What Killed The Movie Poster?
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- čas přidán 23. 05. 2023
- Movie Posters used to be one of the mail selling points for films in Hollywood. A great poster can tell an entire movies story in a single captivating image. Though as the years progress, and IP ownership remains king, poster design has become messy and uninspired. Where have the days of Saul Bass, Bob Peak, and Drew Struzan gone? Is the art of movie poster design truly dead?
#movieposterdesign #movieposter #nerdstalgic - Zábava
I think the oversaturation plays a big part in the lost form of movie posters. Back then, you had one shot, a single chance to make an impression. Today, you have a dozen chances, and the poster is probably the last thing an audience member will think about when deciding which movie to watch.
I never knew about posters really, but only when I got to live closer to a cinema.
All the movies I saw till that point were on TV.
Not only that, but I was too young to see some of those in theaters so when I think of the movie, I think of scenes. Tbf, I think of scenes when I think about Spider-Man FFH as well. What posters did was make you pick which ticket you were going to buy when you went to the theater. Now the likelihood you're going at all is significantly lower.
i think that's no reason to make the poster so dull. i mean, back in the 60-90 they had a lot of chanches of wonderful movies too
@@calebzamudio9445 i think the many chances theyre talking about is in regards to marketing avenues
Nowadays, we have 4 versions of the poster. And this was the case for a long time when they would change it based on the location but we can see all versions now.
I think the floating head poster being more prominent is interesting because the current state of cinema is being run more by franchises rather actors
True, but you do see it with some. The blu ray art for no way home just has spiderman, mask on, with dr strange.
Well, familiar faces are attached to franchises again and again. The floating heads aren't there to highlight the actors, but the characters they play. Those are the familiar faces executives care about.
@@AVdE10000 no, otherwise youd have superheroes with their masks and helmets on. It's why spiderman homecoming's bad main poster had shots of tom holland, RDJ, and micheal keaton as well as shots of spiderman, iron man, and vulture.
You'd think it'd be the other way around.
I think the Parasite Movie Poster still has many elements of the golden era of movie posters
Yes, also the lighthouse. I haven't even seem the movie yet but the poster is stuck in my mind
The tagline on the poster for Parasite is perfect: "Act like you own the place".
I think that cult movies break the trend. I liked the "Nomadland" poster very much.
simple, not 10 heads poster. Is stupid
The artwork of Drew Struzan and the music of John Williams is the definition of iconic cinema. Great video as always.
Struzan, Williams, Lucas and Spielberg.
💯
We owe so much to them, that's what I always felt certain familiarity with those movies, I guess I had a great childhood watching movies.
"The artwork of Drew Struzan and the music of John Williams is the definition of iconic cinema."
You are correct and I completely agree with you.
The GOATS
As a graphic designer, I really enjoyed this video. It's the small details in the artwork that really brings life to the image. Speaking of posters, you should check out Olly Moss. He's made some incredible movie/video game posters. He made my favorite video game cover art, Resistance 3. You should check it out.
@@MC--- @Gerald Reid Those are really nice :) The strong Alfons Mucha influence is pretty obvious in all of them though, i yet have to see a recent poster artist who strays away from the whole Art Nouveau influence (i'm not saying there aren't any, i'm genuinely curious and eager to discover some).
He's made some very awesome posters!
he is the one who did the art for Firewatch right? I absolutely love it
OOOOH! It's the landscape in a character's silhouette guy! I've seen his work before, many years ago, but totally forgot about him. Thanks for bringing his work back to my mind!
I never realised how the posters have changed drastically. There are very few movie posters nowadays that I would call art.
That's because it's an incredibly selective and slanted video. There are still incredible movie posters made today, and tons of shitty ones were made in the past. Look up the alternative black and white poster for Ridley Scott's The Last Duel. It's probably the best movie poster of the decade so far, but so simple yet effective. But you won't see Nerdstalgic bring it up because of his narrative.
There are a lot of great posters actually, This guy is just blinded by the Nostalgia
Teaser posters are often my favorite kind. They tend to be more conceptual, abstract and truly artistic. They aren't trying to sell you on everybody involved, a bunch of actor's faces or even the plot of the film. They're all about the concept, the mood, the mystery. It's what they don't tell you that creates hype. It's what little they tell you they creates intrigue.
Film key art posters are a work of art.
