Carlos Bastarache: posters-grid-uproxx

see how I told my boss to take this job and shove it!

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This Week In Posters is back! This week, we begin with a poster for The Cage Fighter, which has three intriguing pull quotes, right at the top. Call me crazy, that Columbia Tribune (the town in Missouri, not the college in New York) quote seems a little on the nose. An MMA movie that’s like a cross between The Wrestler and The Fighter? So you’re saying it’s almost like a mix of martial arts? Who would have thunk it? Anyway, I’ll probably be skipping this one. One great hint that an MMA take is going to be sensational is when they call it “cage fighting.” That’s what we call a tell.

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Ah yes, horror movies and posters featuring a giant eyeball, two great tastes that go great together. This is sort of like the movie equivalent of chasing your sister around the house with your eyelids flipped inside out. “Are you scared? Are you scared yet? Pretty scary, right?”

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Why can’t all animated movies be made from clay? Too hard? Too expensive? We should have government subsidies for claymation.

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I’m intrigued by this Warlock Man who lives in ancient times with his army of mammoths and pet bird. But wait, isn’t he kind of like the warlock from Qarth on Game of Thrones? Like down to the baldness and cloak color and bird. Not that I’m complaining. You can’t have enough Qartheen Warlock, I always say while preparing to receive a brutal wedgy.

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I know I’m generally staunchly anti-sky portals, but I at least appreciate the visual representation of this one. Where do the birds go?? I don’t know who Moorhead and Benson are, but I support their partnership. It sounds like a brand of expensive cigarettes.

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This guy seems very casual with his Kalashnikov. One hand, with finger on the trigger? I hope the safety’s on. Othewise he’s liable to blow the hell out of that tiny plane.

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This poster for The Game Changers really took the “armed with the truth” concept and ran with it. It’s nicely literal, though the hand should really be holding a scroll that says “TRUTH” if you ask me. Also, where did they get that arm? It looks like the veins are in the wrong place. I hope they bought it at a discount.

Would you guess that this is a movie about a vegan diet? Probably not, and I assume that was the idea.

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Puppy’s got a gun… puppy’s got a gun…

This is a lot better than the last few posters for Game Night, which isn’t saying much. I hope the dog doesn’t fall off that slanted table. Should probably get that fixed.

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This is the first of a big batch of character posters for Gringo. They’re like those collages you make in junior high as a representation of your personality. One time when I was substitute teaching I had to sub for a seventh grade art class and that was the assignment. I remember one girl turned in a giant collage that consisted entirely of different make-up ads. Man, junior high sucks.

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Cookies… hostess treats… I guess her character’s thing is baking? Sure, let’s go with that.

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Charlize Theron’s character is a Mexican iPhone wrestler, obviously.

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Guns and beer and pool for these guys. Sounds like a nice life.

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Christian Bale is preparing for some rain in this poster for Hostiles. Also, there are some sticks in the background? Is this like an old west Blair Witch Project? Anyway, cool sky.

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It seems like half of all indie movies nowadays are just “Nic Cage goes crazy!”

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And here we have the greatest poster of all time for what will surely be the greatest movie of all time, Hurricane Heist. The only thing I’m disappointed about is that Vin Diesel isn’t in this (unless it’s a surprise cameo). They already made a movie about The Rock punching earthquakes in San Andreas, a movie where Vin Diesel robs hurricanes would really tie the room together.

Remember how I said action movie posters these days always have a bunch of debris floating through the air? Like debris flying everywhere became poster shorthand for “big action.” Hurricane Heist almost feels like it took that concept to its logical conclusion. Oh, you want big action? Well, how about a heist set during a hurricane!

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This is a cool poster but it feels like homework somehow, like a diagram in an instruction manual that I’m trying to understand.

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Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again? That’s the real title? That sounds like the caption for the last frame of a Mamma Mia! cartoon. I don’t think I can see this. If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s people who can’t have fun without their mouths dangling wide open.

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This is part of a big batch of Asian posters for The Maze Runner: The Death Cure. They’re all really abstract like this, where the message seems to be “mazes are everywhere!” Mazes rule everything around me.

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A bamboo mat, yep, that’s also a maze.

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A stamp… of a… a maze? Yep, you better believe that’s a maze. (It’s interesting to me that even in a series of posters that are almost entirely visual, some of the images still don’t quite translate).

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Ah, a cookie! Cookies are also mazes. I like these posters because they really home in on the maze aspect of The Maze Runner. I like that aspect way better than the dumb wiener kid aspect. Did you know The Maze Runner: The Death Cure is the number one movie in America? True story.

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You had me with “compelling performances” but lost me with “from the director of The Theory of Everything.”

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“Every match was for her.” I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the “her” in question is a dead person. Who is represented here by… magenta and lens flares? Magenta and volleyball seems like a weird afterlife.

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“From the director of We Are Still Here” is a claim that only distinguishes a movie in theory. It’s easy to confuse with the million other movies with a title that sounds kind of like that, from You Were Never Really Here t0 Wish I Was Here and The Man Who Wasn’t There. Not to mention the nine titles on IMDb that are called “We Are Still Here.” Anyway, it appears to be about a Native American man with giant horns.

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What does it say about me that the first thing I thought upon seeing this poster for Pacific Rim: Uprising was that one of the robots was holding a giant glowing anal probe? I’m still convinced he’s going to put that in the other robot’s butt and it’s all I can see.

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I think you could say Spike Lee has a thing for red posters.

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Oof, did anyone else just get a head rush from rolling their eyes too hard? I guess it’s true what they say, you either die a hero or live long enough to get turned into an obnoxious meme. This movie apparently has a full screen of credits for meme creators. Credit for truth in advertising.

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This poster feels very magical realist but I like it. That is all.

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Just as debris flying everywhere is the thing in action movie posters, all horror movies these days are about a haunted house or a creepy little kid. “The House That Ghosts Built” feels like the culmination of all the horror movies and taglines that came before it.