Worst Trailer Ever: 'Assassination Games'

Posted Tuesday, July 5, 2011 at 5:17 PM Central
Last updated Tuesday, July 5, 2011 at 5:19 PM Central

by John Couture

Over at /Film today they posted the trailer below for the upcoming film Assassination Games. The posting spurred a brief but interesting flurry of tweets claiming that it was the "worst trailer" ever.

I know that taste, and movie taste in particular, is purely subjective and the definition of high quality films varies greatly. It's like the old saying about opinions and, well, let's just say that we'll keep it family friendly and say that everyone has one. Despite this, I have to believe that there has to be some universal qualities that mark terrible movies and, by extension, terrible movie trailers.

While I'm not a big fan of Jean-Claude Van Damme, I wouldn't go so far as to call this trailer the "worst trailer ever." But, there has to be one, right? I mean think about it. A trailer's job is to make the movie look as appealing as possible so as to get people to come out to theaters and watch it.

We all know that a good trailer can often make a pile of dog turds smell like roses. Furthermore, we all know a good trailer when we see one. I think back to this one from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo as a recent example of a good trailer doing its job superbly.

I WANT to see that movie, like yesterday.

So, likewise, there has to be equally horrible trailers that either do a disservice to the film itself or simply are terrible because the movie they are trying to sell is complete garbage. That being said, I'm going to use this ongoing feature to highlight these turkeys (both old and new) of the trailer universe and I welcome your suggestions and comments.

For now, I'll let you be the judge of the Assassination Games trailer. The movie hits theaters for a limited release later this year.