Now that we’ve all experienced the A Talking Cat!?! trailer, which contains more mysteries than the entire Lilian Jackson Braun catalog, let’s dig deep and feel around in the dripping guts of this family film.
The Time Stamp
The first image we, as the audience, are treated to is a glowing green time stamp. This time stamp stays on the screen for the entire trailer. (Please note, the time stamp accompanied the original trailer and this version was up for about a year before being replaced by a more “professional” looking trailer)
Right from the first breath, we have a mystery! Why is there a time stamp on a movie promo? Why does it start an hour in? Where did that hour go? Are we to assume that this movie perpetually takes place one hour from now, no matter where we are in time and space? Was the trailer originally an hour, one minute, and forty-eight seconds long but they decided to use just the last minute forty-eight?
Or maybe someone changed the settings on Final Cut Pro and the editor didn’t know how to change it back. It was almost quitting time anyway.
NEXT! Establishing shots!
We need to know where this movie takes place if we’re going to have any hope of sympathizing with and understanding the main characters.
We open on a foggy mountain landscape filled with pine trees and brush. The cool morning lingers as the air bites with the mossy scent of spring’s return.
We cut to a peaceful woodland waterfall. Its gentle morning mist greeting any visitors who choose to stop and meditate by the pool it forever fills with cool mountain water.
We cut to a warm afternoon on a beach filled with palm trees swaying in the turbulent breeze of a tropical climate.
So, we’re in Mainewaii. You know, the state created when Maine was lifted out of the ground by giant space monsters from the future and thrown at Hawaii? I mean, if I were A Talking Cat!?!, Mainewaii would be my first destination. It’s the only place to get authentic lobster poi.
According to the time stamp, we’re only four seconds into the trailer and we’re already having continuity issues.
What else does the A Talking Cat!?! trailer have in store? Don’t worry, it gets better.
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