VIDEO Two wildly different trailers for Victor Frankenstein starring Daniel Radcliffe

Marketing movies is a funny old game. Take the first promos for upcoming flick Victor Frankenstein. It's been in the works for quite a while now and stars James McAvoy as the doctor and Daniel Radcliffe as his helper Igor.

The trailer debut comes in a couple of different flavours and they're promoting the film divergent ways. Check out the UK and US trailers below.

While a certain amount of the footage is the same it would be fair to say these look like completely different movies. The UK version is denser and darker, portraying Frankenstein as an idealist who becomes corrupted and including a fairly significant subplot which isn't even mentioned in the second trailer - a nefarious fellow who wants to create an army of monsters.

Meanwhile in the US the film is being sold as a buddy comedy with a reliance on gags and the back and forth between Radcliffe and McAvoy. They quip, the doctor is sarcastic and there's even some slow motion action stuff thrown into the mix. It's only late on that things take a turn towards darker territory and even then its overshadowed by spectacle and CG flybys.

It's hard to know how these things happen but it does make the actual tone of the film hard to judge. Without a doubt all of this footage was shot exists for the marketing team to use but there's still time to move things around to pick one direction or the other. Balancing both at the same time is a very tough task indeed, and we're not sure Scottish director Paul McGuigan has the skill for it. He's behind the likes of Lucky Number Slevin, Gangster No 1 and a couple of episodes of TV's Sherlock.

Still Radcliffe and McAvoy could be fun together and Andrew Scott looks to have a decent supporting role as a policeman hot on the trail of some body snatchers.

Victor Frankenstein is in cinemas on the 25th of October 2015 in the States and December 5th in Ireland.