Author Archives: russ

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About russ

Russ Ryan is an avid fan of movie posters -- sometimes even more so than the actual movies themselves! But he's not just a poster geek, he also was lucky enough to have a film produced by the makers of AMERICAN PIE -- the classic, unforgettable, much less successful National Lampoon presentation, REPLI-KATE, starring Ali Landry, James Roday, and Eugene Levy.

Chronicle Books Movie Poster Spree!

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Chronicle Books, that tasteful chronicle of movie poster books (and much more), is having a haul-iday contest in which bloggers and their readers can win a $500 shopping spree!

Even though it’s obviously a clever promo, CB has the wares to back it up. Over the past year, I’ve bragged ad nauseum about their awesome Art of the Modern Movie Poster (by Sam Sarowitz of Posteritati and Dave Kehr) — but they’ve also published a beautiful bounty of poster art books in the past, including The Star Wars Poster Book, Picture Show: Classic Movie Posters from the TCM Archives, Trash, Surf Movies Tonite!, and James Bond Movie Posters (which, unfortunately, is out of stock). And they’ve also released a few rockin’ art titles, too, like The Small Stakes: Music Posters and Gig Posters.

Plus, even if you don’t win the contest, they’re having a Friends & Family Sale through December 5, so just enter the promo code “FRIENDS” and you can get 35% off any books you choose…even non poster books such as The Art of Mcsweeney’s or The Projectionist, an intriguing new release about a small town movie theatre projectionist who once built a fully-functional miniature version of a grand movie palace in his basement. Sounds like a Charlie Kaufman movie waiting to happen!

So feel free to comment about your love of movie poster books and let’s win this sucker!

Taschen Presents…

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Taschen, the world’s leading publisher of high quality art/design/film books (and yes, there’s plenty of sexy titles, too!), has a whole slate of terrific tomés for serious movie buffs, including special editions on Audrey Hepburn, Taxi Driver, Some Like It Hot, and The Godfather Family Album.

What’s also cool about their website besides the literary eye candy — is that they feature a number of author videos and flip-through pages of their latest releases, in case you can’t afford the $700 Audrey Hepburn photo book!

Bocce Balls of Joy!

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Okay, I’m ripping off the “Bocce balls!” line from Splash — but there’s nothing that gets me more pumped for the weekend than big, bright, bouncy, colorful balls…on movie posters!

Marriage and Divorce, Italian Movie Poster Style

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Continuing with the Italian theme, here are some of the best foreign film posters from the Marcello Mastroianni-Sophia Loren romance sagas, Divorce Italian Style (1961) and Marriage Italian Style (1964). (The order is Italian, French, Argentinean, and another Frenchie by Ferracci.)

Mambo Italiano!

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In the mood for a little Italian? Then you’ll surely feast on New York Times film critic/vintage movie poster collector Dave Kehr’s “imaginatively-titled” book, Italian Film Posters!

Kehr goes beyond the traditional Italian classics, such as La Dolce Vita and The Bicycle Thief — and features a bowlful of astonishing, lesser-known beauties as well as fills in some nice chunks of history on the notorious BCM Studio (Anselmo Ballester, Alfredo Capitani, and Luigi Martinati), a trio of artists that launched their designs on the early International movie poster industry. And even though the book’s already been out a few years, I’m sure you’ll agree that the images featured inside are timeless.

Also, while you’re at it, don’t forget about Dave Kehr’s other poster books, including The Art of the Modern Movie Poster, Exploitation Movie Posters, and The Independent Movie Poster Book.

Poster Ripoff?

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After taking a closer look at The Big Heat poster/cover (illustrated by Anselmo Ballester) of Dave Kehr’s Italian Film Posters, it reminded me of the famous Blade Runner one sheet designed by John Alvin…

The Penguins

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Penguin Books is celebrating its 75th Anniversary in the publishing business by releasing a set of 100 postcards of their most memorable book covers and I thought I would include some here since book jackets are like the literary cousins of movie posters.

Monday Poster Smackdown!

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Here’s the Burt Reynolds classic, The Cannonball Run by two movie poster artist heavyweights…Drew Struzan (USA) vs. Clement Hurel (France). Vroom, vroom!