Posterwire.com is a movie poster weblog. From images of the latest Hollywood one-sheets to vintage movie posters, this film poster weblog hopes to offer a bit of insight into film key art.
Just in time for the holidays we managed to get our hands on the new coffee table book Art of the Modern Movie Poster: International Postwar Style and Design. This movie poster design book certainly has to be one of the largest (and one of only a few) books on movie poster design as an art form. Weighing 8 pounds with over 500 pages, the book features 1500 movie poster images from 30 countries over the last 60 years. Also featured are profiles of movie poster artists, including legendary illustrators Saul Bass and Bob Peak.
From the book publisher Chronicle Books:
Art of the Modern Movie Poster — Critically authoritative, visually stunning, and physically massive, Art of the Modern Movie Poster is the first and last word on post-WWII film poster design. Showcasing fascinating examples from 15 nations, this collection of more than 1,500 exemplary designs is a must-have for film buffs, design and poster aficionados alike. The posters are organized by country of origin, offering an intriguing glimpse into each region’s unique visual sensibility and sometimes unexpected takes on familiar films. Gathered from the renowned collection of the Posteritati Gallery in New York—one of the largest holdings of international film posters in the world—this volume is the definitive survey of both film and popular graphic art in the modern era.
The book was created by designers Judith Salavetz and Spencer Drate, writer Dave Kehr, with images from the movie poster collection of Sam Sarowitz and his Posteritati Gallery in New York. The group previously collaborated on The Independent Movie Poster Book.
The official Chronicle Books blog features a post by designer Suzanne LaGasa about various cover design concepts for the Art of the Modern Movie Poster. You can see their exploration of book jacket designs before they finally settled on a “patchwork grid” cover design.
A gallery show for the book’s release is currently on display at the Lincoln Center’s Frieda and Roy Furman Gallery in New York City through January 4th, 2009.
Sony Pictures and Warner Bros. have released an online animated Terminator Salvation movie poster, which the studio is calling a motion poster. From the official synopsis for T4:
In the highly anticipated new installment of The Terminator film franchise, set in post-apocalyptic 2018, Christian Bale stars as John Connor, the man fated to lead the human resistance against Skynet and its army of Terminators. But the future Connor was raised to believe in is altered in part by the appearance of Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), a stranger whose last memory is of being on death row. Connor must decide whether Marcus has been sent from the future, or rescued from the past. As Skynet prepares its final onslaught, Connor and Marcus both embark on an odyssey that takes them into the heart of Skynet’s operations, where they uncover the terrible secret behind the possible annihilation of mankind.
The animated Terminator poster features a bombed cityscape transforming into the ubiquitous T-800 style endoskeleton skull. The Flash animation (which is essentially a stand-alone version of the animation created for the official Terminator Salvation website) was also translated into print form as a Terminator Salvation teaser poster. The Terminator 4 ad campaign was created by the film advertising agency Art Machine.
Speaking of the battle for the future, this Flash animated Terminator poster represents another salvo in the turf war between new media and traditional print (aka dead tree media) advertising. It is not hard to figure out which side of the business is shrinking. In this case there actually is a Judgement Day in the future, and it does not look good for traditional printed newspapers and magazines. That bleak future for the publishing industry will also affect movie print advertising, since print ad buys used to represent a significant portion of film ad spending. The decline of print media means those outlets will become more dependent on advertising as their subscriptions continue to decline. But ask yourself, when was the last time you opened up a Thursday edition of your local newspaper to look up movie theater showtimes for that Friday? That entertainment section of the newspaper full of movie ads used to represent the highest exposure for a film campaign’s key art, but that is becoming a thing of the past. How long will movie studios pay more money to reach a shrinking audience?
Beyond print media advertising, the delivery of film key art will continue to evolve at your local cineplex. Movie theater lobbies are already being filled with digital signage delivering movie ads, digital content and other interactive advertising. Even printed 3D movie posters are advancing beyond the traditional paper one-sheet displayed in an theatre lobby movie poster lightbox. It is not hard to imagine this animated Terminator Salvation poster appearing in a digital movie poster case at a theater near you.
Meet the graphic designer behind Hollywood’s most famous floating head movie posters:
That video hurts because it is so true. See more examples of Big Heads.
In what may turn into an on-going series of celebrities critiquing the movie poster campaigns from their own projects (see director Frank Darabont on The Mist poster), we now have comedian Dane Cook. The comedian recently posted on his MySpace blog about his thoughts about the movie poster for his new film My Best Friend’s Girl. A few thoughts on this movie poster from Dane Cook:
1. Graphics:
Whoever photoshopped our poster must have done so at taser point with 3 minutes to fulfill their hostage takers deranged obligations. They should have called Donnie Hoyle and had him give a tutorial using “You Suck at Photoshop” templates. This is so glossy it makes Entertainment Weekly look wooden.
