The Lookout Poster

I can’t talk about this poster without mention this interview in which director Scott Frank talks about how he hates the trailer and the poster for the movie because they misrepresent the kind of movie this is. So that is a big problem with the poster right there.

The poster in itself, when considered outside of the movie, is actually pretty nice. This kind of layout, with various boxes, each one containing one character, is pretty cliched. Especially when it comes to crime thrillers. But it works well enough here. Not a great or very original poster, but a solid, nice looking one.

But misrepresenting what audiences will get one they actually go to the theater is a big, big sin. Bad Poster!

The Lookout opens this Friday.

Meet the Robinsons Poster

Oh look! It’s a bunch of weird characters ! And then there is the kid who looks out of place and shocked and stuff! This must be a fun movie!

Ok, seriously now. I like the poster. Honestly! I do think that the film is basically about this one character traveling to the future and encountering a bunch of different stuff, so the Poster is accurate.

But the poster’s execution leaves a little to be desired, especially because nothing really stands out from it. Sure, there are a lot of details to look at, but a quick glimpse won’t reveal much interesting. All the characters take about the same space in the poster and just sort of blend with each other.

And all the yellow/orange? Sort of ugly.

Blades of Glory Poster

This poster is basically Will Ferrell and Jon Heder wearing flamboyant spandex suits and doing a silly pose. Which I guess is a pretty good description of what the movie is all about.

The poster goes the “take them seriously” route. It doesn’t itself make fun of the characters, what they do or their seriousness. That job is left for us in the audience. I think that is a good way to go, considering the film’s narrow premise.

Blades of Glory opens this Friday.

No Reservations Poster

The good part: No white background! Instead we get a brown kitchen background. Which I honestly believe to be a step up.

The bad part: Catherine Zeta-Jones look awfully chirpy for someone who recently lost her sister, unexpectedly has to take care of her niece and is forced to accept working with Aaron Eckhart by her boss.

See, the movie, which is a remake of the German Mostly Martha, is about an uptight chef who has her life turned upside down. Eventually she will loosen up and fall in love with the Eckhart character, but that is towards the end of the movie. This poster makes the relationship between the two characters seem easy going and fun, which is a bad misrepresentation of the film’s premise.

As a matter of fact, just having this two characters in equal footing and alone in the poster is already a misrepresentation. The main character is the Zeta-Jones one, by far. And the aforementioned niece is just as important to the story as the Aaron Eckhart character, if not more. The poster makes this look like a typical romantic comedy set in a kitchen, and it’s not, or at least it is not supposed to be.

The promotion for this movie is giving me a bad vibe. It make the film seem like a watered down version of the original, and the original was itself pretty light. Not good.

Related: the No Reservations trailer.

New Transformers Posters

(click to enlarge)

Transformers is yet another one of those movies that I used to think was going to suck but that I now am starting to think might be lots of fun. And this two new character posters actually make me look forward to it more.

Here is what I like:

• The look of the robots themselves is very realistic. The toys and cartoons were always very, well, cartoonistic. In the movie they seem to be going for a more “what if giant robots really existed” style, which should make for a very different, more serious version of Transformers. And I like that. As much as I loved the toons when I was growing up, I’d rather the film gave us a perspective we haven’t seen before.
• The posters makes the film look huge and epic. I’m mostly referring to how the city seems small compared to the robots. This manages to make the stakes seem higher, since we are able to imagine that the robots are capable of causing some pretty big havoc in our world.

And what I don’t like:

• I’m afraid the robots might be a little too inexpressive. Sure, there will be humans, but we need to bond with the Autobots too, and hate the Decepticons. It’s hard to feel anything too strong about a machine that doesn’t really have much of an expression.
• Don’t they look a little too much like each other? Perhaps that’s part of the point. And you can tell that the one with blue paint and eyes is the good guy, and the one with only black paint and red eyes is the bad guy. But I still wished their designs were more different from one another.

The transformers are coming our way in July.

