Posters Let You Know Who Is Going To Rock And Rocket
PrintBefore the stars ***** are doled out across the newspapers and channels after the release of a film , the stars have to really sweat it out and prove their mettle by luring the audience to theatres!..And the classic and basic vehicle to do is Film Posters..
Poster is like a coded message ..One glance and you can make out what genre of film it is, who is selling as a star, who is on the margins and who is providing a mere padding to the package..Even the use of colors and font type generally gives out the feel of the movie..A dark, intense drama..Or a bright rom-com..
There have been interesting things happening on the posters as the Hindi Cinema evolved..
There was a time when people used to watch a film becaue late O P Nayyar’s name was on the poster as a music director..There always was a time when movies were seen for who is the director of the film..Socially meaningful yet entertaining films bore the names Like Raj Kapoor’s, K Asif’s, Guru Dutt’s..Larger than life, masala films came out with the big font size rendering of A Manmohan Desai Film..A Prakash Mehra Film..And people thronged the theatres not to see the stars in the film but trusting the name of the director that if has made a film it must be entertainging and meaningful..
How many directors of late, can draw the audience in, on their sheer charisma and personality..Somehow in the late nineties and early decade of twenty first century one name that made me go and watch his film regardless of any star value was Ram Gopal Verma (RGV)..And then he let it all go up in flames with his version of Sholay!
Most of the directors who love to see their names flaunted on the Film Posters –A Film By, A So –And-So’s Film are mere craftsmen with no vision or signature worth rendering.. ..
In an adapt-lift-steal-translate-era of DVDs, the so called backbone of any film– the writers– don’t even find mention on the Film Posters..One and only writer-duo who demanded that their name be prominently displayed on the posters was Salim-Javed..There came a phase when films were publicized as Salim-Javed’s Deewar, Trishul, Iman-Dharam..Today amongst new crop of writers, Jaideep Sahni is one such writer who may not be demanding the credits but rightly deserves to be featured ( though I am of a strong opinion, every writer deserves to be credited on his film’s poster).
Today a hero may be a hot selling commodity taking almost the full space on the poster design, tomorrow he may be reduced to the margins as a character actor..It happened in reverse for Amitabh Bachchan.. In Roti, Kapada Aur Makaan he shared the poster space with Manoj Kumar and Shashi Kapoor..And he was portrayed in a reduced size and relegated to the side of a six-sheeter..After a decade or so the movie was re-released and this time neither the producer-director-actor Manoj Kumar had the clout nor Shashi Kapoor was anywhere near his peak..It was an era of Big B (one wonders when was not his era in last thirty years!)..And the newly designed posters of the RKM had Amitabh Bachchan towering over the photos of Manoj Kumar, Shashi Kapoor and others!..
When Mahesh Bhatt released his Aashiqui, he had nothing going for it..The lead pair was new..The music-director duo of Nadeem-Shravan ( though seventeen years of struggle) were still considered new..So he had Rahul Roy and Anu Aggarwal featured on the poster with a jacket thrown over their faces!..Seemed a smart way to save face and yet face the audience!..
Of late very few Heroes have commanded such a towering presence ( commercially) that they are solely featured on the poster..One recent example that comes to mind is Aamir Khan in Gajini..But he is a veteran of twenty plus years as a hero..Though He is one such actor who was featured solo on a poster at the release of his debut movie Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak ( QSQT)..
And now I have observed Ranbir Kapoor being one such rising star who is taking giant steps to straddle the screen space..In Wake Up Sid he was featured solo without any other character actor or even the heroine being shown on the posters..Till date I have not seen WUS..But then I saw Ajab Prem Ki Gajab Kahani ..And I was bowled over by Ranbir Kapoor’s natural talent..His complete comfort before the camera..His nuances..And when Rocket Singh—Salesman Of The Year is being released with Ranbir Kapoor selling himself exclusively as a likeable Sardar, it speaks volume about the makers’ faith in his ability to draw and deliver..
By the way there is someone by name of Ravi Kapoor who is featuring solo on the poster of a film titled World Cup 2011 that is getting released alongwith Rocket Singh..In the clash of Kapoors one knows who is going to rock anway.
