I’m a big fan of movie posters. I surround myself with them at the office, and I have dozens at home as well. My favorites are the original Raiders of the Lost Ark poster, which hangs above the DVD collection, the original poster for The Dark Crystal, which hangs above my writing desk in my study, and the very first teaser poster for The Fellowship of the Ring which shows Frodo holding out the Ring to us (that one’s in the living room).
It was an exciting year for movie posters in my opinion. In some cases, I liked the posters more than the movies themselves. I’m curious, though… what were your favorites?
Check out the library of 2008 posters here.
A few of my favorites:
The Bank Job
Blindness
Burn After Reading
The Dark Knight
Dear Zachary
The Express
Funny Games
Get Smart
The Happening
Hellboy 2: The Golden Army
Iron Man
Max Payne
My Blueberry Nights
Gus Van Sant’s Paranoid Park
The Ruins
Semi-Pro
Shotgun Stories
Son of Rambow
Step Brothers
10,000 B.C.
27 Dresses
W.
WALL-E
The Wrestler
And I have a question: Why is there a dragon on this poster?
The “Be Kind Rewind” poster is fun…
The Visitor: http://www.shockya.com/news/2008/03/01/poster-the-visitor-movie-poster-featuring-richard-jenkins/
Man on Wire: http://www.joblo.com/index.php?id=22087
My Kid Could Paint That: http://www.impawards.com/2007/my_kid_could_paint_that.html
Kind of a throwback year, huh?
“Burn After Reading”, “Funny Games” and “The Bank Job” all have a very 60s/70s feel to them that I find interesting (and enjoyable).
There’s one movie in particular that the “Burn After Reading” poster makes me think of, but I can’t think of what it is. I guess there are a couple of Hitchcock posters that are kind of along the same lines (“Vertigo”, is one, I think; I’m trying to think if “The Birds” or “Psyco” do a similar thing too [a drawing, blocky letters).
“Shotgun Stories” also has a grainy, “blown-up” look to it too, that makes me think of the 70s.
Thanks for this fun post! And for introducing me to a great website. Have a Merry Christmas a good New Year!
Funny Games. Possibly the strongest movie poster I’ve seen. That one for The Wrestler is good too.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, or read the book so I don’t know why there is a dragon on the “Tale Of Desperaux” poster but that poster gets my vote. It’s simply beautiful and enchanting and it’s art. My second choice might be “W” – again I have not seen the movie, and most likely I won’t ever see it. However I know about the film and it’s a poke at the President and the poster says pretty much everything which is what a movie poster should -I at least applaud the designer for getting that all right in one clever design.
I haven’t seen the movie but considering Despereaux is about a mouse who loves books my vote for why the dragon, beyond marketing, is that dragons are part of his library experience. And I only know about the library because of NPR’s review on my way home from work today.
It’ll be fun to find out why: let’s hope we do . . .
I saw The Tale of Despereaux and I think the dragon connects to either a story Despereaux reads or one of his mind fantasies or both.