What bothers me the most is that films today will still have great key art posters, but for some reason the most basic one will grace the cover of the DVD/Bluray packaging, making for incredibly dull art direction.
The scream 6 teaser poster is a perfect example, one of the best to come out in recent years
I had a unit in my design uni course, where we focused a lot on movie posters. We are taught to analyse past posters and how they got the message communicated to the audience , through colours, imagery and composition etc. Thankfully we dive into such things as alternative posters as well, basically posters that are unconventional from already exiting films. basically fan art but poster form. They can appeal to nostalgia of an old film or the intrigue of something different. Please give a quick search to alternative movie posters, they are quite amazing to look at! So the designers arent just learning the same techniques, but are actually actively learning to diverge from the oversaturated designs. Its the lack of risk people are willing to take in such areas that are limiting and bland.
Today's audience is busy, stressed, have too many options, are low-key dumb, and just want to be shown that their favorite actor/actress is in a movie. That's the reason for all the same-ey designs and floating head posters 🤷♀️🤪
Whiplash has some amazing alt posters. The one with him at the end of the drum sticks and there is another one with a bandaid where the cotton is sheet music and there’s splatters of blood. Both portray the mood of the film so well
alternative movie posters look amazing!!
There's one movie poster from Spider-Man: No Way Home I truly think is a work of art. Peter has his back towards the audience looking down defeated as snow falls down on him. All around him are billboards with his face plastered saying Enemy #1. It gives soooo much weight on what the film is about.
True.
Love the first Spiderman movie with the city back drop in his eyes
Even then, it's one of the dozens of posters of a character in the center of the picture with their backs to the viewer.
@@rodrigoandrade256 that's such a simple template tho so I dont think you can blame any poster for that
I think the other secondary posters for a film nowadays not the main one and the only poster I like with floating heads is the avengers film cause u know
No Way Home's poster overcomplicated the poster. Spider-Man 1 and 2 from way back in the day had posters that said nothing and everything at the same time. Just the awe at seeing the spiderman against buildings during the golden hour.
Here is my take: when I saw Dune, I was amazed by the movie's photography. Scenes meticulously filmed to be beautiful, memorable, and sublime. They encapsulate perfectly certain aspects of the movie because they're part of it.
So, maybe the industry could start to use movie frames as its posters, adding the name of the movie and the actors over it.
It can definitely be done, but one thing that's interesting is that just because a still from a movie looks phenomenal is no guarantee that there's an arrangement of type text that can effectively supplement it in poster form.
A studio would have to buck the century-long standard of making their primary posters vertical. And even if they did find a stunning still from the movie to use for primary poster marketing, there would still likely be some tweaking and supplementing to give it balance yet convey all of the information needed. Marketing would otherwise be relying too heavily on the cinematographer to deliver a poster-appropriate still.
That said, I would love it is posters went the way less is more, and changed things up from time to time.
Best example of this I can think of is Chernobyl's. It's pretty simple, it's a frame from a scene of the series, but it sells the whole idea of the show perfectly
Yeah, Dune had some aweful posters. It actually had some good ones as well, but they only used the bad ones for promotion, such a shame.
@@rafaelc.c. The teaser poster for Dune Part 2 looks pretty cool, due largely to the relative simplicity of it. But that's the thing, it's just a teaser poster, and we can probably expect the theatrical one released about a month before the film comes out to be another "floating heads" poster
@@christianwise637haven’t seen that poster yet but I’m glad you mentioned it, it does look really good
The worst part is that there are amazing alternative Imax and Dolby posters that deserve to be remembered but are forgotten.
TRUE the Imax poster for Frozen 2 is so beautiful i still have it on my wall, i got it on opening night :')
The internet allows us to keep up with movies, the poster no longer has the weight and prominence it once had. It’s job is now dissolved into other marketing strategies.
And given the ride of franchises the purpose of instilling a story through the poster is no longer needed. We all know we are going to see the next installment of a major franchise.
The John Wick 2 poster is absolute fire. Conveys the entire plot of the film perfectly, and even foreshadows the ending with the open contract on his head. The world against John, and John against the world.
Of all the John Wick posters Nerdstalgic could've used to demonstrate the point, it has to be the most iconic poster of all the John Wick films...
