A Poster says a Thousand Words...

Well yeah, you caught the mistake. The phrase is “a picture says a thousand words, but as you scroll down the article and read further, you might just want to agree with my mistake.

Posters are the first-ever glimpses of a forthcoming movie, or to put it the other way, the first piece of temptation (apart from trailer) that the director puts before you to try and imagine the power of his film. Therefore, it becomes inevitable that the poster when you see it, arouses your excitement for the film pretty strongly.

The conventional way of designing a poster that has been existing since ages is to take up the lead stars of the movie, either individually to show the firmness of their characters or posing for a scene from the movie to show the relationship that they share, all depending upon the genre of the movie. Thus, if its an action movie (Terminator), you would see the hero Arnie in his dark jacket and goggles, completely devoid of any emotions – suggesting that its nothing but a pure action movie, or if you’re expecting a touching love story, consider Titanic, characters Jack and Rose framed over the picture of the ship that was the centre of exploration. If it were family dramas, it showed a full-of-life young lady dancing in front of blue skies and green meadows (The Sound of Music).


The idea thus seems to be the best way to introduce a film to public.

However, the magic of changing times castes its effect on everything living or that has been created by the living and the movie posters in the past two decades give a striking proof of the same.

The new age movie posters create audience’s idea about the film not by simply picturing the characters in the poster but by giving metaphorical hints to the film’s story and characters that pretty well sum up the entire movie itself. The metaphors could be anything that the film is all about as we will soon see. The object remains the same – to introduce a movie to the public but by arousing public interest by surmising the entire film plot in some minutest aspects of the movie which are capable enough to tell what the film is all about.

Now, let’s have a look at some of the posters that changed the way we look at movie posters and gave a complete touch of the movie itself without the look of its characters.

(1) Jurassic Park:

Jurassic Park was the oldest and the most successful poster that started the trend of metaphorical posters. The epic-scaled movie marked new heights to which a man could reach through modern day science and the aftermath of the same too. The poster you see is simply a facial skeletal of the dinosaur – far better than picturing John Hammond, Dr. Ian Malcolm, Dr. Grant, Dr. Sattler or the several breeds of dinosaurs shown in the movie.

(2) The Da Vinci Code:

The film based on Dan Brown’s best-selling novel starred Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou and many other strong characters searching for the replies of intriguing codes left behind by a dying man. The several codes and symbols which revolved around the works of Leonardo Da Vinci (i.e. Mona Lisa, The Last Supper and others) were the essence of the film and had a stronger impact on the film than any other element. The painting of Mona Lisa being turned over by an array of codes and numbers as were reflected in the poster here increased the curiosity of every movie lover for the film.

(3) Ratatouille:

The story of a food-loving rat that turned into a cook and a cleaner boy who inherited a restaurant was all about following your heart’s desires. The film starred several major characters like Chef Gusteau, Anton Ego, Linguini and Collette but one of its earliest posters just pictured a rat moustache and nose wearing a chef’s cap that signified the central character Remy the rat with a background of Eiffel Tower, Paris – the city where the film was created.

(4) The Dark Knight:

One of the best crime-based movies, The Dark Knight combined the conventional and modern ideas of framing a poster – a determined looking Batman with a skyscraper in background Of course, that was just the conventional part. The metaphorical burning batman logo engrafted in the building signified the Batman’s arch enemy in the movie and the action that the movie was all about.

(5) Angels & Demons:

Another movie based on Dan Brown’s novel directed by same director (Ron Howard) again starred Tom Hanks as Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon in search of replies to cryptic clues left behind by the brotherhood “Illuminati”. Set against a Vatican background, dark cathedrals, catacombs and graves, the movie as the name signifies was a battle between good and evil, a subject that could have been treated with a very monotonous poster. However, as you see here, the earliest poster was an edifice against a background of Vatican city that had features of both, compassion (angels) and cruelty and deceit (demons)

(6) Up
Pixar’s adventure story of Carl Fredrickson, a boy named Russell and several other characters begins when Carl decides to blow away his house with thousands of balloons to see Paradise Falls as a tribute to his dead wife’s wishes.


Several posters were printed for the movie, one featuring the movie characters hanging down on each other’s support through the house – the conventional way. The other poster however pictured a house floating in air supported by colorful balloons against blue sky minus all the movie characters – and it successfully retains the crux of the entire film, even adds to its beauty.

(7) Avatar

Cameron needed to stir the world with the magnum opus that marked his comeback since his last direction, Titanic. The wonder was beautifully created with just the look of a olive-eyed half-face in deep blue – just enough to hint that the film is out of this world – as it really turned out to be.

The inquisitive face of Navi tribe was good enough to create a curiosity in all the movie fans worldwide about what Cameron’s going to present us with.

A modern day poster thus emphasises on a movie goer's imagination to feast on the poster and fill up his ideas or simply wonder in awe at the impression of the images in it. To sum it all up, it can be said that lesser the known elements of a movie in its poster, the better it gives out the real picture, or like the title says, speaks a thousand words.

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