Coming Soon (1982)

"Horror movie trailers are the best: Spectacular monsters, fantastic special effects, exotic rituals are all played up to the hilt to sell tickets in the most sensational way possible."
-Jamie Lee Curtis.


I discovered this gem of a documentary on during my senior year in high school, when my love for the horror genre was really starting to grow.

Jamie Lee Curtis is the perfect hostess for this look at the monster movie history of Universal Studios, which was directed by John Landis, who had just directed An American Werewolf in London (1981) for Universal.

As Curtis rightly states, even the worst movies have some good footage to whet the appetite of an audience, which is precisely the job of a film trailer.

The focus is on the appeal of our favorite monsters, including Frankenstein's Monster, Dracula, and the Creature From the Black Lagoon. Some of Universal's non-horror output is also glimpsed, including Marnie, Frenzy (1972), and even E.T.-The Extra-Terrestrial (1982).

The film may not go into detail about the great actors who made their mark in the genre like Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff, but if any documentary can be described as 'fun,' it's this one.