Fannish Friday 5 - Movie Posters

[cookiegirl]

Five best movie poster designs.

I'm pretty sure I haven't seen or can remember enough movie posters to pick the five best ever, so I'll just pick five I like.

We studied Psycho on my film course, before which I never knew that at the time it was made, people didn't go to films the way we do now. They didn't go in at the beginning and come out at the end. Instead they just sauntered into the theater at whatever time they liked, watched the film from the point it was at, and then left when it got back round to that point on the next showing. This makes little sense to me, but apparently it was common. Psycho changed all that. Because Janet Leigh, the star, is knocked off early on in the film (a device then unheard of but afterwards effectively employed by Scream etc), Hitchcock decreed that nobody would be let in after the start of the movie, so as not to ruin the plot twist (and have lots of people complaining they never even saw the 'star'). This decree led to this awesome poster, which I had (and I suppose still have somewhere) on a canvas print, and which spent my uni years on my wall.


The Dark Knight was a good film. The posters were better. This is just one of the awesome artworks that were used. The use of colour, perspective and focus is fantastic. It looks more like a horror movie than a superhero flick, thus successfully setting the film apart from its competitors.


I love this poster. It's classy, intriguing, iconic. The colours are so vibrant and the flames are beautifully depicted. It doesn't rely on pictures of cute boys or love triangles to hook its teenage audience. It is confident in its own power.


I'm not ashamed to say that Love Actually is one of my favourite films, and this poster beautifully sums up the magic of Christmas and of so many intertwined love stories.


This is surely one of the most iconic posters ever produced. One of the things I like about it is that my eye always goes to the shark, and I always miss the person in danger swimming right above it. Then when the poster catches my eye a second time, I'm all 'ARGH, person about to be eaten!' Aside from that, it's just a very well produced artwork.

Comments

[leonie-alastair.livejournal.com]

I love the Jaws poster - which is weird, because I don't much care for the movie (I'm not a big fan of scary movies). Among recent movies, I like the art work for the Star Trek XI posters.

[cookiegirl]

I can take or leave the movie, but the poster is definitely awesome :)

[jerusha]

Very interesting bit of movie trivia! I had no idea that people viewed movies in any other way than going in at the the beginning and leaving at the end, although there have been a couple of movies where I wished I could stay for a second showing.

And I have very warm feelings toward Love Actually. It's a lovely, warm movie, but it's also the movie we watched the night my husband proposed. I had no idea how appropriate my choice would be when the evening started. :-)

[cookiegirl]

Awww, that's definitely a good proposal movie! :)

I so badly wanted to sit and watch The Hunger Games again straight after, but it was not to be :(

[passionrlsusall.livejournal.com]

Don't be ashamed of Love Actually.. it's great!

[jedi-harkness.livejournal.com]

I love all your choices here, especially Jaws and Hunger Games. The former because it's so iconic, and the latter because it's a perfect example of the power of a single image to convey the spirit of the film.

I also love the Psycho poster; It's one of my favorite movies, and I wasn't aware until recently what an impact it had on how people go to the movies. One of my all-time favorite Hitchcock posters is the one for Vertigo, again because of it's use of a powerful single image.

My own personal favorite (and this is mainly my childhood talking) is the original poster for Star Wars. Talk about iconic! There were two different versions of it; the American one by Tom Jung, and the international one by the Hildebrandt Brothers. The latter one was made in a retail version, and that was the poster that adorned my wall for years.

Drawing again from childhood, I also loved the posters for Saturday Night Fever, Logan's Run, and Grease. Saturday Night Fever is especially iconic, that WAS the 70s!

[cookiegirl]

Oh, I didn't think of Grease but that's definitely a good one, it's amazing how just the way the word is written has become so iconic! And yep Vertigo is very cool poster, though I've never managed to sit through the whole film as I find the beginning really irritating! x

[fide-et-spe.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I didn't know that about Psycho, I did know people would come in at different points in films and stay for the next screening. When I was a kid films were always double bills, so you would go to see one film and sit through the "supporting film" which was often a nice surprise. I can't even imagine that happening now in the days of the multiplex.

I like Love Actually, know a few people who hate it, but I think it's the only decent film of that type. Hollywood has gone mad with releasing these terrible films ever since based about holidays with multiple characters, but I think Love Actually did a good job with that format.

[cookiegirl]

Yep, I'm with you on the holiday films - Valentine's Day was pretty atrocious and I didn't even go and see New Year's Eve. I'm waiting for them to bring out Thanksgiving, 4th of July and, I imagine at some point, Easter. :-\

[fide-et-spe.livejournal.com]

New Years Eve got some of the worst reviews I've ever seen. Mark Kermode had it as his worst film of last year, and said it was like someone had swallowed all the Christmas tat and vomited it up. I just wish people would stop going to see these dreadful things. I agree they'll keep going whilst people keep watching. Apparently the what to expect when you're expecting was atrocious as well. I hear critics now refer to these films as watching a lot of contractual obligations being filled. .