@@AL2009man Haha, right? I thought the exact same. There's plenty of JW posters that are just his face or visage standing there. But even those have some cool lighting trick or edge to them that's specific to that JW movie. JW4 in particular had some gorgeous poster designs from multiple different artists.
The most recent movie poster I’ve loved was for Everything Everywhere All at Once. It’s visually stunning, but also contains so many easter eggs and in doing so portrays the chaos of the film
One of my favorite modern movie posters, its great
Kind of hard to look at on a small screen though, it kinda just looks like a mess and you scroll right past it when you see it in a list of options on a streaming service
@@spencerboyce6227 i mean, that is the idea, it has everything hahaha
@@azazel5958 lol
The red one, the one used commercially, is horrible. But the painted one is quite nice. Beautiful to the eyes although doesn't explain anything and everything is too small.
I think what really killed me was how The Batman had tones of fantastically beautiful posters leading up to release, and then for the main poster they still went with the floating heads. Literally the worst looking poster in the selection used only because it’s “marketable”.
Yea, need money. U in the wrong business
I feel like The Martian is one of the few good headshot posters, the “Bring him home” across Damon/Watney’s face makes it feel like some motivational poster that would actually be in that world
That's a little weird to tell that head salad's posters are wrong when all "good old" poster are head salad but drawn by hand. Don't get me wrong, I agree with the other arguments.
That was the closing statement of the video
I agree. It feels dismissive and biased. While not of the quality of days passed, they haven’t strayed too far from the template the video spends half the time praising.
i think its more on the fact of back then, it was limited to significant roles or actors, and were more expressive. Even trying to communicate the movies tone etc. But now its over saturated, too many actors faces, insignificant roles, and everything looks the same, no matter what movie it is. Some of complete different franchises would literally have the same colour pallete and composition , that if you squint you cant tell which movie is which.
There's a big difference between showing the two leads' faces, and having the entire cast of Endgame packed into a mob scene. In bad light, too.
I would have gone with just Stark, Cap, Thor, and Thanos. Those three are the classic "core" Avengers, and of course the villain who drives the entire story.
I think the issue is that the movie posters of today are imitations of those older posters, because they are what is already established, and what works. It's what businesses do. Businesses are not run by creative people. They are run by decision makers, and creativity and decision making are not the same thing. So businesses decide to repeat what already works. They do so in a way that is like making a photocopy, where you lose something of the original, but it's still like 90% there. It's also not like these mega corporations can't afford to hire an artist to be bold and do something different. That 10th anniversary Shawshank Redemption poster is much more evocative of the feeling of the movie than the original poster was even though it uses some of the same imagery.
This is an interesting topic to discuss since movie posters are such an under appreciated art form that not only is mean to advertise a film, but summarize the entire plot, tone, and vision of the film's story. I appreciate old style movie posters that were hand drawn, hand painted, or matte painted, just as much as I appreciate modern movie posters that are done on the computer or photoshop since technology and art evolves, but at the same time I can understand why a lot of people are fed up with the digitally made film posters of today. For me, most movie posters now lack that artistic flair to them, as they just feel like they use the same color scheme (Disney for example is obsessed with blue and orange), same format, are bloated with so many characters or elements that doesn't feel pleasing to the eye, such as most (if not all) modern day blockbusters, or feel corporate rather than artistic (look at dungeons and dragon for example). I wish we can go back to the simpler days of movie posters using few elements, a black background with a single image on it, or have a unique look to it, and I know I'm not alone when I say that. Thankfully some movie posters today do have a unique look to them that actually represents the film quite well or go back to being hand-drawn/painted, along with being pleasing to the eye as works of art.
I think one of the posters for Kong: Skull Island was really well done. The one with King Kongs' silhouette with the sunset and 5 soldiers on water forming a triangle pointing towards Kong. This might be the most recent example of a really good poster, in my opinion at least.
That’s the official poster and that’s definitely an eye catching example.
there are tonnes of really good movie posters today as well as horrible movie posters back in the past , what the video listed here is kinda biased - indie films and eastern versions of foreign movie posters are an example of what i mean
chinese version of 1917 movie poster looks great while the american one looks like your generic "man standing" poster
plus studios release a lot of versions of movie posters for some reason
modern movie posters that i love are:
little miss sunshine
Gojira (2016)
Wandering Earth's carved book pages poster
Jingle Ma's Mulan
The Golden Era's international poster
Masters in Forbidden city 2016
Almost all the Monsterverse films have dope ass posters that don't really fall into this issue. I don't recall ever seeing a single Monsterverse poster with the actors on it. Its just the monster
@@hansolo3154 That’s actually true. The only one with humans is the Skull Island poster but it isn’t any of the main cast and they’re walking away from the viewer towards Kong. Very good framing.
