Film Preview: The Grinch (2018)

Page Revisions:

(March 25, 2018) Original
(September 23, 2018) New Trailers (#2 & #3) / New Posters (#3-#5)
(November 4, 2018) New Posters (#6-#9)

Release Date:

November 9, 2018

Synopsis:

From IMDb: “A grumpy Grinch plots to ruin Christmas for the village of Whoville.”

Poster Rating: D+ / D / C / C / B- / C+ (2) / D+ / D+

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Review: (#1 & #2) Whoever Illumination is using to design posters, they need to be fired. After the abysmal designs created for the Despicable Me films and now these two, it’s clear they have limited artistic style or creativity.

(#3) The Grinch needs no introduction, and apparently no background or detail. (#4) The little Grinch growing up to be the big Grinch is an interesting idea to explore, but not when it’s so ineffectively presented. (#5) Surveying Whoville isn’t a very exciting design choice, but it’s well detailed and modestly inviting.

(#6-#7) This pair of French posters are among the most colorful they’ve released and they’ll sell the film well enough even if they aren’t terribly exciting. (#8-#9) This pair of posters was part of an advertising campaign to extol the horribleness of city life. They are clever, but not visually appealing.

Trailer Rating: C+ / C / C+

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Review: (#1) It’s not just a scene from the film, though it feels like one and that reduces its urgency a great deal. The disappointing lack of humor just makes it less appealing.

(#2) Point A leads to Point B and then to Point C. This trailer follows its paint-by-numbers instructions fairly firmly, giving the audience little information that would make this seem like a film they need to see if they’ve seen the other incarnations.

(#3) With a heavier dose of humor than the prior trailer, but also more sense of the film’s premise, this trailer does a fine job convincing young children that they will want to see this film; however, it also adds to the feeling that this film has already presented all of its content in the trailers.