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.
Not Quite Hollywood is an excellent, raucous documentary looking at the Ozploitation genre of films – the low budget horror, action and comedies packed full of sex, violence and swearing that were made following the introduction of the adult ‘R’ rating by Australian censors in 1971. Featuring just about every surviving filmmaker and actor, the film intercuts new and archive interviews with footage from a huge list of titles that were made during the roughly 15 year period that the genre flourished. Writer/director Mark Hartley has a clear abiding love of the genre and wants to treat the viewer to as many clips and details as possible – you certainly won’t be bored watching this documentary.
Featuring films such as the action/horror Road Games, the dystopian horror Turkey Shoot, the telekinetic coma patient on rampage flick Patrick and the post-apocalyptic action classic Mad Max, it also has interviews with fans of the genre such as director Quentin Tarantino who admits to becoming obsessed with several of the films in the genre. He is interviewed both alone and alongside his friend the Anglo-Australian director Brian Trenchard-Smith (BMX Bandits, Dead End Drive-In) and these sections are particularly entertaining. I guarantee that you’ll come away from watching the documentary with a list of films to check out as soon as possible – I know I did!
This poster, which features several images from the original posters of the films, was put together by Marcus Cobbledick who is the ‘Theatrical Art Director’ at the film’s distributor Madman Entertainment. He is interviewed about his job in this article and mentions this particular poster:
‘Not Quite Hollywood was a special title as I was involved in the project before pre-production and worked many hours on the film itself. We had access to thousands of wonderful production stills and vintage posters from the archives so we were spoilt for choice when selecting images for the poster montage.’
Mark Hartley was interviewed on the (now defunct Media & Culture Australia) site and mentions that Cobbledick also had a hand in the opening title sequence for the film:
‘I had collected, over the years, so much poster art, and we had amassed an amazing amount of stills when we were doing the research. I said to [our graphic designer] Marcus Cobbledick: We just need to keep a real 70s feel, because all the poster art was so great. It’s a lost art. So I wanted everything to have that sort of sensibility to it, and he ran with it. He was getting briefs that no-one really gets: We need to get a photo of such-and-such, and then vomit on her’
Bonus points if you can name each film featured on this poster!
This Thai poster for Terry Jones’ 1989 fantasy film Erik the Viking features artwork by Tongdee Panumas. The prolific Jones (actor, director, author, screenwriter, poet, historian) is best known as a Monty Python member and director of the comedy group’s feature films. The film was inspired by Jones’ own 1983 children’s book The Saga of Erik the Viking but shares only character names; the plotline is completely different. Based largely on Norse mythology, Tim Robbins stars as the titular Viking who discovers in the opening scene that he has no taste for the usual Viking activities of raping and pillaging. He learns from a wise old woman that Fenrir the wolf has swallowed the sun and plunged the world into the chaotic age of Ragnarök. Erik resolves to gather a motley crew together to travel to Asgard and petition the gods to end Ragnarök and bring sunlight back to his people. First he must travel to Hy-Brasil and recover the ‘Horn Resounding’ and there he meets King Arnulf (Jones) and promptly falls in love with his daughter, Princess Aud (Imogen Stubbs).
The film was largely critically panned and didn’t fare too well at the box-office. Over the years Jones and his son Bill have made a few edits to the film, with a VHS release chopping 18 minutes from the runtime, before a 2006 “Director’s Son’s Cut” saw it reduced down to just 75 minutes (from the original theatrical running time of 107 minutes).
This Thai poster features a repainted take on the figures falling out of the viking boat, as seen on the German poster (and painted by Renato Casaro), but adds more colour and a montage of action scenes as was typical of the artist responsible. Tongdee Panumas was an incredibly prolific film poster artist during the 70s, 80s and 90s. I’ve been unable to find out much about him, other than that he was born in 1947, so if anyone has any more details please get in touch.
Note that this particular copy of the poster has been hand-signed by Tongdee and I bought it from someone who had visited Thailand, met the artist and had him sign a few posters. I’ve seen photographic evidence that it’s a genuine signature.
