All that is discernible about Nine from the press and the magazine covers is that it is going to be explosive eye candy crammed with A-listers and Academy-Award winners. They sing, they dance, but what about? It doesn’t matter. Marketing gurus know we will pay to just see one of these extraordinary actors in a film, let alone all of them at once!

But what is the film really about? Well, it’s all there in the trailer.

First, it’s about serious cinema. The trailer welcomes us to the world of the film (and filmmaking) with a serious, heavy ringing of bells and a cinematic shot of a man, deep in thought, entering a dark theater from the bright light outside. We know this will be about filmmaking when we hear Judi Dench’s comic description of a director then see Daniel Day Lewis crestfallen on an empty stage behind the silhouette of a camera. It’s beautiful and hints at something deep and difficult and painful.

But then the trailer takes an interesting turn—it whirls from seduction into frenzy on the brink of chaos. The music picks up and we’ve abandoned the slow, sweet, sultry seduction of the opening in favor of a whirlwind adventure of excitement. This, now, puts us into the world of the film and continues to seduce us by promising eye candy galore!

Edited like a music video (or musical number), the trailer goes on to not explain what this film is going to be about so much as make us feel it: Daniel Day-Lewis’s chaotic life as a director, and cavorting with beautiful women. Perhaps these women become jealous? The scene where Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz and Nicole Kidman are all in black seems to indicate so, but only performances and choreography make us guess at this. Still, the chaos will be fun, says the music, and Kate Hudson’s bright smile, and the shots of Fergie and Daniel Day-Lewis jigging wildly.

But then suddenly, the music slows. And the gravelly-voiced songstress returns to her sultry, sex-bomb tone as we see Cotillard and Cruz crying in the night. This promises that Nine will not be all fun and games, but also broken hearts.

This is when the trailer’s song becomes ironic, or at least self-aware. It tells us, "Be a singer, be a lover, pick the flower now before the chance is past," then later, "Live today as if it may become your last." The frenzy of the previous shots tells us this might just be exactly what Daniel Day-Lewis’s character tries to do through the course of the film, but the darkness of some of the scenes lets us in on a little secret—maybe his carpe diem attitude isn’t as carefree as his smile in public, before the journalists and cameras, pretends to be.  

As Judi Dench says at the end of the trailer, "You’re a world-class liar, darling. Go out there and lie for Italy. Lie for Italia" as Daniel Day-Lewis leaps off a tall platform to, what we can only guess, to be his death.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is a complete and perfect trailer. It introduces the world. It shows us our characters without having to splash their real-life names on the screen. Not only do these actors not need introductions, but their titles would jar us from becoming absorbed by this trailer’s world. It shows us Daniel Day-Lewis’s wild spin into women and fame, and then the inevitable (potentially deadly?) tragedy of such a life. It changes tone three times simply within the 2:30 song. It’s completely self-contained, every bit of information and emotion you need is right there in this music video.

Once you’re finished watching a trailer as well-constructed as this you not only know what the film will be about, but you also have no idea. You’re seduced enough to yearn to see it, but left hungry enough to crave for the whole story.

At this point, if the trailer was all we knew, we could guess at the extraordinary film to come, but would have to see it to be sure of its grand design. This, more than anything, means it fulfills the job of a good trailer.