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I just watched the trailer for the upcoming Sci-Fi Action film Ultraviolet and there were a few things I found interesting about it that I found worth noting.

First off, the rating: when you start the trailer you’re greeted with a nice MPAA warning about the fact that this film has been rated PG-13 with a list of reasons for the rating which reads, “Sequences of Violent Action Throughout, Partial Nudity, and Language.” Doesn’t all that seem a bit harsh for a PG-13 movie? I mean, I’m aware that the MPAA plays stupid games with their rating system (see This Film is Not Yet Rated for more on that), but I’d still rather see an R-rated movie that’s actually rated as such than a R-rated movie masquerading as a PG-13 one in order to make it more marketable (which is just a recipe for cinematic blue-balls).

Second, the content of the film seems to be some hybrid of Equilibrium and Blade (or perhaps Aeon Flux). Actually, scratch that, it mostly looks just about any post-Matrix action sci-fi film. All this kind of makes sense because Equilibrium was actually written and directed by the same man, Kurt Wimmer. The good news is that it was a decent film (for the genre anyway), despite a heavy imbalance of style over substance. Meanwhile, one would think that Milla Jovovich, the star of Ultraviolet, would be tired of staring in these types of movies after doing two Resident Evil movies. Wait, scratch that too, she’s working on a third. Ugg…

Finally, the initial spark that led me to write this post, was the music in the trailer. The first song that plays a few minutes into the trailer is none other than the neo-SF-asskicking-anthem Clubbed to Death (Kurayamino Variation) by Rob Dougan which was originally in The Matrix (if you don’t know what I’m talking about just listen to the iTunes sample, I guarantee you’ve heard it before). Maybe, I’m alone in this but isn’t this song one of the most overused and cliché songs in film. Don’t get me wrong, I love it anyway, but do we really need another movie or trailer featuring it? Shouldn’t producers/directors be trying to differentiate themselves from the pack instead of flocking to it? This leads me to the next song in the trailer: 24 by (my fantasy musician girlfriend) Jem. I think this type of song is exactly kind that the aforementioned producers/directors should be including in their trailers. It’s recognizable (I’m told it’s now the theme song for the 24 TV show) but still a bit below the radar (though maybe that’s my own wishful thinking?). In any case, I thought it worked very well.

Okay so the whole thing is a bit cliché and the title is just lame, but nevertheless it looks fun.