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‘Total Recall’ debut trailer logs 10.8 million views in 48 hours

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Sony Pictures’ debut trailer for “Total Recall” racked up 10.8 million views online in its first 48 hours, demonstrating that a “trailer for the trailer” was effective in building hype.

Last Wednesday, Sony released a 30-second “teaser” that showed several scenes from this summer’s remake of “Total Recall” starring Colin Farrell. It encouraged people to “get ready for the world trailer premiere” Sunday.

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In addition to its debut on Apple’s trailer website in the U.S. and other Web destinations internationally, the “Total Recall” trailer was first shown, in a slightly shorter form, on ABC during Sunday’s Boston Celtics-Miami Heat game, where it was seen on TV by an additional 4.5 million people, Sony estimated.

ABC promoted the trailer debut in the lead-up to and during the game.

While not the first to employ a “trailer for a trailer” strategy, Sony received some lambasting from fans on the Internet for hyping a video that is in and of itself hype. “There’s something distinctly perverse about trailers for a trailer,” said a writer on the site CinemaBlend.com. “I know, I know, I’m part of the problem by rewarding this ‘trailer for a trailer’ phenomenon with coverage,” added the site Filmonic.

But people still clicked through on the trailer in huge numbers. While 10.8 million is not a record -- the most recent “Avengers” trailer, released in late February, was seen 13.7 million times in just its first 24 hours -- it’s a huge number that immediately drives widespread awareness of the movie, which is the goal for a first trailer.

In addition, on YouTube, where Sony’s official version of the trailer has been seen nearly 2.8 million times, 90% of viewers gave it a “thumbs up” vote, instead of a “thumbs down.”

“A trailer is one of the most influential pieces of marketing you can do for a movie, so you want to treat it like an event,” said Sony marketing President Marc Weinstock. “You should launch it with every piece of promotional firepower you can.”

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