Parasite?
Weirdly enough, I have to say the poster for Cocaine Bear stood out when I was at the theater and saw it in the hallway. No head salad, just a bear roaring, white powdery effects all around it, all black & white except the Bear in the title being red. It conveys the idea of the movie pretty well I think, though I haven't seen the movie so it could be completely wrong. But it did stand out compared to all the head salad ones.
I remember seeing this poster for Tobe Hooper's The Funhouse, it was just still frame from the scene where main killer is unmasked and you see his deformed albino face just roaring. Underneath it simply said "Tobe Hooper's The Funhouse" in big orange font. That was the poster. Just title and still frame taken directly from the movie scene. To this day, one of the creepiest posters I've seen as kid, and keep in mind this was actually in late 90s when they had "re-release" in one of those theaters in my hometown that would occasionally play older, "cult" movies. However the poster itself was original movie poster they used for it's 1981 release.
I think I read somewhere that during the early years of the MCU they did make a few variations of the movie posters, some were very stylised and hand drawn, using silhouettes and experimental compositions as well as the posters that they usually use.
They claimed that they showed these poster variants to focus groups and that a lot of them said they preferred the head salad posters because they clearly showed the cast members which would make people want to see them.
This is sad
I gotta argue that the posters for Scream 6 were actually really great. Maybe not all of the floating head ones (although they served a purpose for a whodunnit) but the poster you guys displayed on Ghost face in Time Square had a ton of Easter eggs and other stuff in it. I don't think that one was just churned out by some artist who just needed to get something to the studio immediately. I think the Scream franchise actually does a lot of fun (not always successful) things with their marketing.
The scream 6 marketing was great. That aforementioned Ghostface over times square, the Ghostface in a subway window and the Ghostface made up with aerial view of new York were all fantastic.
I think that the Once Upon A Time in Hollywood is a perfect example for what movie posters should be like. It has a story, it grabs the viewer’s attention and has massive detail in the small corner.
Good point. It's like the film. Reminds you of older cinema, a different time. Even being shot on actual film and not digital. A love letter to movies going from not just an escape but blockbusters and events.
To be totally honest with myself, I never really gave it a Second thought about movie posters. I usually watch trailers to determine if I want to go and see the movies but yes, there are lots of iconic movie posters, that make you want to see the movies. Great video!
I've had a love for movie posters since I was a kid! I used to walk through every hallway of the theater to browse every one like they were masterpieces in a museum. When I got my own apartment, I actually decorated my walls with them! My favorite of all time was the teaser poster for "Star Wars: Episode I". That image of li'l Ani with Vader's shadow... Awesome! Awesome to the max! I absolutely agree that the art has been lost because I haven't seen a poster that I've wanted to own in a long time. A long time.
Commercials, trailers, posters, merchandise, interviews, etc.
It's all over-saturated greed and it's everywhere. All future art is going to feel lifeless compared to times when people actually created art, not corporations. And the only art that will feel like anything is that which points this fact out.
Been watching this channel for a couple of years and this is your best video yet guys! Really feels like the culmination of a lot of lessons and improvements you've been making over that time. Loved it!
I think that one of the posters for 2022’s The Batman was absolutely gorgeous. It is the red and black poster with the silhouette of batman in the rain, by far one of my favorite posters of all time.
I haven't seen it in the comments yet, but I love the custom artwork done for movies at Alamo Drafthouse. Done by Mondo who appears to be out on their own now doing other things also. They are iconic, and unique.
Mondo was actually purchased by Funko and they are shutting down the poster division of the company. Mondo years ago was legendary, now they are the bargain bin of posters.
@@Nerdstalgic oh no, I didn't quite know what their current state was, as I remember reading something about the split from the Alamo, but my cursory search didn't turn up this unfortunate news. That stinks. I hope there will be more artists or public interest in this part of the movie experience in the future.