2. My head:
The left side of my face seems to be melting off of my skull. I guess I am looking directly into the Ark of the Covenant? Are they going for the bells palsy thing here? My left side looks like Brittany Spears’ vagina.
3. The Stare.
My character apparently has fallen in love with a strand of Kate Hudsons hair. Kate’s mannequin is desperately in love with the inside of my right ear while Jason is half stunned, half corsage.
4. Lips:
It looks like I’m wearing Maybelline Water Shine Diamonds Liquid Lipstick. My characters name is now Winter Solstice and I’m a hooker with a heart of gold. Jason is my floral carrying pimp, while Kate is my first trick!
Interesting comments, and no need to re-hash the perils of the “constructed reality” based around unit photography and head strips. But you have to wonder if Dane Cook hates the My Best Friend’s Girl movie poster key art so much, why did he incorporate the Flash animated version of the same movie poster art on his own personal site?
The Hollywood Reporter’s 37th Annual Key Art Awards were presented June 13th during a ceremony hosted by actor-comedian Jeff Garlin. Highlights of the 2008 Key Art Awards included a “Best in Show” award to The Simpsons Movie in the Print category and No Country for Old Men in the newly-created “Best Campaign” category. The “Best Campaign” winner was selected by a panel of experts that included filmmakers David Fincher and Kevin Smith.
The Visionary Award, given to a filmmaker who “inspires movie marketers”, was presented to comedy director Judd Apatow:
“I’d like to thank everyone here who has done such amazing work. I’ve enjoyed my interactions with everybody. It’s one of the most fun parts of the process. This award brings me full circle because I started out thinking you were all f***ing a**holes.”
Looking back at the Key Art Awards of recent years (including this most recent ceremony), it seems clear that The Hollywood Reporter is struggling on how to define the entire enterprise. Award categories are constantly being added, changed, merged, or removed each year, which seems to give the whole process an air of confusion. Awards (such as Judd Apatow’s Visonary Award) are doled out to above-the-line talent in recent years in an effort to make the Key Arts ceremony more appealing. It may be more entertaining to sit through an awards ceremony where Apatow calls them “fucking assholes”, but it does push film advertising personal further into the background during the only occasion they even have a chance to gain any recognition. There even seemed to be a half-hearted attempt this year to tweak the name of the award ceremony itself to The Hollywood Reporter Movie Marketing Key Art Awards (since no one outside of the industry knows what “key art” means), but even that effort was inconsistent. One wonders what categories will be offered next year.
2008 Key Art movie poster winners:
ACTION/ADVENTURE/HORROR POSTER
COMEDY POSTER
DRAMA POSTER
FAMILY POSTER
To see the complete list of 2008 Key Art Award winners visit The Hollywood Reporter.
The Hollywood Reporter has announced the nominees for The 37th Annual Key Art Awards. The 2008 Key Art Awards will honor achievements in movie marketing in different categories including film posters, movie trailers, print ads, DVD packaging, new media and more. Film advertising agency BLT & Associates took the lead among agencies with 18 nominations. Director Judd Apatow will receive the Visionary Award, recognizing a filmmaker who inspires movie marketers. (The main Apatow inspiration seems to be the recent trend of the “Sears Portrait Studio” look in comedy film posters.)
“The goal is to honor the best work that is done in movie marketing, and the quality of the work that is done in this area gets better and better every year and moves into new areas every year,” said Bob Israel, chairman of the Key Art Awards Advisory Board and executive producer of the show.
Changes to the awards this year include Action/Adventure and Horror movie posters being combined into a single category, the elimination of the Teaser poster category, and the expansion of “New Media” categories.
Some of the 2008 Key Art Awards movie poster nominees:
ACTION/ADVENTURE/HORROR POSTERS
28 Weeks Later
The Number 23
Grindhouse
30 Days of Night
Vacancy
COMEDY POSTERS
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
Superbad
Juno
Blades of Glory
The Darjeeling Limited
DRAMA POSTERS
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
Black Snake Moan
I’m Not There
Zodiac
Premonition
FAMILY POSTERS
Shrek the Third
Ratatouille
Bee Movie
Surf’s Up
Alvin and the Chipmunks
The Hollywood Reporter’s Key Art Awards ceremony will be held on June 13 hosted by actor-comedian Jeff Garlin at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza in Century City, CA.
