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.

Legendary director David Lynch‘s brilliant, surreal nightmare Eraserhead celebrates its 35th anniversary in 2012 and its fair to say cinema has seen nothing else quite like it in the years since it was released. Lynch’s first full-length feature was five years in the making and was begun whilst he worked at the American Film Institute school in Los Angeles. The initial grant of $10,000 given to the director quickly ran out and he was forced to spend the following years using money from odd jobs, as well as donations from friends and family to continue work on it.

Ben Barenholtz, the owner of Libra films saw the completed film at the Filmex Festival and, after declaring it was a ‘film of the future’, decided to help Lynch get the film into cinemas. The first screening took place at midnight on the 29th of September, 1977 and, like Jodorowsky’s El Topo before it, Eraserhead became a staple of Midnight Movie shows in Los Angeles, New York and London.

This Japanese poster is from a 1993 re-release of the film and features the classic shot of Henry (Jack Nance) with his worried stare and great shock of hair. The poster was printed on mirrored mylar paper and is therefore very hard to photograph without capturing lots of reflections.

Having just watched the recent UK blu-ray release of the film, which was apparently supervised by Lynch, I can highly recommend picking up a copy of it as the film has never looked or, perhaps more importantly, sounded as good.

The original trailer is on YouTube.

Steven Spielberg’s folllow up to JM Barrie’s classic Peter Pan story featured Robin Williams playing a grown-up Peter Pan, now called Peter Banning and working as a corporate lawyer, who has forgotten his life in Neverland. Whilst visiting England his two children are kidnapped by a mysterious stranger and it’s not long before Tinkerbell [Julia Roberts] appears to return him to the world he once knew so that he can reclaim his youthful spirit and save his family.

The film was roundly panned by critics but was nevertheless considered a box-office success (with worldwide takings over $300 million) and is one of those films that splits audiences in two. Today, Hook continues to have as many fans as it does detractors, with some calling it Spielberg’s worst film and others lauding it as a misunderstood classic.

Whatever people thought of the film there’s no question that this final release poster by Drew Struzan was a definite success. It followed a very minimal teaser poster by John Alvin, which doesn’t even feature the name of the film. In his must-have book ‘The Art of Drew Struzan’, the artist talks about the creation of the poster:

‘We had a very long time to work on it, and you know what means: I wound up recombining heads, seemingly forever. ‘Round and ’round, for more than six months; everybody at Sony who needed to stake a reputation had an opinion on what the poster should be.

Nevertheless, Drew used the strong relationship he had built with Spielberg on previous projects to make sure his designs were seen by the director:

(…) I took each group of drawings directly to Steven. The first time, I walked onto the set where they were shooting Peter Pan in the tree stump. Steven stopped everything after he called “cut”, we laid out all the art on this huge table, and he stood there for like half an hour talking with me about it. Now, the cost-per-minute budget on a movie this big is how much? But Steven can do what he wants.

Not everyone was happy with the work in progress, as Drew recalls:

Dustin [Hoffman] said, “It’s not that I don’t like my portrait – it’s beautiful. But I don’t think it’s my character”. He wanted Hook to look “less villainous”. So off I went to Dustin’s house (…) we’re walking and taking and suddenly he goes into Actor Mode to explain what he wants (…) Finally I had to paint out a third of the picture and redesign it. He loved it. They all loved it.

Drew clearly loves the design but he notes that, in a twist of Hollywood madness, the poster wasn’t actually in cinemas until a week after the film opened.

The book (which is also available on Amazon.com and from all good bookshops) features many different versions of the poster before this one was ultimately chosen. Only Drew could have nailed the faces, particularly those of Williams and Hoffman, as well as this.

To see a gallery of the other posters by Drew I’ve collected click here.

The original trailer is on YouTube.