An excellent design on this 30×40 poster for the release of one the most prominent entries in the blaxploitation genre, 1973’s Cleopatra Jones. The late Tamara Dobson stars as the eponymous secret agent who masquerades as a catwalk model in order to disguise her real job, which sees her traveling the globe and tackling drug gangs. After burning down a Turkish poppy field used to create heroin by the kingpin Mommy (Shelley Winters), Cleopatra returns to Los Angeles to arrest the dirty cops on the cartel’s payroll. An incensed Mommy tracks our heroine back home and tries to prevent her dismantling the rest of her drug operation.
The film is notable for being the first in the genre to feature a strong female lead who uses physical strength and combat skills to battle adversaries, and because of its box-office success was later followed by films such as Coffy, Black Belt Jones and Foxy Brown. Dobson would return for the sequel Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold, which was released two years later but saw nowhere near the same level of success, mostly due to the blaxploitation genre’s waning appeal at that time.
I’m unsure who is responsible for the design of this poster, or for the hand-drawn artwork featured on it, so if you have any ideas please get in touch.
The trailer is on YouTube.
The late Tamara Dobson‘s second and last outing as the titular blaxploitation crime-fighter sees her traveling to Hong Kong to rescue two of her fellow agents who have disappeared whilst on a case. She soon discovers that the owner of a Macao casino and major drug lord, the sinister Dragon Lady (Stella Stevens), is responsible and Cleopatra sets out to stop her at all costs.
Apparently the film failed to make as much of an impact as the first one due to the fall in popularity of blaxploitation films by 1975. Director Charles Bail had previously worked on another entry in the genre, Black Samson, released in 1974. He went on to direct episodes of several TV series including CHiPs, Knight Rider and Dragnet.
The original trailer is on YouTube.
The late Tamara Dobson‘s second and last outing as the titular blaxploitation crime-fighter sees her traveling to Hong Kong to rescue two of her fellow agents who have disappeared whilst on a case. She soon discovers that the owner of a Macao casino and major drug lord, the sinister Dragon Lady (Stella Stevens), is responsible and Cleopatra sets out to stop her at all costs.
Apparently the film failed to make as much of an impact as the first one due to the fall in popularity of blaxploitation films by 1975. Director Charles Bail had previously worked on another entry in the genre, Black Samson, released in 1974. He went on to direct episodes of several TV series including CHiPs, Knight Rider and Dragnet.
The excellent artwork is by the American artist Robert Tanenbaum who was responsible for many excellent film posters during the 1970s and 80s. He’s also an award-winning portrait artist and his official website features several galleries of his impressive work. IMPAwards also features a number of his film posters.
To see other posters I’ve collected by him click here.
The original trailer is on YouTube.
This is the original Czech poster for the release of Steven Spielberg’s Indiana Jones and Temple of Doom, which followed on from the classic Raiders of the Lost Ark but was in fact a prequel to the original action-adventure. Set in 1935 (so pre-WWII Nazis), the film sees Harrison Ford’s intrepid adventurer escaping from an ambush in a Shanghai nightclub whilst trying to procure an ancient artefact. Together with the American lounge singer Willie Scott (Kate Capshaw) and a cocky Chinese kid called Short Round (Jonathan Ke Quan) he escapes on a plane only to be double-crossed by the pilots who disable the controls before parachuting out. Surviving with the improbable help of a rubber dinghy, the trio end up in a remote northern Indian village.
After discovering that all the children from the surrounding area have been kidnapped and taken to the nearby Pankot Palace, as well as the fact that village’s sacred stone is missing, Indy decides to pay a visit to the palace. Although they receive a warm welcome at first, questioning around the missing children is quickly dismissed and later that night Indy is attacked by an assassin, which leads the trio to discover a hidden door in Willie’s room. Venturing through booby-trapped passages they discover an underground temple which is presided over by an evil Thuggee priest called Mola Ram and before long their presence is discovered.
Although the film received mixed critical notice back in 1984, particularly in respects to its darker tone and increased violence over Raiders (the film was responsible for the creation of the American PG-13 rating), the film was mostly well received by fans and has since gained more of a critical appreciation. Spielberg was less enamoured by the finished film, however, and is quoted as saying “Temple of Doom is my least favourite of the trilogy. I look back and I say, ‘Well the greatest thing that I got out of that was I met Kate Capshaw. We married years later and that to me was the reason I was fated to make Temple of Doom'”
The film was first released in Czechoslovakia in 1986 and this poster was designed and printed by the Czech artist Milan Pecák. The imagery alludes to one of the most memorable scenes in the film, which seriously disturbed me when I watched it as a child, where Mola Ram sacrifices an unlucky innocent into a fiery pit. A celebrated designer and artist, Pecák was born in 1962 and studied at the Vaclav Hollar School of Fine Arts in Prague before working as an architect and later as a set designer for several films.
It was whilst working on the 1986′ ‘Zastihla Me Noc’ that he was first given the opportunity to work on the film’s poster and from then onwards he was in demand as an artist for posters advertising Czech releases, as well as several American films, including Gorillas in the Mist, Mississippi Burning and arguably his most famous design for James Cameron’s Terminator (released in Czechoslovakia in 1990). In addition to film posters, Pecak is also an accomplished book and magazine cover illustrator and in his spare time works on fine art painting as well as digital graphics.
