I'd been following the development of this supposedly revolutionary mainland Chinese sci-fi opus through Dennis' Daily News updates, but had lost track until I saw this horrendous English trailer a while back at YouTube. Good GAWD does this look stupid. I recall Jeff Lau being quoted, somewhere, as stating that he found the robot battles in the TRANSFORMERS movies to be confusing and/or laughable and that his overreaching fantasy would erase all memory of Michael Bay's allegedly incoherent action design (none of which I found particularly incoherent, I should add), but looking at this trailer, I just have to laugh at the naivete on display here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfyHzr03oaM
Maybe it's just me, or maybe it's just that trailer and it's jaw-droppingly callow attempts at American-style marketing, I don't know. But I don't think it is. Still, this is NOT the way to advertise an arguably gonzo picture like this to overseas distributors, (as the case seems to be), despite the marketing department clearly thinking it is. I posted a comment under the video at YouTube that I'll repost here for kicks:
Mainland Chinese film companies should NOT try to mimic American marketing techniques. Regardless of the quality of the finished film, this trailer is just a mess. Nearly EVERY line from that narrator is a catch-phrase you might find on a poster, as though the marketers thought they had SO MANY good ones, they might as well use them ALL in the trailer. The constant DESCRIBING of? characters instead of plot doesn't help. Too bad this couldn't have been made in Hong Kong. It might've had a chance.
All said, I'm still interested in seeing this, just to see if Jeff Lau's as delusional as he seemed to be when he was shooting this alleged turkey. (and yes, I know some Chinese trailer-makers actually mimic American styles quite successfully, even in English, but this is not one of those instances).
. I'll look at the trailer soon.
"One is a pessimist...one, not so much." WTF?
