Teaser trailers and Theatrical trailers

In order to discuss the main differences between a teaser trailer and a theatrical trailer, I will use a current example of a film that displays both a teaser and official trailer on Youtube, which are shown below.


The Woman in Black Trailers; (teaser above, main below)

 

 A teaser trailer is designed very obviously to tease the audience and arouse an interest in to watching the film, it gives limited details about the narrative but does include important aspects that would interest their target audience, such as the genre, the title, and a very basic narrative.

Thus the above teaser trailer only lasts around 50 seconds, whilst the official theatrical one lasts almost 2 minutes. This is because the teaser trailer is designed mainly to build an interest in the target audience and so once the main trailer is released the audience already want to know more about the film. Also in the main trailer, the date of release is usually included, and in this case particularly, similar shots are used to build continuity between the two clips and to reinforce the aspects that made the audience want to watch it in the first place. The theatrical trailer usually gives much more away about the narrative, and this is what entices the audience to actually see the film.