This Week in Posters: With Cowboy Bill Murray


This week in posters was on hiatus for a few weeks on account of how long these damned things take to put together, but now it’s back! Because at least six of you demanded it!

Here’s Cowboy Bill Murray in a publicity still from Roman Coppola’s A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III (via ThePlaylist). Trying to ignore the fact that Charlie Swan is Bella’s dad’s name, Coppola co-wrote Moonrise Kingdom and The Darjeeling Limited with Wes Anderson, and Charles Swan will be the first film he’s directed since 2001’s CQ. Not for nothing, he also has a bitchin’ unibrow. Will it be quirky and twee? Well, it’s about “A graphic designer’s enviable life slides into despair when his girlfriend breaks up with him,” and Charles Swan is played by Charlie Sheen, so I’m going to say that’s a big yes.

Meanwhile, Bill Murray was the subject of a recent NY Times profile. This was my favorite part:

[The car is suddenly cut off by another vehicle.] “That person was insane. [To his driver] Well-avoided, Mustafa. But you can bump her now. She’s got it coming.”

Sometimes I think Wes Anderson is scripting Bill Murray’s life.

Jessica Chastain is pretty great, and I’ve heard nothing but universally-glowing things about this movie so far, but I really think they used the wrong picture of her for this. Why not this picture, from the teaser the other day?

See? Much better.

I’m so very sorry, Jessica Chastain. In the interests of fairness, here’s an unflattering screencap of me:


Let’s see… director of Oldboy, chick from Alice in Wonderland… yes, I will watch this. Very cool poster. Also, I think it would be an awesome marketing stunt if they paid someone to actually get this as a neck/chest tattoo. Someone would do it. If there’s a dude out there who got a Romney face tattoo for free, you could definitely find someone to get this. Promise me you’ll think about it?


Looks like they got this poster from the same decades-old time capsule Billy Crystal’s Oscar jokes came in, am I right?? HIYO! But seriously though, this is terrible.

Look at that wacky font! This movie must be so zany!

Whoa, Thomas Jane directed a western starring Nick Nolte and Jeremy Irons? This poster assumed that would be all it took to intrigue me, and it assumed correctly. I would watch this if it was just those three dudes growling at each other like dogs for two hours. Sadly, it’s still in pre-production. Ugh, I hate waiting. (*kicks can*)

Timeless love. Passion. A man pulling… uh… pulling a ship… across… a wheat field? This looks like a parody of a foreign movie. And also dangerously close to my favorite fake indie band name, “Horse-Drawn Sailboat.”

GRRR, CLOSE-EYED HEADBUTT!

Bruce Willis? Joseph Gordon-Levitt? An acclaimed sci-fi film? No, this Italian poster for Looper answers the more pressing question: “But a-why for-a you call it a-‘Looper’?”

Ahh, the closed-eyes headbutt, still the best visual shorthand for passionate love and yearning. I’ll be honest, I’m a Les Miserables virgin, and hearing that all the dialogue is sung (no talking, only singing) makes me think this will be about as fun as a root canal. The one intriguing bit in this poster is the elephant. I hope it’s the Water for Elephants elephant, and it just runs around eating Italian immigrants’ cabbage.

Here’s a still from Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, starring Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck. THE CLOSE-EYED HEADBUTT STRIKES AGAIN!

In the tradition of BADLANDS and BONNIE & CLYDE, AIN’T THEM BODIES SAINTS tells the story of Bob Muldoon and Ruth Guthrie, two young outlaws who are brought down by the authorities in the hills of Texas. Four years later, Bob escapes from prison and sets out across the countryside to find Ruth and the daughter he’s never met – unaware that Ruth has set her past behind her and struck up a relationship with a lawman who is tied to their violent past. [The Film Stage]

I love Casey Affleck, but it’s going to take more than a cowboy shirt with the sleeves rolled up to make him look tough.

I like the poster, but as a non New Yorker I will never get over the fact that this guy was on The People’s Court. And as a San Franciscan, Willie Brown needs a court show like yesterday.

Get it? It’s in Elvish or something.

What a beautiful drawing of my favorite character, Not Viggo Mortensen.

This is why magic is confusing. Does a wizard need a sword or not? Can’t he just turn you into a newt or shrink your wiener or something? There’s no rhyme or reason to why magic works or doesn’t except how far into the movie you are. “Okay, movie’s about to end, have him use some magic shit he’s been sitting on the entire movie.”

I want to see the in-between story of Lord of the Rings, where Bilbo just screams at Frodo for playing grabass with Sam all day and complains about Orcs taking everyone’s jobs.

Throughout the production of Hansel & Gretel Witch Hunters, produced by Will Ferrell’s Gary Sanchez Productions and directed by the guy from Død Snø, the question has been, is this an incisive parody of generic movies or an actual generic movie? I can’t really envision a third option. The super-generic diagonal poster definitely leans toward actual generic movie. What the hell are they standing on?

Here’s another one for A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III. The banana is Charlie Sheen, get it? …Yeah, me neither. It’s either some Dada-ist play on Freudian word association, or a visual metaphor for Charlie Sheen’s penis, which actually peels down like a banana from banging hookers for 20 years.

Speaking of Dada, here’s a car with eggs on it. Okay, I admit it, I’m intrigued. Still, you know what’s even more overrated than reality? Dream sequences. We get it, you wish you were directing a music video.

From my upcoming book, Men Are Peeled Bananas, Women Are Ripe Cherries. Alternate title, Everyone Has a Pee Pee!

Lipstick – slightly less sexual than cherries, I suppose. But more phallic.

Penispenispenispenispenispenispenispenis…

Sheen gets a banana, Schwartzman gets a pickle, and Bill Murray gets… a lady licking her lips? Okay, now I definitely don’t get it.

People were crapping on this poster because the tagline isn’t a critic quote, just an assertion from the marketing department. But I like it. I’d much rather have this than quotation marks around it with Pete Hammond’s attribution. You guys know it’s the same thing, right? Might as well just structure it as a boast, like when Rolling Stones declared themselves the world’s greatest rock and roll band. It’s more honest.

“The original Devil Wears Prada.” Oh boy, I can’t wait. I hardly see any documentaries about the fashion industry.

Kind of generic, sure, but I like this style of classic poster design a thousand times more than floating heads, people standing diagonally, rom-com characters leaning on each other, etc. And top hats are boss, always.

You know how you could double the ticket sales? Take marker, cross out “vibrant spectacle,” and pencil in “These chicks make out.”

You know they’re not really in love because their eyes are open and their heads aren’t touching.

Cirque Du Soleil in IMAX 3D sounds like the best use of IMAX 3D imaginable. Theaters should pass out buckets for people to puke their shrooms into.

Hmm, dude in edgy mall clothes, vine font, tooly name, heartburn face… yep, looks like a Twilight ripoff.

Ethan longs to escape his small Southern town. He meets a mysterious new girl, Lena. Together, they uncover dark secrets about their respective families, their history and their town.

What do you think, witches, ghosts, vampires or werewolves?

“Lena” is better than “Bella,” I suppose.

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