According to Variety, a federal judge ruled in favor of audiences suing movie studios under false advertising laws if they release trailer-exclusive content. The most interesting part is the reason why this all started. If you thought it was because of Disney’s penchant for using “deceptive” trailers for its movies, you’re wrong. A pair of Ana de Armas fans filed the lawsuit because they rented out Yesterday, a romantic comedy film that came out in 2019 starring Himesh Patel. Apparently, the two fans didn’t like that Ana de Armas isn’t in the film even though a brief shot of her is included in the trailers and she’s also listed as part of the movie’s cast. The story here is that de Armas’ part as a potential love interest to Patel’s character was cut from the film because it didn’t test well. Universal Pictures’ lawyers tried to argue that this is common practice in the movie industry. One of the examples cited is the trailer for Jurassic Park that acted as a prologue for the film and didn’t have any footage of the film. In addition to this, Universal’s team argued that the use of trailers is protected under free speech laws and that the lawsuit could lead to similar lawsuits down the line. But, according to U.S. District Judge Stephen Wilson, companies use the trailers as advertisements and should be held to the same standards. Wilson also wrote that such lawsuits only hold ground if the argument is “whether an actress or scene is in the movie, nothing else.” This new lawsuit could have a huge impact on films going forward. Marvel Studios, as we’ve mentioned, frequently includes “trailer-exclusive” scenes when advertising their movies. As fans can now sue movie studios for misleading them, Marvel will have to tread lightly going forward. It’ll be interesting to see if the effect this lawsuit has will extend to video game trailers. Like with movies, gamers have felt misled by early gameplay trailers for select video games with promises of certain gameplay features and graphics only to fall short. However, video game companies skirt around this by including disclaimers by saying that cinematic trailers don’t represent actual gameplay and more. We might see future movie trailers use disclaimers to avoid lawsuits now that the courts are watching. Speaking of Marvel Studios, audiences will be keeping a close eye on the trailers that have been released and are going to be released for the first Phase 5 MCU film, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania ahead of its premiere on February 17.