Sir Roger Moore‘s last outing as James Bond, A View to a Kill, was definitely not his finest hour, although it is memorable for a few reasons, including Christopher Walken‘s turn as the truly psychotic bad guy (Max Zorin), Duran Duran’s great title theme and the appearance of the incomparable Grace Jones as Mayday, Zorin’s accomplice. She may not be able to act very well but she’s never anything less than a striking presence and is definitely not a lady to mess with, as British chat show presenter Russell Harty infamously found out.
This poster is the UK one sheet that was designed by Vic Fair and illustrated by Brian Bysouth, a not insignificant pairing of two great English talents. Having been commissioned by the studio the poster was apparently then rejected and ultimately never used in cinemas to promote the film. Sim Branaghan, the man behind the must-own book ‘British Film Posters‘, interviewed Vic Fair who recalled that they were looking for a more conventional design, something that often frustrated the designer when working with clients:
‘Not very exciting are they, the Bond posters … always the same thing. So I had this idea of putting him in a white jacket, but they just threw their arms up in horror – “Ooh no, we can’t have that”. It was ridiculous really’
The poster is now known as the ‘recalled’ UK one sheet as, despite the poster having been printed, it was recalled by the studio and most copies were apparently pulped. Obviously, several did manage to escape destruction and made their way into the hands of poster dealers and collectors. I’d like to know a rough figure on how many did survive since it does show up at major auctions and on Ebay occasionally, so it’s certainly more than a tiny handful. If anyone has any more details on this please get in touch or leave a comment.
The artwork did end up being used for other countries, notably a Japanese B2 poster promoting the film.
For more information on Vic Fair and Brian Bysouth I highly recommend picking up a copy of ‘British Film Posters‘ as it features sections on both men. Here are the posters I’ve collected so far by Brian Bysouth and those by Vic Fair (with more to add over the coming months).
In 2012 I met and interviewed Brian Bysouth and this poster was discussed:
There are two specific collaborations you had with Vic Fair that I’d like to talk about. There was the UK one sheet for A View to a Kill, which you mentioned, and before I read Sim’s book I had no idea that it was one of yours. It’s quite different to others you’d worked on before then.
Ah yes, that poster was painted with a different technique than the one I’d typically work with. It has a very smooth look mostly done with an airbrush. The clients had started to require illustrations to have a less painted look and they were asking for much more photo-realistic illustrations. This requirement was because of falling sales in the video market. The clients had concluded that the paying public had become more discerning and distrustful of what was portrayed on the video sleeves, and to some extent on film posters. The public had begun to realise that an exciting illustration could flatter what in reality would be a truly awful film. So illustration had to take on a new, more highly-finished look, but this only worked for a short while before the use of photographs and the versatility of the computer took over completely.
Anyway, to continue, Vic asked me if I’d like to do the finished painting based on his rough; it was a really excellent and novel design, which required me to execute the painting in two stages. The first stage would be used as a teaser poster and this was just the image ofGrace Jones and Bond contained within a diamond motif. All I had to do was get the airbrush out and work up his design. I remember spending a while on the Grace Jones image, polishing and improving her look, as well as the pose of Bond. It went away to be printed but later we were disappointed to learn that it was going to be withdrawn because the clients were not happy with the legendary spy being portrayed in a white tuxedo; that being considered not very Bond-like!
For the second stage, Vic’s design included an exciting montage to fit either side of the central icon of the two characters. The preliminary painting was returned to me for completion and I continued by adding the montage of scenes from the film onto the artwork in a semi-drawn style, which I was experimenting with at the time. I was very pleased with the final results and Vic liked it too. That went off for approval but, for reasons unknown to me, the printing didn’t go ahead. I never saw the artwork again and pathetically, because it was not approved, I don’t even think a transparency was made. I entertain hopes that one day it will eventually re-appear and I will be able to establish my claim to ownership.
Here’s the film’s original trailer.