I work in the cinema industry. There are still plenty of great posters. The studio send us several copies and i always snag one of the good ones for my wall. The Wonder Woman 84 poster comes to mind. It was unique and intriguing in its bold simplicity
At 3:05, that's an image from The Dark Tower by Stephen King. I was curious as to why Struzan had painted that, since the image wasn't used for the recent movie adaptation. I looked it up. It was a painting Struzan did for The Mist. In the beginning of The Mist, the main character is a movie poster artist. He's shown in his studio making movie posters. A lot of them are for movies that already exist, but one is for The Dark Tower. It's a sly nod to hardcore King fans, who will recognize the image immediately.
Nailed this video hard. Being an artist and video film graduate, I hope to make cool posters for any films I may one day make to pay homage to these legends. I hope studios can wake up
What an awesome video, so much history in under 10 minutes. This was amazing.
Can really see what you mean with how a lot of posters now don’t have a patch on older posters. They were awesome works of art. Now as you said it’s just floating heads. It’s like how a lot of gaming covers, esp between 2006 to 2016 were “Main character (usually a guy) on cover holding gun”
I think the poster for Wes Anderson's 'The french dispatch' (the one in cartoon style) is one of the best when it comes to graphics made for recent movies. It's styling that imitates the front pages of The New Yorker references the fact, that the movie is a sort of tribute to the magazine. You can see all the main characters in their most recognisable scenes, and the background setting contains symbols from the stories told in the movie. The colours and style just scream Wes Anderson, so the poster does a great job capturing the feel of the movie, in my view.
You are an ARTIST in the questions you ask, the topics you choose. You're a philosopher, and i am here for it!
This is the topic I didn't know I needed. Excellent video.
Appreciate it! Thanks for being here
Remedy's Control (video game) had a pretty cool set of posters and key art. The painterly style reminded me of older films.
Huge movie poster collector here with an emphasison sci-fi, fantasy, and action/adventure movies. Big fan of Struzan's. Most of my collection is from the 80s, the era of my childhood/teens. I agree, in recent decades, movie posters have become boring. I've almost stopped looking for recent posters but continue to hunt for older posters.
I hope some day we get illustrated posters back in popularity.
Really enjoyed this video! Here the question for me also arises whether artistic posters like those of Bass/Struzan etc would even appeal to todays "main" cinema audience because of its deviation from the norm... as a hobby artist myself and also just having finished my masters degree in film science I would LOVE to finally see some kind of artistic chance in the film business (and not done by AI), even if it´s just in the way the movies are being advertised
My favorite "recent" movie poster is from "It Follows", the one with the rear-view window. Also the Scream VI poster at 05:00 looks great 🔥
I believe that both movie posters and trailers are suffering at the hands of the same enemy. That enemy is speed. The time from the first trailer/poster to streaming at home is almost the blink of an eye. But before the internet, movie marketing was a slow drip. When a poster appeared in the lobby, we pondered it deeply, like an art critic to a Picasso. Magazines, tv, and newspapers provided small tidbits of information and occasionally a picture or two. We anticipated the film’s release, like a kid anticipates Christmas morning.
But today, we rarely stand in lines outside the theater. We rarely wait in lobbies. We rush in, optionally grab snacks, watch the movie, and rush out to the parking lot. Film marketing and coverage are fed through the internet firehose. We don’t spend weeks discussing the marketing with friends, we watch a CZcams video that tells us all we need to know.
I am not “bad-mouthing” the internet, or saying things were better “back in my day”. I am saying that something has been lost, as is the natural course of time.
The last time I watched a movie by just looking at the poster was ‘The Jungle Book (2016)’. I had gone to watch BvS but it was removed from the theatre, and then I glanced at this amazing Jungle Book poster & immediately decided to watch that. Definitely one of my best movie experiences ever.
as a artist myself, this video was needed
Thanks for watching
I was thinking about this last week, thanks for itching the scratch on my brain!
Thank you for bringing this man's work to our attention. I was not familiar with the painstaking work that brings even the movie poster, an element of the film we take for granted without thinking about, to life. That iconic image that is conjured when mentioning a movie. And it's not just about the design but the meticulous level of detail and utter craftsmanship. Moviemaking was once an art form. I don't know if it even matters anymore whether or not a.i. does all the work. The way these soulless corporate "by the numbers" people work, it may as well already be that way.
