Are Alternative Movie Posters Better Than The Original?

We speak to Simon Hawkes, a graphic designer and illustrator created a website called AlternativeMoviePosters.com last year to find out...

By Amarpal Biring / May 28, 2012

Movie posters; as well as a tool to sell a film, they can also be works of art in their own right. Posters for films like "Metropolis" or "Jaws" are as iconic and instantly recognisable in pop culture as a Manet or Da Vinci in the art world. However, many believe the era of the classic poster has been and gone as film studios shift away from creating a poster that could be considered art and see it only as a means to advertise and sell. Even films that cry out for a more abstract poster like "Casino" or Clint Eastwoods "The Changeling" succumb to the uninspiring trend of only using a photograph of an actors face instead of something more meaningful. And you have to wonder who will have the poster for "Avatar" hanging on their wall in 20 years time? This decline in artistic merit has given rise to a fast growing community of alternative movie poster artists. Free from the pressure of having to sell a film, they are able to be more creative and come up with designs that are both stylish and intelligent. Step forward Simon Hawes, a graphic designer and illustrator by trade who's created a website called AlternativeMoviePosters.com (AMP). His plan was to set up a site where artists could submit their poster designs and in turn create a catalogue of alternative posters that can all be viewed in one place. Having launched in March 2011, its grown rapidly as artists see it as a unique place to show off their talents. WhatCulture spoke to Simon and asked him what motivated him to start;

movies have always been a constant source of inspiration. One day, I thought Id have a go at creating my own versions of some of my favourite movie posters. Early attempts werent very successful but as time went on and I did more and more I found I just couldnt stop. I was intrigued by the idea of taking a film youve always loved and creating your own interpretation of it in a poster. Whether it held up as a viable contender to the original didnt really concern me, it was more an expression of how the movie had affected and influenced me throughout my youth and had impacted my work. It was a deeply personal thing. As I continued to play and experiment, I noticed more and more people online doing their own alternative movie posters, and this fascinated me. The talent used to create these alternatives was incredible, but I couldnt find a single outlet to view them all at once. Thats when I decided to create alternativemovieposters.com, a site designed to showcase all the amazing work I was finding out on the internet. Everyone I contacted was really behind the idea. It was a great way to get their work out into the public domain, and to show it alongside other works by like-minded people.

Simons own work is also included on the site like this poster for Inception.

If people want to move away from the cliché poster, I asked Simon if there was a particular trend he's noticed when it comes to people designing their own posters?

I think the biggest trend is minimalism, stripping down the idea of the movie to one simple form or icon with a clever thought behind it. See the work of Olly Moss - he does this to perfection. But the biggest trend is that more and more people are having a go at creating posters for themselves, which is great. We hear from lots of people who are annoyed that a great movie had a poster that didnt work hard enough or was just a composition of the main characters. We know thats done to sell a movie, but with alternative movie posters, people can express the movie in a more creative way, because theyre not selling the film, theyre creating theyre interpretation of it. I think the future lies in these more stylised posters.

''RoboCop'' by Olly Moss

Simon has published a collection of the best submissions in a book, however the intent is not to make profit but rather to catalogue and showcase the talent;

AMP Volume 1 was created, not to make money as the price of the book only covers the cost of print and postage, but to catalogue the many posters we have on the site. We liked the idea of a tangible record of the many talents at hand on your desk or book shelf. We aim to do 1 or 2 a year so we can build a really nice library of cool little books. We would love to eventually do a big A3 hard back coffee table book where the work can be seen in its full glory, but until then A5 is just fine.

With the evolution of programs like Photoshop and illustrator and them becoming more accessible, designing your own alternative poster has never been easier. The community will only grow as more people use it as a medium to express their feelings for a film or TV show. Simon adds;

To create an alternative movie poster is to express your absolute love and passion for that film. As I said before, its a deeply personal thing. Its your interpretation and understanding of what that film was about. And its you creating a piece of work that puts that idea into poster format, be it minimalist, retro, illustrated or photographic. Its your chance to add a piece of yourself to something you love. Hopefully, others will love it too.

In the future, Simon hopes that his site gets the attention and involvement of film studios who take advantage of AMPs expanding collective of artists;

What wed like is the opportunity to share some live briefs from established film studios and distributors with the AMP community and see what happens, Im sure the results would be fantastic.

Head over to alternativemovieposters.com and you will see some great reworked and imaginative poster designs, some of which can be seen below. And many thanks to Simon Hawes for answering our questions.