The White Stuff?
Category Archives: Pop Culture
Spider City!
The Amazing Spider-man has already taken over Broadway, so it’ll only be a matter of time before it weaves its web all over the world’s cineplexes. And Magnificent Mel of MoviePosterCollectors.com has pointed out the new teaser’s clever homage to the original 2002 Spider-man one-sheet (left), each poster respectively reflecting on two of NYC’s greatest landmarks, The World Trade Center and Empire State Building.
Hop-kock!
Anthony Hopkins (pictured right) is slated to become Alfred Hitchcock (aka Hop-Kock!) in an upcoming biopic on The Master of Suspense. Hopefully, the one-sheet won’t go to The Birds and will be as mysteriously elegant as vintage French-Cock.
Pretty In Pink
Pink is the new black — at least when it comes to the trendy font flavor of the movie poster. Needless to say, the color has been around for a while ever since it got its start on Jack Rickard’s Pink Panther one-sheet back in 1963 and continued its hot streak up through the 1980s with a string of John Hughes movies. (ImpAwards)
Mondo Movie Posters!
“It’s sexy time!”, to paraphrase Borat, as we delve into the strange, sensational, hyper-sexualized film genre known as Mondo (not to be confused with the other Mondo gang at Alamo Drafthouse).
Before Reality TV, the creation of Italian mondo cinema in the 1960s gave birth to a weird world of exploitation documentaries that covered many taboo subjects, including sex, death, and pretty much anything else that could either turn you on or creep you out (thank you, Russ Meyer!).
But the one good thing to come out of all this depravity is a remarkably gorgeous portfolio of movie posters, featuring artwork from such mainstream International designers as Manfredo Acerbo and Constantin Belinsky. (Images courtesy of Film Art Gallery and EMP.)
Django Bass!
Quentin Tarantino has gone Saul Bass on our ass (or perhaps it was a combo platter of Rene Ferracci’s Wild Bunch and Thief of Paris that caught his eye) with the new teaser for his upcoming spaghetti western, Django Unchained. (ImpAwards)
Girls Night In?
Tonight, HBO premieres its new funny female-driven series, Girls…which looks like Judd Apatow’s Sex and the City.
Stooged!
I’ve always had high respect for the lowbrow humor of The Farrelly Brothers, but this weekend’s release of their take on The Three Stooges franchise could challenge hardcore fans’ lofty expectations. Hopefully, the comedy is closer to Dumb and Dumber and Kingpin than some of their more recent turkeys.
And let’s also pray that their sight gag of unleashing Kate Upton’s big screen debut as a nun — coinciding along with her 2012 Sports Illustrated swimsuit cover — is no joke!
Thomas Kinkade Dead at 54.
Thomas Kinkade, one of the more controversial commercial artists of our time, has died over the weekend at the age of 54. Well-known — and sometimes ridiculed — for his cozy cottage industry of cutesy, quaint storybook paintings and reproductions (and questionable business practices), Mr. Kinkade was nothing if not a pioneer for the concept of Artist as Businessman, as his artwork reportedly brought in hundreds of millions of dollars.
Taking a cue from his illustration idols, Norman Rockwell and Walt Disney (who he later drew media attention to when he was accused of drunkenly urinating on a Winnie the Pooh statue in a Disneyland Hotel while muttering, “This one’s for you, Walt.”), Kinkade also dabbled in the film biz, getting his start working as a film animator on Ralph Bakshi’s Fire and Ice (poster art by the great Frank Frazetta) — as well as producing a Hallmark holiday TV movie based on his own life story, The Christmas Cottage, starring Peter O’Toole.
And to ensure that his tainted painted legacy was complete, he was even castigated profiled on 60 Minutes back in 2001.
Movie Poster Museum 