One other issue is that the promotion for the film has to span across different aspect ratios. The vertical movie poster is one of them, but there’s also billboards, banner ads, soundtrack album art, etc. It seems like there’s a more of a web approach now, as opposed to things descending from the poster.
I would argue he was a provider of the face salad, but did so by hand. That's, essentially, what the phantom menace poster was.
I love the sheer endless amount of videos relating to anything vaguely to art „This was better in the past…“
Masterpiece as usual. Keep them coming
great video I would have to say a movie poster that I enjoy lately from a sort of new film from 2019 is Good Time by the Safdie Brothers. The illustration style with the crazy neon color and Robbert Pattinson inside the sprite bottle is amazing.
7:25 Glad you brought that up. I swear when you went through the history of posters I saw some floating heads in these iconic posters as well.
It's not that heads are inherently bad. It's the extreme overuse of them that's the problem. It shows a lack of care and creativity, thus making them no longer art.
I'd like to mention John Alvin who has done heaps of memorable movie posters over the years and is right up there with Drew Struzan.
Came here to say this. There is a great book that compiled his work.
I miss the days of Drew Strusan and others movie posters. They had character, mystery and art to them that's just not there anymore in today's posters. Technology and impatience killed the movie poster.
Thanks for letting me know about the term "Head salade". I will now be using this in as many conversations as possible.
Probably cost cutting. Instead of hiring an outside artist to give a quality poster, theyll just get an inside effects person to photoshop a poster for them. But whats worse than the death of the poster, is the desth of a trailer.
The stupidity of a teaser FOR a teaser trailer and then theres the trailer that gives the best scenes and surprises of the movie away. I cant watch ANY trailer for a movie i want to see because id risk a spoiler.
Dude, this video is really good. I've always been very interested in posters and film art in general, how it's always been done and the creativity of the artists behind it. It's kind of complicated and sad to see that this has been lost with the new generation, making everything more generic and ugly, but there are still those committed to preserving techniques and the creativity of these projects.
You could still do something interesting for multiple character posters. Imagine if for the Mario movie they made posters for Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Toad, but when you put them next to each other it looks like the character select screen for SMB2 (US), which happens to be a stage with curtains. That could even work for the sequel.
I hoped to see Everything Everywhere All At Once's alternative poster. The circular one.
That James Jean poster is phenomenal, as is the movie.
Ok mostly agree. But John Wick 2 with the circle of guns and Knives Out with the circle of knives don't really fit your other examples, and to me are a great representation of what the films are about as well as iconic images that stick in my head when I think about those movies.
I actually have a lot of thoughts on this. I am a big fan of Struzan as most people from that generation are. One thing I find funny tho is that he used the exact same head salad format for most of his work. It really was just the style and textural aspect that carried those designs in my opinion. Which I think there is something to say for that. It is important. But I also don't think that something needs to be created in a physical traditional medium too feel unique and be good design. It's interesting cause a lot of the modern posters you showed while bringing up issues, I think are actually very successful in being distinct and communicating the vibe/feel of a movie. The guardians 3 posters for example are all very well done. I think another that came to mind was the Scream 6 poster.
Interestingly both of those were posters which had a series showcasing individual characters. I don't think the real issue with those types of posters is just that they detract from one strong central image for the movie. I think that has a lot more to do with the age we live in now. Things aren't advertised the same. Most things are pushed primarily on social media, and social media promotes a more consistent drip feed of promotion. And while someone would have been ok walking by and seeing the same poster ad on their way into a store, reposting the same thing again on SM is not effective. So people need to come up with a solution or way to present varied imagery that feels like a series.
While I do think that it's a bit sad and maybe less effective, the old way of doing things wouldn't be as effective today either.
Also, back Struzans day all of us were going to guy a physical copy of the movie and have it on our shelf. That alone also increases the impact of that imagery and I think is why so many of us remember old movie "posters" so well.
As one of the "guilty perpetrators" (I've been designing key art for over 30 years), I can say there is one thing that "destroyed" the "art" of the movie poster... the computer.
Before the advent of the computer in the mid-90s, we started out with a completely blank canvas... anything goes... you could even tie and airplane in a knot... but after computers (and I'm even talking about the brief pre-personal computer era in the mid-80s, where "computer" work was done by specialized shops) designers who were not particularly "artistic" began to depend heavily, and/or completely, on production photography which, naturally, led to a plethora of "big heads."
