By Scott Mendelson, Contributor

Neill Blomkamp’s Elysium holds the distinction of being among the very last, if not *the* very last major summer tentpole picture to release a trailer.  The Matt Damon/Jodie Foster futuristic thriller is scheduled to open on August 9, 2013 from Tri-Star Pictures.  This is the first real look at the film, and frankly it’s a pretty decent trailer.  If I’m not as over-the-moon about it as other, it’s because the visuals feels awfully video game-esque and the 136-second clip offers so little plot that it basically presumes that we’ll want our hero (Matt Damon) to succeed in his goal (reaching Elysium, the above-Earth utopia where the rich and privileged live above the destitute masses still residing on a ravaged Earth) purely because he’s established as our lead character and he’s played by a movie star.  Still, the imagery looks impressive and rather large-scale, as befitting the man who made the $30 million District 9 look like a $150 million production. And that there is so little plot revealed only means that the moviegoer remains that much-more unspoiled at this point in the marketing cycle.  So now here’s my challenge to Tri-Star: No more video-based marketing before August 9, 2013! We don’t need another full-length trailer that spoils the plot, explicitly establishes character relationships, and ends with a 45-second montage of money shots.  We don’t need character posters laying out who the major players are.  We don’t need spoiler-filled television spots that contain Matt Damon protecting children or kissing a girl in a cynical attempt to stereo-typically appeal to female moviegoers.  The studio already has two minutes of footage to pick from to make a handful of TV spots.   We don’t need featurettes, either released online or as part of an in-theater promotion, that contains major sequences and talking head interviews of the stars and filmmakers discussing their characters or the moral of the story.  We don’t need interviews where the filmmakers discuss their potential sequel plans and/or who does or doesn’t survive to return for said sequel.  And we absolutely don’t need Tri-Star to release 10% of the finished film online in the weeks prior to release in the form of stand-alone ‘clips’.  The trailer above does its job almost perfectly. The trailer above establishes the world, introduces its two main characters, tells you who is in Elysium and who is making it, and establishes the core journey.  We’ve been teased.  We don’t need to be spoiled.  If Tri-Star has the courage to show restraint, they can establish a new precedent for marketing major studio releases.  They can say “We know we have the goods, we don’t need to give away the store to convince you to shop inside”.  The film is expensive, but at just $90-$100 million, it doesn’t need to be a world-changing blockbuster to make a profit.  Tri-Star can take the risk that letting moviegoers discover the film’s pleasures for themselves will pay off in a superior audience reaction and superior word-of-mouth after opening weekend.  But a certain restraint, both in quantity and “quality”

From: http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2013/04/11/summer-movie-marketing-challenge-tease-dont-spoil/