Share your favorite picks from the nominees in the comments section. To see the complete list of 2008 Key Art Award nominees visit The Hollywood Reporter.
Sam Sarowitz (owner of our favorite movie poster art gallery Posteritati) is releasing a new book called Translating Hollywood. The poster book takes a look at the different foreign movie posters for popular films. The book highlights examples of interesting (and somewhat surreal) foreign movie one-sheets from around the world, including samples from the United Kingdom, Japan, France, and of course the ubiquitous posters of Poland. What sets the book apart is the foreign posters are compared to the original domestic one-sheets to draw a contrast between cultures and marketing. Look no further than the comparison between the U.S. and the Polish poster for the Dustin Hoffman film Tootsie for an example of this. Our favorite poster from the book would have to be the Japanese Army of Darkness movie poster (which is yet another example of the King of the Mountain pose) which makes several changes to the original U.S. key art, including the addition of several Bruce Campbell soup cans.
Author Sam Sarowitz will be having a Translating Hollywood book signing at his Posteritati gallery in New York City on May 7th.
Director Frank Darabont’s horror movie The Mist (based on the Stephen King novella) was recently released on DVD. In the film, actor Thomas Jane plays a movie poster illustrator, which has to be a first as far as film character occupations go. The movie poster illustrator as a hero character is interesting when one considers director Darabont’s strong feelings about modern movie posters. In this Comic Con interview with Chris Hewitt of Empire Magazine, Frank Darabont does not mince words about his assessment of the state of film poster art. The Frank Darabont interview begins at 2:10 in the Comic-Con Video Diary #3 (Part 2) (Warning: NSFW language):
“Blow me with that poster art” musings aside, Darabont has long been a strong advocate for movie poster illustration, which is apparent in his film projects, like The Majestic movie poster or the DVD cover art for the anniversary releases of The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile. The Mist Two-Disc Collector’s Edition DVD even includes a featurette called Drew Struzan: An Appreciation of An Artist about the famed illustrator, who illustrated The Mist teaser poster.
To honor the premiere of the new Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull teaser trailer, we wanted to direct everyone to a new online article about artist Richard Amsel, who illustrated two of the original Raiders of the Lost Ark movie posters. From the author of the new Richard Amsel article, Adam McDaniel:
The key to his success, beyond raw talent, was the unique quality of his work and illustrative style. Amsel could perfectly evoke period nostalgia (his posters for THE STING and westerns such as McCABE AND MRS. MILLER come to mind), while also producing something timeless and iconic, perfectly befitting both something old and something new. And however different his approach from one assignment to the other, all would bear his instantly recognizable stamp.
Although Amsel illustrated one of the most recognized movie posters of all time (in addition to many other one-sheets), perhaps his greatest exposure was a record breaking run illustrating TV Guide covers in the 1980s. This work for TV Guide marked the last era for illustrated covers for the television magazine, just as the era of traditional illustration would soon end for movie posters.
The McDaniel tribute makes for an interesting read — it was nice to see comparisons between Amsel and American artist J.C. Leyendecker. Although he worked in the same mediums as other illustrators of his time (watercolor, acrylic, airbrush, and color pencil), the “crisp” detailed and flat lighting style Amsel often employed is something that alluded many artists. To see a great example of this type of the detail, look no further than Harrison Ford’s face right down to the whiskers in the domestic Raiders of the Lost Ark one-sheet. Amsel’s Raiders work is an interesting contrast to the dynamic lighting style of Drew Struzan’s recent Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull poster.
Famed movie poster illustrator John Alvin has passed away. Here is a statement from his family courtesy of IMPAwards:
We mourn the loss of JOHN ALVIN.
From Blade Runner to E.T to Beauty and the Beast, John Alvin left behind a legacy of art that will forever be followed, appreciated and respected by millions.
John loved “making movie posters” because he, just to put it plainly, loved movies. Thirty-eight years and over 120 film campaigns show that his contribution to Hollywood was very integral in shaping the landscape of motion picture advertising. Along with Peak and Amsel, John is now a part of an elite group. A group that helped create the “Golden Age of Movie Posters.” An era of art that sadly will never be echoed through the halls of an institution but more through halls and cubicles of our industry.
We lost a giant in our field and there will never be one like him ever again. Ever. John leaves behind his wife ANDREA his beloved daughter FARAH and a forever indebted Padawan.
We love you John and will never forget you.
Really sad news. John Alvin was one of the most important movie poster illustrators in the modern age, and having met him personally, was happy to find him to be extremely thoughtful and a giving person. He will be missed.