Then and Now: The Hills Have Eyes Posters

The Hills Have Eyes (1977) Vs. The Hills Have Eyes (2006)

n the newer poster we have the creepy image of a woman who is being held down by an unseen assailant. In the older poster we have a bald guy. Oh how much movie posters have changed.

Honestly, the older poster is pretty cheesy and follows the convention of showing “the monster”. I don’t think that was ever a very effective style and you don’t see much of that anymore. What you generally get nowadays is a shot of the victim, or part of her (and it generally is a “her”). Sometimes you get a hint of “the monster”, perhaps a tool he uses, or, in this case, a hand. But never a full blown picture of his face.

The Hills Have Eyes Part 2 (1985) Vs. The Hills Have Eyes 2 (2007)

And here we see pretty much the same difference. In the poster for The Hills Have Eyes Part 2 the bald guy is joined by grimacing red guy. In the poster for the latest film we have a victim in a bag being dragged through a desert.

I think I prefer the posters for the new films. A lot.

By the way, The Hills Have Eyes 2 is not a remake of The Hills Have Eyes Part 2. But it is still fun comparing their posters.

Away from Her Poster

Here is a poster the once again proves that not all characters on a white background posters are created equal.

I like the way the characters are positioned and the way they interact. And I think the lighting, hair, make-up and wardrobe give the poster a very classic and dignified look. But what I really appreciate in the poster is how the woman (Fiona, played by Julie Christie) is disappearing, a subtle reference to the fact that the character suffers from Alzheimer’s.

This movie is the first directorial effort from actress Sarah Polley, and it is about how the two main characters depicted in the poster deal with Fiona losing her memory due to Alzheimer’s. I haven’t seen the film, but this seems to me like a poster that really complements the movie and informs us about it’s tone. Very good.

(Source: Cinematical)

Wind Chill Poster

The problem with using a tagline like “There are worse things than dying” is that some smartass (like me) is bound to respond with “Yeah, like watching this movie”.

Besides that, the rest of the poster doesn’t do much to make this look interesting, does it? Basically what you can tell from it is that the movie will be some sort o terror story about a woman being terrorized by something, and that the setting will probably be somewhere cold. Very generic so far.

And the poster doesn’t even look that good. The whole white-black-blue color scheme is not very interesting, at least not as it is used here.

The movie opens in April, so I’m guessing this will be the final poster. Well, maybe the trailer is great?

Pride Poster

I really hate this poster. Why? Mostly because it’s ugly. The whole stylised blue waves surrounding the faces of the cast makes for an unseemly contrast. And the blue waves themselves don’t really work. They feel weird, out of place, like they belong in a surfer movie.

Also, the poster does little to make you interested in the movie. It doesn’t give us any sense of what the relationship between the characters is. It doesn’t give you any idea as to why you should care about them or about what they will have to go thorough. It basically tells you nothing.

And why is Terrence Howard the only one laughing? It makes no sense.

Now, this poster is much better:

Still a little too bland for my tastes, but it has several good characteristics. It evokes the period the movies takes place in. The positions of the characters hint at their relationships. And their postures and looks tell us these are people that are serious about what they are doing and who are maybe facing difficulties in order to do it. I think that evoking the period is especially important since the movie seems to also focus a lot on this aspect.

So, not great, but definitely not fake wavy things ugly.

Reign Over Me Poster

Oh, I love this poster, so so beautiful.

We get the usual characters interacting stuff. Which is important. It let’s us see that Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle are in it, and that their relationship is central to the movie. But the characters are unusually small and most of the poster is taken by the background.

And what brilliant background it is. Although it doesn’t resort to using any clear landmarks, it is obviously meant to evoke New York City, which is relevant since the movie deals with the aftermath of a loss occurred in 9/11. The city, and the tragedy, loom over the characters. It’s in the background, and doesn’t call attention to itself, but it is undeniably there. Subtle, touching and effective.

And the use of color (or lack of color) is also great. Not only it looks good, but it also portrays the sadness that the characters must be dealing with, while still pointing to the possibility of happier times. There is light (and color) in the end of the tunnel, so to speak.

I can only hope the movie is as subtle, appropriate and touching.