Carlos Bastarache: posters-grid-uproxx (13)

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

IMPA

This week in posters, I may have to have a talk with these studios about not releasing seven batches of character posters for every movin’ picture. It makes this poster poster’s job a lot harder. Or at least, longer. Anyway, enough about me. Let’s begin, with this new poster for Always At The Carlyle.

I assume The Carlyle is a fancy place where celebs hang out, so it makes sense that the poster for it would literally be a series of names dropped — into the shape of the Empire State Building! Another clue! And it comes from the director of… uh… Crazy About Tiffany’s. Which my research tells me is a documentary about Tiffany’s. Before that he directed Scatter My Ashes At Bergdorf’s, about the department store. All in all it seems like this guy has made a fine career out of loving brands.

[all posters via IMPA]

IMPA

The perspective on this is so offbeat that I keep scrolling up and down and getting lost in it. So that’s nice. Also, I like that they put a flower on his crotch and made it squirt glowy things. Is the Freudian angle a stretch here? It feels like the only thing happening in it.

IMPA

Ah, a good ol’ billowy smoke poster. You may remember Murder On The Orient Express? That one was good. Here they kind of ruined the nice smoke image by sticking a floating head in there (though I do love Melissa Leo). This Summer… Melissa Leo is… The Smoke Monster.

IMPA

You might not be able to tell because of the small size and crappy quality, but this movie apparently features Corey Feldman playing a drag queen named “Queeny.” Clever name. Kind of like when I was five and got a golden retriever and named her Goldie. Anyway, they should publicize that part more.

Here’s the official synopsis:

A rogue police detective in search of his parents killer is murdered and reborn the ultimate killer. [IMDb]

Well well well, I guess the murdered has become… uh, the murderer. Sounds wonderful. Now, go back and make a real poster. I can’t even tell what the murder weapon is. Is that a sharpened stick? A sword? A giant toothpick? Is that Snookie on the far right? I need to know more.

IMPA

Duck Butter gets a Jazz Age poster to go with the Jazz Age title. Doesn’t exactly scream the premise, but hey, points for thematic consistency. You think the ladies go cheek to cheek? Yowza.

IMPA

The inspiration for this design seems to be “What if we threw some dirt clods at a cinder block wall and they smushed in the shape of pensive people?”

Sidenote: Is Daniel Bruhl our most rat-like actor? Discuss.

IMPA

See, now that’s how you use a pull quote. I know just enough to be intrigued.

IMPA

Man, how many of these Transylvania movies have they made now? I bet they can knock these out in an afternoon. Adam Sandler is an evil genius. Also, what is the green guy? Does Dracula hang out with Slimer now? I’m way behind.

IMPA

You have to think the competition in Lynyrd Skynyrd for who got to wear which hat was fierce. How’d they decide who got to wear the cowboy hat, the pimp hat, and the pimp cowboy hat? You think they drew straws? And then one guy gets a knit beanie. That seems like a lot of hat for a Summer in Alabama. Lynyrd Skynyrd intuitively understood the “one fedora per crew” rule before it was even a thing.

IMPA

The backdrop on this Isle of Dogs poster is interesting, because I don’t remember any desert scenes from the movie. Anyway, I was trying to figure out what Wes Anderson is the other day and it finally came to me: he’s an analog enthusiast. He loves anything that looks like a giant machine from the ’60s — hence the gondolas, Polaroids, giant punch card computers, etc. Everything he does makes me want to put on an Earth tone puffy jacket and trade collectibles.

IMPA

When your movie is like 80% amazing set design I don’t know why you’d stick the characters in front of random patterns for the character posters. But hey, at least it sells the character design.

IMPA

If I’m being honest I wish more of the doggies had had mouths. I like a doggy smile, sue me.

IMPA

He should sell these as wallpapers. Honestly.

IMPA

See how much better the one with the mouth looks?

IMPA

Jupiter is my second favorite of the character designs in this movie. I want to pet him the most of all the doggies.

IMPA

The biggest knock on Isle of Dogs is that I expect the making-of documentary to be as interesting as the movie. How long does one of those figurines take?

IMPA

Mayor Kobayashi always looks like he has a flashlight under his chin, that’s just his thing.

IMPA

Nutmeg is very feminine, so of course she’s the love interest. Still, I think it would’ve been interesting to have a female Rottweiler or a male Pomeranian. Cast those breeds against type for once!

IMPA

Remember when I said Jupiter was my second favorite character design? Oracle is by far the best. The character design on Oracle is so good I’m almost retroactively disappointed with the rest I liked. Why can’t they all be this good? I laugh a little every time I look at her conspiratorial pug face. It’s perfect.

