2008: The Year in Posters
The Best
1. Hellboy II: The Golden Army - The only one-sheet of the year to literally take my breath away, this beautiful rendering effortlessly suggests the cosmic, devastating struggle of our unlikely hero to find himself in the world, literally falling to his knees at the forces before him. Looking up with a beam of heavenly light embracing him, his determination and grace is noble, awe-inspiring, and singularly badass.
2. Tropic Thunder - Approximately 100x funnier than the concentrated sum of Ben Stiller's misguidedly obvious Hollywood satire, this banner brilliantly delivers its denunciation of overwrought blockbuster pretensions in the punchline of Robert Downey, Jr.'s wily facial expression. It's a stroke of genius that transcends mortal words.
3. WALL·E - As majestic an image as any in Disney-Pixar's near-masterpiece. I'd prefer the composition sans all non-title text (kudos, though, for the nicely understated tag line), but one cannot deny the simple, profound poetry in the image of this impossibly endearing fella and his soulful peepers, contemplating his place in the universe and beyond the infinite.
4. My Blueberry Nights - Like Wong Kar-wai's underappreciated film, this attention-grabbing shot smacks of gooey, sensuous, no-holds-barred romance, wondrous to behold and worth a thousand swoons.
5. The Bank Job - Roger Donaldson's film isn't quite as devilishly satisfying as this pulpy, retro-styled one-sheet (suggestive of a lurid crime novel one might find in the bargain bin at a seedy flea market) might suggest, but that's an unfair comparison given this composition's riveting sense of in-the-moment anticipation.
6. Iron Man - Perhaps the finest facial montage since Roger Kastel's Empire Strikes Back masterpiece, this setup sleekly, tastefully promises everything that an artful summer blockbuster should be; almost as astounding was how near-perfectly the film itself delivered.
7. The Dark Knight - Whether you love or hate the film in question, there's little room to deny the eye-popping effectiveness of the advertising campaign for Christopher Nolan's big, booming sequel. Trying to choose only one of these three is, to these eyes, an exercise in torture.
8. W. - Audiences and critics expected a scandalous political diatribe from Oliver Stone's strangely timely biopic, only to unfairly dismiss the deliberately, necessarily tame work as a result. Among the film's many early teasers, this one most succinctly captures the tone of a work not about a clown in the public spotlight but a misguided leader who, for reasons within and without his control, simply didn't have a clue.
9. Paranoid Park - Simply put, there's no way to communicate the visual smorgasbord of Gus Van Sant's angst-ridden tone poem without actually immersing oneself in it, but this haunted, lonely image of the film's wandering teen effectively ensnares one in the solitude of the subject matter.
10. Australia - I've yet to see Baz Luhrmann's woefully received epic, but this tryptic of synthetically-embracing, romance-infused images had me hook, line and sinker at first sight. Even if the man can't tell a story to save a limb (as those who've seen the film have by and large suggested), his technical command, evident here, is a force to be reckoned with.
Honorable Mention: RocknRolla - Destined to hang in only the coolest of college dorm rooms (side note: how hilarious is that text-message influenced URL?), this ridiculously gonzo, boffo thing blisters with vigorous, chic pop art madness, like a shot of seductive enzyme gone straight to the jugular.
The Worst
1. The Hottie & the Nottie - I can't pretend to be anything but biased here - about 96% of Paris Hilton's persona offends everything I think true and virtuous in this life, and this titanic piece of dubious crap only serves to further that notion. Forget the fact that, given the choice to "tap" either of these titular hyperboles, I'd rather shoot myself, and focus on the shrill, juvenile notions about what constitutes sexuality on display here. It's enough to make one wish for nuclear holocaust.
2. Bad Batch - I never heard of this film prior to my unfortunate run-in with the above, altogether ugly image, and to the best of my estimation, nor had anybody else lucky enough to avoid it. Aside from the fact that the grade-Z effort on display here is an insult to even the most obnoxious of potheads, this teaser is manifest of such stupidity that just looking at it is enough to feel it rubbing off.
3. City of Ember - The revelation of the "e" logo in the official City of Ember trailer may have been the most underwhelming cinematic moment of 2008. Note to all advertisers and graphic designers: adding lighting bolts to lower-case vowels might look cool in a book club publications intended for middle schoolers, but for a theatrical motion picture - even one designed primarily for consumption by kids - it is the epitome of that which is lame.
4. Religulous - Even as a skeptic and one critical of much in the way of organized religion, the vibes emitted by Bill Maher's faith-critical opinion piece seemed disingenuous at best, aided in no small part by smug, self-satisfied and altogether unimaginative images like the one employed here. Please, for the love of all that is thoughtful, just go away.
5. Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed - Someone out there thought that the image of Ben Stein scrawling graffiti in an AC/DC outfit was one that constituted subversion, hipness, and cool. What planet are they from?
6. An American Carol - If my gut is any indicator, Abraham Lincoln's corpse needs a centrifuge for all the spinning he's doing right now.
7. The Women - Winner of this year's award for Zero Eye for Composition Whatsoever.
8. College - I'm grateful to say that my days of academia never once included so intimate an encounter with the invention where most of us prefer to defecate. As of this moment, I feel vindicated.
9. Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden? - Wherever it is, it can't be far off. An image such as this can only mean that, in at least a small way, the terrorists have won.
10. Mamma Mia! - Call me silly, but I tend to not look at the movies as an excuse to revisit bad party scenes with douchebag relatives.
Dishonorable Mention: Witless Protection - There's alot going on here that's just plain wrong, but what irks me the most is the stale, altogether soulless look in Jenny McCarthy's eyes. Is she supposed to be that entranced by Larry the Cable Guy's hairy torso, or is this just reflective of the by-and-large manner in which the film's target audience views the female gender? Both possibilities are too frightening to truly contemplate, to say the least.
And, finally, a bonus bit of anguish: 2008's DVD Cover from Hell...
If looking at this doesn't fill you with an immediate, profound sadness at the current state of the human race, then you are a far more optimistic being than I, and I envy you for it.
Labels: posters
