How did movie trailers work before the time of the internet?

They showed them in the movie theaters before a movie. I believe they would have been spliced on to the film reel before distribution or projection.

cinemas and television

Cinemas and television.

cinemas and television

They were called “previews” and they would be shown in a movie theater as the “coming attractions” before and after the cartoon.

Here is a classic from 1939

@zenvelo Very cool. How I would love to see a show like that in the movie theatre.

@anniereborn The Paramount Theater in Oakland CA holds over 3,000 people, and while they mostly have concerts now, they do show classic movies for $5 a couple times a month. I took my daughter to see “Singing’ in the Rain” there a couple years ago.

And, they always show a few trailers and a newsreel.

When trailers were first done, they actually followed the movie, which is why they are called trailers.
aren’t I full of fun, amazing trivia?

By the way, there is a series of DVDs of Grindhouse trailers from the late 60’s and early 70’s, that are a blast to watch.

They were on TV, radio, and pre-feature cinema. Shots from them appeared in newspapers and magazines too. It was more than enough. I can’t imagine why anyone would watch them intentionally.

“Previews” (short for “Previews of Coming Attractions”) were a popular feature in movie theaters since before I was born. And that’s a looooong time back. And like all film editing was done before the process became digital, a preview’s select scenes were spliced together by a razor blade using footage from the film itself.

Razor blades were still being used in the ‘70s when I was editing TV commercials.