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.
We often cite Wikipedia.org in our postings because it’s such a great online resource of information on most any subject. For those unfamiliar with the site, Wikipedia is known as “the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit”. From the Wikipedia.org About page:
Since its creation in 2001, Wikipedia has rapidly grown into the largest reference website on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, written collaboratively by people from all around the world. This website is a wiki, which means that anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer can edit, correct, or improve information throughout the encyclopedia, simply by clicking the edit this page link (with a few minor exceptions, such as protected articles and the main page).
For being such a far reaching reference on so many subjects, it’s a bit surprising that Wikiepdia’s entry about the term movie poster seems to be lacking. Since the power of Wikipedia is that it is collaborative, we were hoping our appeal to any Wikipedia editors (or would-be contributors) who are reading this site might be able to help make the movie poster article better and more informative. The current Wikipedia discussion about the article seems to be whether the entry only serves film poster collectors and dealers.
An example of what could help expand the article about movie posters: Is the term for a standard size theatrical movie poster spelled one sheet, one-sheet, onesheet, or 1 sheet? (We use different spellings for the term, but we believe the proper spelling is “one sheet“. But is this how Thomas Edison spelled “one sheet”?)
If you’d like to help edit the movie poster (or any other Wiki) article, you can read Wikipedia’s Tutorial to learn more about the editing process.
Actress Keira Knightley, in a recent interview, reminded everyone how her breasts were “digitally enhanced” back in 2004 for the King Arthur movie poster:
“I remember we had an interesting discussion when they said, ‘We want to make them slightly larger and you’ll get approval’ and I was like, ‘OK, fine.’ I honestly don’t give a shit.
But then they showed me the first copy and these things must have been double-Es — and they were down to my knees.
And I was like, ‘I don’t mind you making them bigger, but don’t give me droopy breasts. They look like your grandmother’s tits.’”
Keira seems to be trying to make a point about Hollywood’s attitude about actresses and how they are marketed (News Flash: Americans like large breasts), but she goes on to admit she does have final approval over how she is portrayed in key art. In the same interview she says about appearing on magazine covers:
“I did one magazine and found out you’re not actually allowed to be on a cover in the US without at least a C cup because it turns people off.”
While that sounds more like something she heard from an intern at a magazine cover photo shoot rather than an industry wide rule, it remains to be seen how each and every magazine art director chooses to depict Knightley on a magazine cover. What is true is that images of actors (all actors) are retouched in one way or another when appearing in film print advertising. Most of the time this goes unnoticed, sometimes not.
Looking at the special shoot image of Keira Knightley used for the King Arthur one-sheet, it’s not surprising the art directors and film execs involved decided to rework her figure, as her chest appears to be flattened by a tight leather strap costume. Did the studio go too far? Hard to say. Perhaps next time they’ll be able to highlight Keira Knightley’s abs instead, which don’t seem to need any enhancing.
Matthew Baldwin of the weblog Defective Yeti was a guest on the July 11th episode of the KUOW (the Seattle NPR affiliate) radio program The Works, talking about movie related weblogs. (You can listen to the show via an MP3 stream or Podcast.).
Matthew was kind enough to mention Posterwire.com as one of his favorite movie weblogs, which we certainly appreciate. We would also like to echo his pick of GreenCine Daily, a great film related weblog.
You have seen us mention the infamous “Two Big Heads Floating in the Sky” cliché of movie poster design many times in the past. (This “Big Head” type of movie poster could also be called a “Star Sell” — meaning the biggest selling point of the film, the film’s stars, are featured the most prominently on the one-sheet.)
So in honor of the big movie star heads on movie posters we asked one of our favorite artists — Goopy — to illustrate this beast of Hollywood film ad marketing: The Two Headed Movie Poster Monster. This Goopymart creation is available as a poster (natch), on t-shirts, and more.
The weblog Ironic Sans points out that movie posters for the new Ivan Reitman comedy My Super Ex-Girlfriend are using the same Uma Thurman head strip on two different bodies.
“Someone grafted the exact same head onto this poster, too. If they weren’t going to do a good job, couldn’t they at least make it less obvious that it’s the exact same head?”
It’s interesting the Ironic Sans site chooses to focus on the “cloned Umas” while giving the less than ideal Luke Wilson’s body double on the My Super Ex-Girlfriend poster no mention. It is all another example of how difficult a movie poster body double / actor Frankenstein creation can be to pull off.
Using the same head on different bodies isn’t uncommon (and sometimes a necessary evil). A possible explanation in this case might be that the head shot in question was the only “approved image” of Uma Thurman available for use at that time. Or perhaps a deadline forced the second poster artwork to use the same head shot. Or… we could speculate endlessly.
Most well-known movie stars have approval (either contractually or as a professional courtesy) over ALL photography of themselves available to a film’s marketing campaign. For example, when images from a film (in unit shots, special shoots, etc.) become available, the images are first given to the actor for approval. Contact sheets (also known as proof sheets) of all the photography are sent to the actor, which are then sent back with a lot of red Xs — known as “kills” — marked through photos that the star (or more likely, their manager) don’t want used. This can be frustrating for designers working on the project if some/most/all of the best shots are “killed”. This power to “kill” can be taken a step further when a star (or producer, director, etc.) has approval over the movie poster design of the final one-sheet. This is why one of the first questions asked by many art directors on many key art projects is: “Who has approval over this movie poster?”
