Posterwire.com is a movie poster weblog. From images of the latest Hollywood one-sheets to vintage movie posters, this film poster weblog hopes to offer a bit of insight into film key art.
Is 007 back? Well, not really, but… Jason Statham returns as a rough and tumble mercenary driver for hire in The Transporter 2. For The Transporter 2 one-sheet, the film’s advertising executives decided to pay homage [cough] to that iconic touchstone of sexy spy film posters, the one-sheet for the James Bond film For Your Eyes Only.
For the 1981 Roger Moore Bond film, legendary movie poster art director Bill Gold created a photo illustration of Bond seen in perspective between the legs of a thong wearing femme fatale armed with a crossbow. Designer Gold was well known throughout the industry, particularly for his work on poster key art for Clint Eastwood films, including the “Dirty Harry” series in the 1970s. Needless to say, the For Your Eyes Only poster created controversy in some venues, with later versions featuring retouched shorts on the crossbow wielding model. Newspaper ads for the Bond film covered the leggy assassin even further by painting on a black mini-skirt.
We’ll leave it to you to judge the Transporter 2 movie poster and whether it’s an effective one-sheet. (We did notice that the model in this modern poster is cropped a bit more modestly than the Bond original. Is that considered progress?)
Homage or Rip-off?
Posterwire notes the similarity between the posters for THE TRANSPORTER 2 and FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. It’s sad commentary on movies today that the poster for a cutting-edge, French action movie is actually tamer than a 20-year-poster for a