I know that some people cannot stand the trailers that are shown before films, although personally I don't really mind them. Cinemas tend to have two different types of trailer, and usually show ones for normal consumer products first, followed by ones for upcoming releases. The first lot I find a bit repetitive, as the reels used don't normally change for months. On the other hand, because I spend so much time at the cinema I get enough variety with the film trailers I see that they don't really bother me too much. However, there is one type of trailer that always comes close to making me furious, and you normally get 2 or 3 at every showing. I am of course talking about the anti-piracy trailers.

Film piracy is a serious problem, and it's one that needs dealing with. The film industry is constantly under fire for making too much rubbish, overpaying talent, and for helping to push the price of cinema tickets ever higher. However, the fact is that the film business is exactly that, a business, and if it stopped making money the films we enjoy would be no more. So clearly something needs to be done to stop people making pirate copies of films, but I am sick and tired of being blitzed with advertising (in the cinema), telling me that it's partly my fault that piracy happens, and that I shouldn't pirate films myself.

I'm sure most of you have the same anti-piracy trailers as I do, at least those of you in the UK. For the last year or so they have consisted of clips of an upcoming film, with a voiceover explaining the problems with pirate DVDs. Past films used have included Narnia, King Kong, X-Men III and Superman Returns - I think Casino Royale is used in the latest version. The voiceover (usually provided by a smug Scottish man) tells us that pirate DVDs have bad sound quality and a poor picture, and then a woman with a ponytail walks across the picture because she needs the loo. The final shot is usually of an audience clapping and cheering, usually at a somewhat strange place in the film for such behaviour to be exhibited, but the point of the advert is clear; going to the cinema is great, pirate DVDs are not. There's also normally a more textual trailer shown immediately before the film starts, usually far less polite in tone, that warns of the consequences of trying to record a film.

But I see absolutely no reason why they show these trailers to paying patrons at the cinema. Do they really think that people go into public screenings of films and try to make copies on a regular basis? How many times have you been watching a film in the cinema, only to look around and spot someone with a Digicam up their jumper? Even in the age of high quality mobile phone cameras, people still have to hold the thing up to the screen throughout the duration of the film, so someone is bound to notice. At most cinemas a member of staff will come into the screening at regular intervals, just to check nobody is using a piece of recording equipment, but have you ever seen them catch anyone? The fact is that most pirate films don't come from people filming public showings, but from private screenings, projector tests and even studio insiders. And yet someone feels the need to remind the public not to record the films they are watching, even though it's a tiny percentage of the population who do it.

If you apply the way these trailers are presented to different scenarios, you realise not just how pointless they are, but also how insulting they can be. For example, can you imagine how rude it would be if every time you got to the cashier in Tesco they reminded you not to steal anything? Similarly, what if a waiter asked you not to run out before paying the bill in a restaurant? And as for the textual trailers, it would be rather like buying a car only to find the sentences for various driving offences written on the windscreen. It's strange that we wouldn't normally accept the sort of behaviour seen in these scenarios, but that every time we go to the cinema we're quite happy to be reminded not to record the film or buy an illegal copy of it. I also feel that these adverts only preach to the converted; what's the point of an advert telling people to go to see films being shown in a cinema? It would be a bit like opening a bag of crisps and finding a note inside that said "Buy Crisps!"

I go to the cinema to be entertained, not to be blamed or shouted at for doing something I don't actually do. Piracy is a problem, but it's not a problem that will go away by aggressively reminding the largely law-abiding public that they shouldn't break the law.

© David Mercier
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