With the world’s financial markets going into the toilet, now might be a good time to buy Bonds. That’s right — James Bond! Specifically, these International beauties from Italian designers, Giorgio Olivetti (top row) and Averardo Ciriello (bottom left), as well as French kingpin, Boris Grinsson (bottom right). (via Heritage and 007 Illustrated)
Although he is generally not mentioned in the same breath as the incredible Italian trio of Ballester–Capitani-Martinati, it is without debate that fellow Italian artist, Averardo Ciriello, is right up there with the poster kings of design when you take a peek at his astonishing résumé of Hollywood classics.
My only guess is that the illustrator’s choice of doing girlie pin-ups for the Italian erotic comic book, Maghella, perhaps soiled his splendid reputation later in life. Whatever the case may be, his gorgeous work cannot be denied. (via MoviePosterDB)
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!
No, no, not Joseph McCarthy and the Hollywood blacklist! I’m talkin’ Frank McCarthy (1924-2002), the longtime illustrator whose career spanned over 50 years, doing magazine covers and paperbacks (Avon, Bantam, Dell) and brought us the high-octane one-sheets for The Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape (Paul Crifo did the International version), and many more, including split-duties with Robert McGinnis on the James Bond posters for Thunderball and You Only Live Twice.
Mr. McCarthy quit commercial work in 1974 and, like many of the other greatest poster artists of his generation, such as John Solie, Howard Terpning, and Robert Tanenbaum, moved to Arizona to focus his talents on Western art.
I got a hold of Mr. Obrero over the weekend to explain the Dorero-Obrero mishap and he sent me an early version of what his Never Say Never Again poster looked like “before the lawyers took everything out”.
What I also didn’t know is that he did the artwork for the original Masters of the Universe toys and lunchboxes.
So if you’re into all things Obrero, check out Rudy’s own masterful website here — as well as this interview with him from 2009.
Last month, I wrote about an “unknown” artist named R. Dorero who did the Never Say Never Again one-sheet. Well, the reason this Dorero character was such a mystery is because he doesn’t exist!
The real artist who did this James Bond classic happens to be a very accomplished illustrator named Rudy Obrero who has done a whole slew of other movie posters, including The Postman Always Rings Twice, Oh God You Devil, A Fish Called Wanda as well as work on more recent pics such as The Cat In The Hat and Russell Crowe’s Master and Commander.
But I wasn’t the only one fooled — it appears that LearnAboutMoviePosters and EMoviePoster also made the same mistake. My best guess is that someone misread Obrero’s signature on the original Never Say Never Again poster and the search engines ran with it, thus the confusion. Anyway, the truth is that Rudy Obrero is the real creator behind 007’s NSNA and is still doing great work. So sorry, Rudy. I will never again mistake a Dorero for an Obrero!
Just when I think I’ve seen about every James Bond movie poster artist out there, another one pops up…Case in point: R. Dorero, who created the Never Say Never Again poster, which was also Sean Connery’s last turn as 007. As for Mr. Dorero, his whereabouts are apparently also classified as not much information is available on him. But you can get the Lebanese version of NSNA for $23 at EMoviePoster.com!
Most movie sites talk about Bond girls — but we here at Meansheets prefer Bond illustrators! Which brings us to Mitchell Hooks, the man who drew up the original poster for Dr. No. Like Robert McGinnis, he was also a very successful book cover jacket designer of paperback romances and pulp fiction novels, and was inducted into The Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame in 1999. So he’s kind of a big deal!
His name is Gouzee. Daniel Gouzee. Or Dan Gouzee for short. And I can’t figure out why this artist isn’t more well-known since he’s only contributed to some of the most popular movie franchises in motion picture history (i.e. James Bond). Oh well. Sit back and enjoy his work!
Movie Poster Museum 