Once designers began to learn how to use computers and their various filters and FX, another divergence occurred within the design community and persists today... those who had the artistic/illustrative skills, could still use photography to utilize their vision (the availability of stock photography expanded this exponentially), think the Batman poster with the destroyed buildings creating the bat symbol, that requires a lot of personal illustrative talent on the part of the designer... and lesser "artistic" designers who simply utilize the photography as they find it, dress it up with filters, flares and fades and churn out stuff like the Bourne Identity poster.
But what you're about so see is the re-emergence of "artistic" poster design. With AI, even the least artistic designer with an idea will soon be able to see their conceptual vision realized, even if it far exceeds their personal talent. Conversely, what we also might see, is the decline of actual designers and artists contributing to the process and more interference by "suits" who think of themselves as "creative" -- and trust me, they've had their fingers in the pie all along, contributing mightily to the mediocrity of the poster art -- who will think nothing of giving AI a few commands and then shilling their own crap to the "upper suits" of the marketing department.
We're on the cusp of a brave new world... not sure which way it's going to work out for the art of movie posters. *sigh*
Because posters don't carry the same promotional weight that they once did, modern movie posters just seem like an afterthought from the studios, with many of them being lackluster Photoshop. I think Paul Shipper does a good job of continuing the Struzan style into the modern era. He has done some great stuff. The studios should probably start using some of his work as their primary promotional poster; it would certainly stand out in the era of "head salad."
This is such an interesting video with a topic I knew nothing about
The Super Mario Bros. Movie may have a cliché poster BUT it used the color circle so beautifully!!
Look up the movie poster for Hugo. It has a small head salad at the top, and a beautiful image underneath with Hugo hanging from the arms of a clock as snow falls around him.
More movie posters should be that majestic.
Great video - I'm new to your channel. I live over a theater, and just yesterday the new "Indiana Jones" poster caught my attention because it's just so lifeless and visually muddy. Loved your analysis - I grew up on '70s Bob Peak, and heard of Saul Bass, but wasn't familiar with Drew Struzan at all. Thanks for the introduction!
Dial of Destiny poster is amazing, it is similar to Raiders 's one
I still remember the great movie posters from my youth -
Jaws, A Clockwork Orange, Alien, Rollerball.
Maybe another issues would be the loss of a single "canvas" before you only had the theatrical poster which seems like a standard but now you have to fit your "poster" to many aspect ratios, landscape or portrait modes and even resolutions, because it could be part of the side of a bus or the rectangular icon in a streaming app, and old posters are somewhat "inflexible" in that matter and instead of using a proper painting tou got a PSD which you can edit however you like, I can bet that's also why studio execs are more interested in modern face salads, as to need to always leave the franchise logo and lead actors faces visible as they believe is whst drives sales, it is what it is.
I completely agree with everything in this video!! I'm curious though, how would you keep this art form in the current meta modernist film landscape?
As a graphic designer and a wanna be filmmaker.... this was an excellent video that I plan to share in my film groups.
Don't forget John Alvin, another of the great poster artists whose work spanned the 1970s-2000s
I remember working at an old RKO cinema on Long Island back in the mid 1980's and that theatre had Half Sheet (short and wide) and Insert (tall & skinny) sized frames as well as the standard One Sheet poster frames. I remember when a new movie came out an artist came to the theatre and painted a custom Half Sheet and Insert posters based on the full version. You couldn't tell they were custom painted. I wish I had been able to keep some of those.
This whole episode was like that old man shakes fist at cloud meme from The Simpsons.
I don't know, I love some of the modern posters, including even some of the ones you've put here, like Dunkirk's, Soho's or Rogue One's.
7:00 Ain’t no way you can call the Lord of War and The Truman Show posters soulless. They are two of the best movie posters of all time.
Alien Covenant, while a terrible film, had one of my favorite posters ever. Just an Alien's head, the release date, and the word "Run" on a black background. Phenomenal
Very cool to see Darabont was paying tribute to a particular person when showing the movie posters the character has made in "The Mist".
Great movie posters also reminds me a lot of the novels I used to buy as a kid. There were some really memorable book covers out there, like the art for the original release of the Thrawn trilogy which were illustrated by Tom Jung (who also worked on one of the theatrical posters for Empire Strikes Back). The Dune books also have seen a vast array of cover art -- some inspired, some not so much.
