several people on my FB feed shared the link. On each & every one, I commented that it seemed more like a horror film than a romance. Slowly as the posts progressed, I realized that even those who were die hard fans of the book (seemingly for no other reason than it was their first exposure to erotica fiction) have realized it was a terrible series & will be a terrible movie. Frankly, they waited WAY too long to make it & now release it. The hype is over & I expect Razzies for all involved. I expect it will do well enough weekend 1 but that is all.
As for Dakota’s stellar acting, since the original book was a Twilight fanfic, it seems fitting that she should do some fanfic-esque caring a la Kristen Stewart.
Lastly, is the movie based on all 3 books or will this one end with the break up?
I couldn’t wait for you guys to review the trailer. I love this blog! 🙂
I may be alone in this, but I actually enjoy this version of Crazy in Love. Not as a soundtrack to a “love story”, but as the arrangement of the song itself. In a different trailer, it could have been perfect.
The trailer is… ehh. It’s not as terrible as I was expecting, which I guess is a compliment? I feel that way about the movie itself. They had millions and millions of dollars at their disposal, screenwriters and producers… I mean, can it really be THAT bad? But then I remember that the books were really that bad and I give up.
Does anyone else see Emile Hirsch when they look at Dornan? That’s the first thought I had when seeing him. Lastly, just now realizing the actors initials are JD and DJ. Triple crap… it’s totes meant to be??
I think this movie will be an improvement, just for the fact that Ana’s thoughts will not be included. Other than that, I honestly think it’s going to be painful to sit through. Going by the trailer, they could have made this into a really great horror movie (okay, maybe not really great, but it would probably be something I would actually go to theatres to see – as it stands, I’ll let you guys have the honor).
i agree with mathew more here on both the character’s look.the whole world is just getting biased to dakota because the director clearly favors her.the entertainment weekly did a much better job with their looks than the film aesthetic department EVER could. India is getting a watered down censored version though. 🙁
oh and by the by( i borrowed from “Pamela”, how appropriate!) don’t skewer me but i really don’t find Ryan gosling hot, so yay for him that he didn’t take the role.
and never trust ana when she says that she finds something intimidating let alone on christian. i mean she finds anything looking remotely stately or clean intimidating( kate, office building, christian’s PA, PA’s charcoal suit, “capiche” ,interview questions, CHRISTIAN) you name it, she is intimidated by it.