Film Poster History

Movie Poster’s research

A brief history.



It is said that the first movie posters date back to 1890. However, posters didn’t become popular till the 1920’s when artists were hired to make the posters look more spectacular. Plus, actors and actresses were becoming ‘stars’ in this era, and the bigger the star, the bigger their name on the poster.
In the 1930’s during the depression in America, movie posters apparently lost some of their artistic merit because film posters had to be generate more cheaply. This continued into the war period too, but on the other hand, war films became more popular.
Back in the 1940’s, when films were shown in a cinema after each other, the day before a film was to be released in a particular city, the cinema would receive the posters. Some cinemas may have ordered more posters for a bigger display. However, fans of the collectable items wouldn’t be able to get their hands on them easily because the posters were passed onto the next cinema. This is why older posters dating back to this time are extremely collectable.
In the 50’s, the television was born. Now film posters had to be better to help fight against the new competitor. This included large colour photographs of the main stars and big ‘stock lettering’.
The sixties and seventies saw films like Star Wars, which are still collectable today. The style was painted and often showing the main characters. The Star Wars posters are a good example of this; the Empire strikes back has a collection of characters and appears hand painted.
Posters are more common today than in 1920’s and are expected to accompany a film and it’s advertising. It’s not uncommon to have several posters for the same film, like with Harry Potter, which will have an individual poster for each main character. Posters are now computerised too, and don't rely on painters.
Lately, posters seem to be going through a ‘simple’ phase were the poster has very little on it, but the bear essentials. The posters look sophisticated but clear to understand. A good example of this is the Let Me In poster which is just of a girl curled up in the middle of the poster. Of course, the idea behind this was to make the girl look innocent and vulnerable.

But what do all posters have?
A main image. This is usually the protagonist, or something that can sum the film up in one image. The Ghostbusters poster is of a cartoon ghost trapped inside of a no-entry sign. This connotates no ghosts allowed, which is theme of Ghostbusters.
The title of the film is essential. The people who look at the poster need to know what film it belongs to!
As the poster is to provide information about the film, the date of release is shown, and information on the director, writer, casting, music and the stars in the film. The distribution company and production company’s logos are also visible.
The other objective of the poster is to advertise. This can be achieved through the names of the major film stars being displayed, good quotes and ratings from critics and awards it’s won and nominated. Sometimes, the name of the director or writer who is relatively famous is also shown as a means of advertising the film.
Taglines are used to sell them film and create a memorable phrase that will sum up the film to reinforce the audiences memory it. ‘Who ya gonna call?” is a classic example of a tagline that is memorable and effective.
Posters sometimes display the certificate. This is often small and out of the way.