IMPA

The dogs all look very alert.

IMPA

Give the dogs a dang mouth, c’mon. They deserve at least that.

IMPA

“She turns men into boys and boys into men” has to be this week’s coolest tagline. Especially when you put it next to Rosario Dawson.

That seems like way too many names up there, but kudos for not trying to fit them all into the image.

IMPA

All that sky above her head lets you know she’s about to do something heroic. But humbly.

IMPA

Mid-night Sun, won-cha come… and smush together our cro-tches…

This could be a Converse ad.

IMPA

Oh hell yeah, dude. No one stares off into the distance of a fog-shrouded beach like Saoirse Ronan. She’s like cinema’s number one foggy beach starer. No one yearns like Saoirse.

IMPA

I had to look up Brad Silberling. He’s the guy who directed City of Angels and Land of the Lost. I guess it’s better to just put his name in big letters like that above the title in case people just assume he’s some acclaimed auteur and they have to pretend to have heard of him. Also, hasn’t the title “An Ordinary Man” been used a bunch of times already? Tagline for this should be “Definitely a movie!”

“It has actors and is showing in a theater and everything!” raves Pete Hammond.

IMPA

This is just one of many Pacific Rim Uprising landscape posters. I’m not going to post all of them, but suffice it to say they all involve giant robots smashing stuff.

IMPA

Wait, there are little kid cadets in this one? Bold move to Muppet babies the franchise so soon, but I guess we should’ve seen this coming.

IMPA

These posters are perfect, because Pacific Rim seems like a set of trading cards masquerading as a movie.

IMPA

Oh Jesus, little kids and Scott Eastwood? He always has that furrowed brow expressing concern, but something about him makes me think he’s confused over something obvious, like trying to work his toaster. He kind of reminds me of a handsome Tucker Carlson.

IMPA

If you’re an action guy and need to look tough, you have to stand with your arms hovering way above your sides, thems the rules. Kind of like if you’re a real tough Harley motorcycle guy you have to have your handlebars way up above your head. There must be some correlation between perceived toughness and tired shoulders.

IMPA

That wallpaper kicks ass.

IMPA

Wow, that is some reverent imagery. What is this guy, sacred or something?

IMPA

The floating DNA strands motif is a new one. Otherwise this kind of looks like those old “three wolf moon” shirts. That image of The Rock in a tight t-shirt holding a big gun you could really just mix and match with any The Rock movie.

IMPA

Aw hell yeah, finally a movie about a giant portal!

IMPA

Those are their Second Life avatars behind them. But how come only one guy is wearing the VR headset? Can the other characters see the virtual world without the goggles? Anyway, a bunch of dorks sitting in a room five feet away from each other all on VR headsets desperately seeking human connection is our future.

IMPA

I don’t know what never sinks, but that font/fog combination is creepy as hell. It’s that Fifty Shades/Thoroughbreds font again. This font is definitely having a year.

IMPA

Wait, is this the Sinbad one?

IMPA

Yep. Just A+ work all around here once again. I also enjoy that Gabriel Iglesias goes by “Fluffy” as a middle name like he’s a rapper.

IMPA

Those thumbs look weird. Fix those thumbs.

IMPA

The way the heart-shaped target starts at the chest and ends at the crotch feels very sexual.

IMPA

I mean, why mess around with the Sinbad genie movie when you can watch the one where The Fat Jew plays an internet genie who makes your status updates come true? “It’s Kazaam for millennials!” raves Pete Hammond.

IMPA

It’s the return of Alex Pettyfer! And the child actor doesn’t seem to have an excessive amount of hair, which is nice. Usually child actors have at least twice this much hair.

IMPA

I did not know that they were remaking Superfly. And the skyline perched on a cane is a nice twist to the city skyline backdrop format. And he does indeed look quite fly.

IMPA

Yep, they made a movie out of that story about the guys who’ve been playing tag for 30 years. And it’s such a big deal that they made a poster with just words.

IMPA

Un-der The Si-lver La-ke. Cool. This is the “trying to figure what the vanity plate says” of movie posters. It looks like a shirt I’d see on a yoga lady.

IMPA

Wildling? Oh we’re just borrowing Game of Thrones characters now? Anyway, we’ve seen the “trees as nerves”/”trees as veins” visual metaphor a few times now, but to me the most striking thing about this one is the fact that that’s not Cara Delevingne in the poster. I didn’t notice it at first, they might want to make that more obvious. “Does not star Cara Delevingne” is a big selling point for me these days.