Cool Videos: Enjoy these rare vintage trailers and featurettes for Star Wars and Gremlins

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

I love vintage movie trailers and clips. In this modern age of Blu-rays and Internet marketing, we take for granted what movie trailers used to look like. They were not the art form they are considered today and were pure advertising. The editing was not slick and the commercial sometimes didn’t match the final result. Hell, forget about featurettes. We are lucky to get behind the scenes photographs, let alone video.

With that in mind, here are two old clips that have made their way online featuring some rarely seen glimpses at the marketing for STAR WARS and GREMLINS. First up is the original teaser trailer for STAR WARS, back before we even know what EPISODE IV meant. The teaser is two minutes long and does not feature the iconic John Williams score or even the trademark STAR WARS font we have come to know and love. Instead, the clip showcases the action scenes from George Lucas‘ film with a dark score that sounds more like something from a dystopian scifi movie and not a pulpy action epic.

Pretty cool, huh? Not remotely close to what the tone of the movie ended up being. But, still a very different perspective on what STAR WARS was before it became a global phenomenon.

Next up we have a behind the scenes feature for the classic Joe Dante film GREMLINS. Dante and producer Steven Spielberg explain what exactly a gremlin is and where the inspiration came from for the characters. It is also a sad reminder that we don’t get more GREMLIN movies, or even Joe Dante movies for that matter. it is also cool to see just how different the marketing department treated this little videos back before the advent of DVD.

Gremlins – Behind The Scenes by eduardojapan