Prior to watching this trailer, I didn’t know too much about Tom Ford’s A Single Man except that it was one of three movies playing at TIFF this year with similar sounding titles (The Coen Brothers’ A Serious Man and Brian Koppelman’s Solitary Man being the other two). After watching this new trailer, I still can’t say that I know very much about it, but in a way, that’s actually a good thing. This is an artfully constructed trailer that relies more on atmosphere and imagery than plot elements to sell you on it (okay, and a little bit of Oscar buzz as well).

Based on Christopher Isherwood novel, the movie stars Colin Firth as a gay college professor in the ’60s who loses his lover and is stricken with grief. After a night out with his friend Charley (Julianne Moore), however, he starts to see the possibility of moving on with his life. The production design is done by the same folks who work on Mad Men, which is certainly a selling point for me. Interestingly, first-time director Tom Ford is also a well-known fashion designer, so I think we can assume there is a lot of attention given to the period clothing too. All that being said, I still have no idea what the story is about. I guess I’ll just have to see it to find out. A Single Man hits select theatres on December 11th; check out the trailer after the jump.