The top secret world of JJ Abrams

Posted January 11, 2013 - 18:00 by David Konow

Anybody who knows anything about JJ Abrams understand that everything he does is always top secret.

It was probably Alfred Hitchcock who first started the policy of keeping everything tightly under wraps on a movie, and being that he dealt in mystery and suspense, he didn’t want anyone giving away a thing before the film came out. One can only imagine what kinds of hissy fits Alfred would have in the internet age trying to keep anything a secret these days, and he’d probably have to work harder than ever to protect his movies from spoilers.

Since the days of Hitchcock, movie secrecy has gotten ridiculously paranoid, but at the same time it’s great fun to see a big movie without knowing much about it in advance. Back in the day when you went to go see a huge blockbuster, there were no internet spoilers, and it would take a lot longer for rumors to travel by pure word of mouth, so seeing a brand new movie really was a pure experience for the audience.

So Abrams was recently asked about his secrecy policies, and as he told Entertainment Weekly, "All I ask is that we preserves the experience for the viewer.[It] all becomes less magical if it’s discussed and revealed and pictures are posted online. I just want to make sure that when somebody sees something in a movie they didn’t watch a 60-minute behind the scenes [video] that came out two months before."

Abrams also said when he gets together with his creative teams, “it’s not like there are threats” over keeping secrets. “We just say up front that all the work we’re doing is about making this a special experience for the viewer; let’s preserve that as long as we can.”

These days of course everyone has to sign lengthy confidentiality deals when working on movies, and long gone are the days when Hitchcock had everyone raise their right hand and promise not to reveal anything. Abrams also wondered why anyone would want to have anything spoiled about a film ahead of time, but some of us fans just can’t wait and have to know at least something.

Now that we’ve got some clips, as well as the first 9 minutes of Star Trek Into Darkness out in the world, it should definitely tide the fans over until the movie comes out in May.

There’s a definite balance to giving fans enough to keep them satisfied, and keeping the rest under wraps until the release date. So far, JJ’s done a very good job with it, and if there’s goodwill among the fans, they’ll also keep their end of the bargain and not spoil it for anyone else either.