Paramount Pictures' much-anticipated CG adventure Rango won't hit theaters until next spring, but anxious fans can preview the adventure with a beautiful trailer cut by Chrome Editor Lance Pereira. The film, which reunites legendary Director Gore Verbinski and versatile screen star Johnny Depp (key players in the success of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise), is the story of a chameleon that faces an identity crisis after he escapes his terrarium to find himself lost in the vastness of the Mojave Desert.
Pereira's trailer opens with a line of mariachi owls perched upon a cow skull, introducing Rango and his predicament to the viewers with a song and dialogue whose central message is "The lizard? He is going to die." The trailer stars a cross section of the film's wacky anthropomorphic characters - from top hat-wearing snakes to saloon-dwelling rats - whom Rango encounters as he fights, runs, and shrieks his way through his treacherous new atmosphere. Pereira incorporates a fair balance of action and dialogue, so the trailer hints at the story while still showcasing the talents of co-stars Alfred Molina, Harry Dean Stanton, Ned Beatty and Abigail Breslin.
The Rango trailer is just the latest project that Pereira and Verbinski have teamed up on. The prolific director has also entrusted Pereira with cutting a music video for The Crystal Method, several scenes in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and every TV version of his feature films.
"I love working with Gore," noted Pereira. "It's been exciting to see the process as the film has gone from drawn storyboards to scenes shot with real actors to hyper-photoreal CGI. Rango is an amazing-looking film, with incredible design, and the trailer had to meet that same quality standard. It had to set up the story, previewing a bit of the film's darkness, all by showing as little as possible. Oh, and it had to rock; this is ILM's first animated feature and they're absolutely killing it, so we couldn't come back to them with anything other than an outstanding product."