Milan Pecak’s official website can be viewed here and features several galleries of his work as well as a biography.
Probably my favourite of the five cinematic outings by the Monty Python crew, Life of Brian is one of the funniest films ever made and the brilliant satirical humour hasn’t diminished at all in the thirty plus years since its release. Infamously causing an uproar with various religious groups, it also saw EMI, the original financial backers, pulling out during production claiming the script was blasphemous. Luckily, George Harrison stepped in with the finance, apparently after realising it may have been the last chance to see another Python film in cinemas. His company HandMade Films was formed as a result of this deal.
The film’s religion-baiting story sees a man called Brian (Graham Chapman) born at the same time as Jesus Christ and initially mistaken for the Messiah, who ends up living an unremarkable life under the Roman occupation of Judea. Things take a fateful turn when his infatuation with a young rebel called Judith (Sue Jones-Davies) leads him to join the People’s Front of Judea, a bickering group who have decided to take a stand against the emperor.
The film raised the ire of several religious groups who were outraged at the concept, despite most of them having never even seen the film, and it was only given a general release once several cuts had been made. Despite the edits, several local UK councils banned the film from being shown at cinemas within their boroughs. Apparently some of these bans lasted until very recently, with the Welsh town of Aberystwyth finally lifting its one in 2009, which then saw a screening of the film attended by Jones, Michael Palin and Sue Jones-Davies, who was the then mayor of the town.
One of the more infamous bans was carried out by the Norwegians who refused to allow the film to be screened at all, which lead some of the international marketing material for the film to be emblazoned with the proclamation ‘So funny it was banned in Norway!’
This is the American one sheet for the release of the film featuring illustration by an artist I have been unable to identify. William Stout had previously provided an illustration for an alternative one sheet, which can be seen here.
The original American trailer can be seen on YouTube.
Probably my favourite of the five cinematic outings by the Monty Python crew, Life of Brian is one of the funniest films ever made and the brilliant satirical humour hasn’t diminished at all in the thirty plus years since its release. Infamously causing an uproar with various religious groups, it also saw EMI, the original financial backers, pulling out during production claiming the script was blasphemous. Luckily, George Harrison stepped in with the finance, apparently after realising it may have been the last chance to see another Python film in cinemas. His company HandMade Films was formed as a result of this deal.
The film’s religion-baiting story sees a man called Brian (Graham Chapman) born at the same time as Jesus Christ and initially mistaken for the Messiah, who ends up living an unremarkable life under the Roman occupation of Judea. Things take a fateful turn when his infatuation with a young rebel called Judith (Sue Jones-Davies) leads him to join the People’s Front of Judea, a bickering group who have decided to take a stand against the emperor.
The film raised the ire of several religious groups who were outraged at the concept, despite most of them having never even seen the film, and it was only given a general release once several cuts had been made. Despite the edits, several local UK councils banned the film from being shown at cinemas within their boroughs. Apparently some of these bans lasted until very recently, with the Welsh town of Aberystwyth finally lifting its one in 2009, which then saw a screening of the film attended by Jones, Michael Palin and Sue Jones-Davies, who was the then mayor of the town.
One of the more infamous bans was carried out by the Norwegians who refused to allow the film to be screened at all, which lead some of the international marketing material for the film to be emblazoned with the proclamation ‘So funny it was banned in Norway!’
This is a scarce, alternate style UK quad which differs from the other somewhat confusing design, which is simply the logo doubled up. A reader of the site got in touch to confirm that this quad was designed in house at HandMade films. To quote their informative email:
HandMade and the Pythons decided to re-submit the film to Irish Film Board to have the original ban overturned. The submission was successful and with the censor certification under our belt plans to release the film moved ahead and the Life of Brian was finally released in Ireland I recall in the summer of 1988 as I recall eight years after original release. One of the unsung heroes of HandMade was freelance artist/designer George Rowbottom.
George was closely involved in many HMF posters over the years along with Ray Cooper and it was George who re-worked Life of Brian poster and came up with the “tablet” design for the quad used for the Irish release and also the superior amended 1-sheet. In both cases these were printed by National Screen who printed all our posters for domestic and international.
The original American trailer can be seen on YouTube.
A unique design on this Japanese B2 for the 1969 take on the true story of the infamous Wild West outlaws Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, here played by Paul Newman and Robert Redford in arguably their greatest screen roles. George Roy Hill would later go on to direct the pair again in the equally brilliant con men caper The Sting (1973).
The film follows the pair as they rob from money trains with varying success (a botched effort can be seen on the poster) and are forced to flee America after a posse of bounty hunters are unleashed to track them down. Arriving in Bolivia with the Sundance Kid’s lover, Etta Place (played by the gorgeous Katharine Ross), the duo try to make an honest living working as security guards. It’s not long before a violent incident sends them back to their old ways and on a collision course with destiny. The film features arguably the most famous freeze-frame ending in cinematic history.
A number of excellent posters for the film can be viewed here. The original trailer is on YouTube.