Good video, very interesting as someone who collects posters, I do enjoy some of the head salad type posters, but look at composition and structure as well as color when I collect posters. I can understand those posters like the Hell Boy one looked gorgeous, while others don’t. I feel it’s a matter of opinion when it comes to certain designs.
I love your videos man I swear
A lot of the Imax posters are great. The more recent creature feature films such as Godzilla, Kong, and Planet of the Apes have posters I like as well.
I collect posters myself, mostly from 80's movies. The only recent poster I have is from District 9. I agree with the floating heads statement. No thought put into newer posters.
Good essay. This is exactly why I have Back To The Future and A Nightmare on Elm Street posters on my wall, but no matter how much I enjoy a movie like John Wick, it won't ever be hanging on my wall. It's a real shame that this is a lost art. These days, a lot of physical media distributors like SCREAM Factory will release special anniversary editions of cult classics with newly painted cover art which is often gorgeous. I wish those designs would make their way to poster format, but given the niche nature of these releases, it's not likely.
In the 2007 version of the mist. On the DVD special features there is a half hour documentary about Drew Struzan, talking about this very thing. The film opens with a shot of his work on canvases and the main character painting a current one as if it was his art.
Absolutely worth the DVD for that documentary alone.
Hah, I actually was thinking about his recentely! Ever since I made a letterbox account, I've seen several films (Suspiria, Belladona of Sadness, Shiva Baby, etc) because I loved the posters. Like a good book cover, it can make a difference!
If I'm not mistaken, one of the early Star Wars poster had the main characters on it, but they didn't look anything like the actors in the movie. A later similar poster made was in the actor's likeness however. I'm sure it was because they were unknowns or perhaps it was made up before it was actually cast. The Jaws artwork for the movie poster was simply carried over from the artwork on the novel cover it was so effective. I have reprints of both those posters. Two of my all time favorite movies (and posters).
A justified and very prominent message here! Awesome vid! But how do we solve this? If we were to use vintage styles for these movie posters it would be really captivating. But, like you said these posters somewhat take weeks or months. So would using this style of posters fail the promotion of films if they took too long?
As he said, they reflect the period they are released in. When it comes to what image that pops into my head when i think of a movie its rarely that of the poster.
I agree. Although nowadays there are still many great posters.
Some of my favourites are the Chinese version of Ghibli movie posters and Big Fish Begonia. I really like the illustrative styles and colours. More recent ones I really like are Parasite and EEAAO. Also I recommend looking at alternative movie posters as they tend to be more interesting and creative!
To some degree, the modern cinema is advertised on CZcams, Instagram, TikTok and all the major social media platforms, while a poster is still one of the advertisement methods, it isn't the key seller to the audience, so productions have started putting less and less effort into the beauty of it.
These days, we are more drawn towards a movie on the basis of its trailers and teasers.
So, it is all about time.
I know it's another superhero with his back in front of the camera poster, but the 2017 Logan poater has marked its place in my head as ome of my favorite movie posters. It features Logan walking towards the sunset, you can see his back and i think the claws of his right hand, unfortunately it's also one of many posters that was made for the same movie, but i really like it till this day and i remember once i wanted to print it and putting it next to posters like Star Wars on the wall.
Yorgos Lanthimos is my favorite director and the person who designs his movies posters, Vasilis Marmatakis, is incredibly creative. I really love those posters since they perfectly reflect the weirdness and darkness in Yorgos’ films.
The website alternative movie posters is a great way to get inspired for what could have been.
Since you mentioned Star Wars, another artist for Lucasfilm is Tsuneo Sanda. He did the poster for Attack of the Clones and he has an extensive body of work for Star Wars. His work has that photographic realism that just tells a story.
I think a large part of it really has to do with marketing the actors and the characters they play. I think movies are very character focused nowadays because recognizable characters (brands) are easier to sell than stories and abstract concepts. So you put as many characters as you can, or you take the face of your celebrity main character (like Matt Damon) and have his face fill the whole poster.
Teaser, IMAX, 4DX and Dolby Digital posters are 9/10 times better than the actual posters.
I also like the National Lampoon’s movie posters that are illustrated by Rick Meyerowitz. You don’t even need a trailer. The posters are enough. They capture everyone and everything in the illustration. The style doesn’t fit every genre, but they are really fun to look at.