Super sad book trailers

[Dave Monroe]

Pynchon's voice

[...]

Thomas Pynchon's video for "Inherent Vice" (garnering more than
126,000 views) perhaps best captures the imagination because Pynchon
himself reads from the opening passage of the book.

"If you're driving south from L.A. International, you should take no
more than a hit or two off of your favorite brand of cigarette before
you're right here in Gordita Beach, Calif.," he says in voiceover,
accompanied by the sounds of jangly garage rock and grainy footage of
SoCal streets and landscapes. "Later on, this is all going to go
high-rise, high-rent, high-intensity. But right now, back in 1970,
what it is is just high."

Pynchon gives enough of a taste to get you hooked before ending with a
verbal shrug of the shoulders: "Maybe you just want to read the book,"
and then expresses mock disgust at the price. "$27.95, really? That
used to be, like, three weeks of groceries, man."

"It works because it happens to have one of our greatest living
geniuses — and one of the most reclusive men of letters of all time —
doing a voiceover," Mendelsund said. "To me, that was the thing. You
could have shot anything and had Pynchon do the voiceover and it would
have been interesting. I can't tell you how many times in my mind I've
thought, 'What does this man's voice sound like?' The fact that he's
involved in any way gives it an imprimatur that you could never have
in any other way. You could take still photos of your cat, and (if)
Thomas Pynchon is narrating, trust me, it would be really
interesting."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/books/ct-prj-0708-book-trailers-20120706,0,1322205.story?page=2