Haven’t I Seen You Before?

Would you believe that there will be yet another Three Musketeers film? It’s true. This version stars Orlando Bloom and Milla Jovovich and was directed by Paul W.S. Anderson. The movie is scheduled for release on October 11, 2011. An image of the movie poster is floating around cyberspace and chatter on it is mixed. There are comments from those who like it, saying that it recalls a time when movie posters were drawn. Comments from those who don’t like it range from “Blah” and “Lame” to “Too busy for this poster. My eyes are all over the place!!!” As for me, I like the compositional style, I just don’t like the look of those in the poster. They have a going through the motions/ “I’m just here for the check” look. Below is the poster.

Moving right along, a recent story in the Times of India was about two movie posters. In particular, how a Bollywood movie poster for Murder 2 was very similar to Lars won Trier’s Antichrist. Both posters featured arms entangled in twisted branches and if there weren’t an Internet either no one would call attention to it or the attention would come much later. Anyway, below are the two posters in question.

What’s going on here? Has Hollywood’s current recycling kick spread to posters? Actually no. The reuse/repurposing of compositional and artistic styles has been going on since before the Renaissance. Both Michelangelo and Leonardo DaVinci influenced Raphael. Henri Matisse and pre-Roman Iberian sculpture influenced Picasso. A can of soup influenced Andy Warhol. I would go on but you get the idea.

So, it’s not a case of movie posters artists getting lazy, they are taking part of a long tradition of artists seeing something that they like and incorporating it. What separates art from a mere copy  is when the artist uses a technique in such a way that it becomes a part of his or her signature style. Of course, with the above-mentioned Three Musketeers poster, sometimes taking elements from the past doesn’t always work. That’s why talent is so important. No matter what the tools he or she uses, whether photography, computer generated images or acrylic paint, the true talent of an artist shines through. Think of the movie posters for Back to the Future and Mystic River (seen below and created by Drew Struzen and Bill Gold, respectively). One is drawn and one is photographed, yet they are great posters because two excellent artists created them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Therefore, if the artist is good—a movie poster is a thing of beauty. If the artist is bad, the movie poster is lambasted throughout the Internet.

Keep this in mind the next time you look at a vaguely familiar movie poster.

Sources:
http://www.flix66.com/2011/06/09/logan-lerman-and-orlando-bloom-look-awful-in-new-poster-for-the-three-musketeers/

http://www.movieweb.com/news/the-three-musketeers-poster

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-06-09/news-interviews/29637659_1_poster-mohit-suri-trier

http://www.artchive.com/artchive/R/raphael.html

http://www.artchive.com/artchive/P/picasso.html

http://www.drewstruzan.com/illustrated/portfolio/?fa=medium&gid=686&mp&gallerystart=1&pagestart=1&type=mp&gs=1

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/secrets-hollywood-s-greatest-movie-188670

Advertisement

Other Centers of Movie Making

Shocking but true, the United States is not the only place in the world where there is a thriving film industry. There are other places that are making movies and they all aren’t the art house favorites (though a good many take that route).  So, what other countries are making films?

India
The country of Gandhi and outsourced call centers is also famous for Bollywood movies.  Bollywood movies are mostly musicals with comedy, love story and thrills thrown in for good measure. In other words, the guy always gets the girl at the end of a Bollywood film. The term Bollywood comes from a combination of the city of Bombay (now known as Mumbai) and Hollywood. Recently the Bollywood style of movie making has made its way to the mainstream with films like Bride and Prejudice and the Oscar winning Slumdog Millionaire. Both films found critical acclaim and box office success.

France
Films from France tend to be of the intellectual art house type and films like François Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player and Jean-Luc Godard Breathless are two shining examples. Those films were part of the French New Wave of the 1950’s and 1960’s, in which film conventions of Hollywood were re-imagined and the use of handheld cameras gave the films a “you are there” look. These films influenced a generation filmmakers throughout the world.

Italy
Italian films aren’t exactly intellectual. Instead they take familiar stories and tell them though the Italian cultural lens. They put their own spin on subjects such as mid-life crisis, coming of age and the Holocaust. Films that tackle these subjects are, respectively, Federico Fellini’s 8 ½, Giuseppe Tornatore’s Cinema Paradiso and Roberto Benigni’s Life is Beautiful.

Australia
The Land Down Under has a vigorous film industry, ranging from the irreverent Young Einstein, to the genre mixing Mad Max, which introduced the world to Mel Gibson, to the current Bran Nu Dae. Australian films are a mix of reflection on the country’s agrarian past, commentary on current events and cultural mashup. Yet, it all seems to work. Good on ya’ mate.

So if you are in the mood for a foreign film, check out films from the countries listed above. You’ll either laugh, cry or wonder what is going on.

Sources:
http://www.bollywoodworld.com/whatisbollywood/

http://www.amazon.com/Bride-Prejudice-Martin-Henderson/dp/B00094AS9U/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1284738812&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Slumdog-Millionaire-Dev-Patel/dp/B001P9KR8U/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1284739458&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/8-1-2-Criterion-Collection/dp/B00005QAPH/ref=sr_1_2?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1284742131&sr=1-2

http://www.amazon.com/Cinema-Paradiso-Version-Philippe-Noiret/dp/B00007G207/ref=sr_1_4?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1284742359&sr=1-4

http://www.amazon.com/Life-Beautiful-Roberto-Benigni/dp/B00004D0DU/ref=sr_1_3?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1284742762&sr=1-3

http://www.amazon.com/Mad-Max-Special-Mel-Gibson/dp/B00005R2IS/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1284744210&sr=1-1