If you’re like us, nothing gives you the heebie-jeebies like seeing one’s venerable calling fall into the filthy paws of the hoi polloi. Which is why we recoiled in horror when one of our readers sent us this link to Cracked’s Rejected Ideas For Disaster Movies. (Although,we must admit the copy on number 13 is Key Art Award winning material.)
If you’re like us, the last place you want to see your anatomically incorrect finish is on Photoshop Disasters. The commenters on
that site are so viscous - unlike the gentle folk who post remarks here
at MonKeyArtAwards.
Perhaps our readers will remember we briefly posted the theatrical one-sheet for this madcap comedy about an umbrella named Steve.
One of the many high-strung creative types we count among our readers sent us the latest teaser for Salt along with this one-of-a-kind rebuttal poster - to which we would like to add our own rejoinder.
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Looks like Universal stepped into a pile of poo when it made the decision to eighty-six the film’s only black couple on the UK poster for Couples Retreat.
Of course, if you've seen this crapfest of a movie (written by Vaughn and Farveau) you're probably wondering why Jason Bateman, Kristen Davis, Malin Ackerman and Kristen Bell didn't didn't ask to have their images removed as well.
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Uh oh, it looks like the irrepressible wags in civilian advertising are having fun at the expense of those of us in the entertainment sector.
One of the many copywriting crazymakers we count among our readers sent us this AdFreak post that describes the Sherlock Holmes tagline as being, among a host of other unpleasant things, "cringe- worthy."
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Superficial-typographic dermatitis (STD) is a virulent graphics infection that is highly resistant to most antibiotics. The initial oubreak appears as a noticeable serif font on the left cheek.
If left untreated, it soon erupts into an invasive bold typeface, spreading over one side of the face.
In its final stage, it mutates into a distressed grunge font, covering the head and neck with painful and unsightly capitol letters.
If you’re like us, you spent a sizeable portion
of yesterday’s billable hours gleefully reading the comments re: Takers that
were posted on Photoshop Disasters and Perez Hilton and Geek Tyrant.
Now that we all view posters on our 24 inch wide screen LED cinema display monitors, rather than merely as we stroll past them in theatre lobbies or drive by wild posts on Santa Monica Blvd., we judge them on the arrangement of their pixels rather than the overall composition.
While we expect finishers and art directors to weigh in on the craptacular Photoshop skills of their comrades, we can’t help but grow dismayed at the sheer volume of nitpickiness we now hear coming from every Hinz und Kunz out there.
So, with the barbarians at the gate, we must say something here in defense of our brethren: as far as the strips on these characters go… well, who knows? We have all had the unnerving experience of being at a photo shoot with an actor or actress who, standing there before you in real life, looks just like a really bad headstrip.
If you’re like us, you can’t get enough of these
smirky rat pack posers in their stingy brim hats and their shiny suits. So, at
first glance, we were delighted when one of our readers sent us this he-manly poster.
But our mood darkened when we read the accompanying lament, “I expect more from
Sony, with all the $$$ they spend!”
Before you take this one-sheet’s key artistry to task, be aware that it’s already been raked over the coals at our beloved Photoshop Disasters and even by the unwashed masses who read Perez Hilton.
If Lionsgate's marketing strategy was to leave us utterly confused as to whether this was a movie about a florist, an optometrist or a disco queen, then let us be the first to say mission accomplished!
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If you’re like us, you’ve noticed a trend
toward a mix of faux naïve drawing and photography popping up posters recently.
We’re not sure if these key art and crafts are truly primitive or just way ahead of the curve.
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One of our many international
correspondents sent us this collection of las películas de acción donde el
protagonista siempre mira hacia los lados.
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Dear Edwina,
While trolling photographers sites looking for scrap to rip off, I came across this gem on Kevin Lynch’s site via artmix. I am so very curious as to why marketing decided against this poster. Any thoughts?
Signed, What Were They Thinking
Dear WWTT,
Often times the great motivator in marketeers' decision making is fear. Fear of putting a poster out there that might inform John and Jane Q. Public what the movie is actually about. However, we thought the teaser was most excellent.
And while we all love seeing other people’s doomed attempts, if you’ve ever had the mind-numbing experience to be the third or fourth vendor on a film and had the client send reams upon reams of rejected comps done by the previous agencies, then you know what it’s like to question your very existence.
The latest edition of The New Yorker
provides some back story on AMC's Mad Men key art, including all-too-brief
descriptions of some rejected concepts and the tantalizing tidbit that the Refinery won a three-way
bake off.
If you're like us, the only thing you appreciate more than a
really fine piece of key art is a truly godawful piece of key art. Which
is why we were so delighted when one of our readers sent us this link to the IMPawards showcase of My One And Only.
As always, the comments are the best part. Like this one: "oh my gahd! not since clifford have i seen something so ghastly!"
We can only hope that we here at monKeyArtAwards have played a small part in making Clifford the standard by which all craptacular key art is measured.
But, to get back to the key art at hand, in defense of our profession (and we use the term loosely) we will venture to guess that the original concept sketch was something on the order of the one at left, and that it was only through the concerted efforts of the marketing weenies at the studio that the one-sheet ended up the train wreck that it is.
Deep
inside an article in The Globe and Mail on how the value of collectible movie
posters has increased, we came upon this particularly painful paragraph: “When it
comes to movie posters, most collectors agree that things just ain't what they
used to be. In the early 1900s, posters were hand-drawn works of art. Today,
they are usually computerized images that offer little in the way of
creativity. The article goes on to quote the owner of Toronto-based movieposter.com's store, “But mostly now what you see is a
big close-up of somebody's face.” Well, that's hardly the fault of our
fearless art directors, now is it? The studios often push for a big
close-up, insisting that the star's face is what puts asses in seats, citing some focus group tested face-to-ass marketing equation or other. Sadly, this type of key artistry only works to further inflate the bloated egos of movie stars, when the studios could just as easily use those billboards and bus shelters to
showcase our clever concepts and Photoshop skills.