Tags: aamir khan, Aashiqui, Ajab Prem Ki Gajab Kahani, Amitabh Bachchan, Guru Dutt, Jaideep Sahni, K Asif, Manmohan Desai, Manoj Kumar, O P Nayyaar, Prakash Mehra, Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak, Raj Kapoor, Rocket Sing-Salesman of the year, Roti Kapda Aur Makaan, Salim Javed, Shashi Kapoor, Wake Up Sid, World Cup 2011
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Rahul Dholakia
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Varma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Sachin Kundalkar
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Nice collection of random thoughts about posters. From your earlier blogs, I know you could do so much better
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Good post. Write-up ke saath kuch posters ke dwara aankho ko santushti bhi mil jaati to maza aa jaata.
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World Cup 2011 releasing on Dec 18th & not along with Rocket Singh.Yes film posters always have that magical quality about them.Its always been a pleasure looking @ some of the better film posters over the years.
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I miss those hand drawn posters now a days. They were quite captivating posters with rawness on the face of the characters.
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I remember long before the days of flex poster there used to be big canvas of hand painted poster infront of every theatre . One such workshop was there In myway to school where me and my friends used to spend considerable time just watching and admiring those big master peices .
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mention of RGN reminded me… he had a great piece on his blog about the effect and Impact of Posters. was very insightful.
his veiws on tht Blog are very interesting, one just needs to look beyond the megalomania and avoid his responses to responses section
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Krysh, you need to visit RGV’s blog to read about the article on poster designs. A wonderful read and a wonderful insight. He has even listed some posters which he likes and why.
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Example include Jaws, featuring a girl and a shark with a tag line “She was the first”
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Disclosure, with MIchael douglas sitting and demi moore almost on his lap. Both faces are not seen
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Poster for a film on a porn star, which has the hero in a Jesus pose in front of a woman’s bikini, indicating that religion comes in the way of free sex/emotions
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Initially lead actors would be on studios’ payroll. They used to get salary. It was Raj Kapoor who brought importance to lead actors. Helping him in this venture were Dilip Kumar and Dev Anand.
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Almost 99.99% hindi film posters have stars on the posters with no creativity in the posters.
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Munnabhai MBBS gave a little thought to the posters. Sanjay DUtt in a doctor uniform had a bubble above him proclaiming “Apun”. Apun ka friend, Apun ki girlfriend, etc
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Jaws, Aliens, Disclosure, come to mind that hollywood is pretty creative with its poster designs
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Since RGV considers poster designs important, his posters are always innovative. AGyaat only had a jeep with lights on and marks on the ground, indicating someone being dragged.
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@ VJ,thnx for sharing these nuggets..i will surely check RGV’s blog..
@ sethumadhvan..yes, i stand corrected..thnx
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Hey no need to search. Here it is
http://rgvzoomin.com/2009/09/25/titles-and-posters/
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@VJ..yes RGV makes a very pertinent point about “Bollywoodies” shirking away from making thier posters as an art form in itself that tell about the film more than the stars in it…thnx once again for the link..
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In my opinion posters are driven by two factors
Storyline of the movie: Hence when I see Ranbir Kapoor alone on wake up sid’s poster I am not surprised coz the title and the movie is all about Sid.
Star power : Sameera reddy was missing from a lot of DE Dana dan posters.
Both drive the poster design. However in some cases you might say Oh he’s a big star and he got a solo poster. BUt thats not always the case……. its difficult to derive any conclusion from poster.
But to say that single star posters are gone and only Ranbir Kapoor is getting solo posters is wrong
Salman had a solo poster for wanted and again for Veer
3 idiots first poster had only Amir Khan
My name is khan’s first poster only has Shahrukh Khan and even for Chak De
Neil Mukesh was there on Jail’s poster alone.
For God sake Harman Baweja also got one for Victory.
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check dis poster out..i have seen the movie and it suits the movie perfectly which is on ‘Tamasha’
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/24/Natarang.jpg
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