Movie poster artwork: Decline?

[Darren]

Hello,

This is a continuation of my "best era of movie poster art" thread from a
few months ago. :P

These days when I go to the local multiplexes, sadly I have to admit it is
less than 1 to 3 times a year, I notice that nearly all the movie posters
look the same or have a simular look to them (dark siloettes[mispelled] are
dominant).

What decade or year would you peg the start of the decline in movie poster
art work?

From memory and lookng at eBay auctions I'd say it was with the early 1980s.
The "Flash Dance" or "Dirty Dancing" type of poster work. From then on it
was a slippery slope.

What's your thoughts?

Darren

[Stott]

I think it began to deteriorate in the 50's- 60's, when more and more
text and credits crowded the picture. Nowadays I think that they want
you to notice the title, possibly from a distant moving car, and don't
care a lot about the image. The cheapening of the printing quality
hurt too.

Stott

[StormChaser]

Today, with more advertising venues such as TV, radio and the internet,
the significance of the movie poster for advertising has diminished sharply
since the mid-sixties.

Most of the time, the only place a real poster is seen is outside of a movie
theatre so most advertisers really don't care if the artwork is top notch.
People already know about the movie. It functions more as a sign than the
art it used to be.

"Darren" <dnem...@charter.net> wrote in message
news:Ckmue.7710$mD6...@fe07.lga...

[gerry]

The decline actually started in the late 1930s, when stars got studios
to give them credits above the title on posters. Early 30s movie
posters were all art design. Look at the poster for Gold Diggers of
1933 or 42nd Street as examples. Besides rarity, the artistic skill of
these early 30s posters is one reason for their super high sales
prices.
As the quality of the outside posters declined, the quality of the
opening credits on movies increased in many cases, starting in the
1950s.

[Darren]

Stott said this

> .....The cheapening of the printing quality hurt too.

The paper stock is definately of a more higher quality than what is made
today. I have about 200 movie posters from the early to mid 1960s era and I
like the texture of the older posters. A more thicker, fiberous paper in
most cases.

Darren

[Stott]

Darren wrote:

Well, what I meant was going from lithography and similar processes to
straightforward printing like a magazine cover. (OK, I don't have the
technical terms). The modern printing seldom has any real depth of color.

Stott

[Darren]

> Well, what I meant was going from lithography and similar processes to
> straightforward printing like a magazine cover. (OK, I don't have the
> technical terms). The modern printing seldom has any real depth of color.

I know that was what you ment. :)

But the type of paper used was still better, also. :)

Darren

[rod...@mont-alto.com]

StormChaser wrote:
> Today, with more advertising venues such as TV, radio and the internet,
> the significance of the movie poster for advertising has diminished sharply
> since the mid-sixties.
>
> Most of the time, the only place a real poster is seen is outside of a movie
> theatre so most advertisers really don't care if the artwork is top notch.
> People already know about the movie. It functions more as a sign than the
> art it used to be.

Well, it also has to work in newspaper ads too, which is the worst
possible punishment for detailed art. Of course, they are subtly
redesigned for newspaper use (with cute Santa hats on the characters
near the holidays), but the graphic designers try to have a single
"image" that appears in almost every ad as the symbol for the film.
Everyone remembers the bench image in the ad for Forrest Gump, for
instance. If you get something too busy -- the original STAR WARS
poster, for instance -- it isn't going to work in a small newspaper ad.
The change to glossy paper parallels the change to four-color printing,
which is just modern economics and presswork. (I just framed a
hand-screen-printed poster for a recent revival of Nosferatu -- you
aren't going to get that today even for art releases.)

I think some of the current movie posters do their job quite well. And
I actually dislike some of the original silent film posters --
especially those dour cartoon Buster Keaton posters. I don't think they
represent the films well at all. The THIEF OF BAGDAD posters are quite
magnificent. The posters I've seen for Valentino films don't seem to
capture his face or his charm very well.

-- Rodney