What Happened To The Art Of Movie Poster Design: Tenet

There was a time when theater lobbies across the land were filled with exciting movie posters featuring top notch illustrations like these. Sadly, that time is long past. These days the cineplex walls are littered with poorly Photoshopped one sheets that wouldn't be accepted in an introductory design class.

It's been a while since we've played "What Happened To The Art Of Movie Poster Design" here at Bob Canada's BlogWorld. Most likely because it's been a good six months since there've been any new movies and corresponding posters released. You know, what with the whole end of the world thing and all. 

There've been a few posters that've trickled out in the past week or two though, and brother, were they well worth the wait! Let's get to 'em, shall we?

Yes, it's film auteur Christopher Nolan's latest sci-fi opus, Tenet. As near as I can tell from the trailers, it's about a man with the power to reverse the movie projector so it looks like everything's happening backwards. Groundbreaking!

Warner Bros. is going all in on this film, as they just released not one, not two, but TWELVE different freakin' posters!

Obviously Warner must have fired all the designers in their Marketing Department at the beginning of the lockdown, and were forced to hand the assignment over to an unpaid intern.

Faced with a task for which they were never trained, this resourceful intern just took a bunch of screencaps from the trailer, pasted the movie's title over them at an oblique angle, uploaded them and then went back to diddling with their phone. Heck, they may have actually used their phone to cobble them together!

The entire process probably took fifteen minutes, tops.

Seriously, these are NOT movie posters. I'm not even sure what you'd call them. Thumbnails? Photoshop "sketches?" Placeholders to be used until the real art is finished?

Go back and look at those real posters at the top of the page. Note how they draw you in, and cause an emotional reaction. When you see the Jaws poster, you fear for the swimmer's life, as you know she's a goner. Likewise, The Thing poster features some unseen horror that explodes right at you, invoking fear and unease.

Compare them to these Tenet "posters." The only reaction I'm getting from them is one of boredom and apathy. They don't tell me a thing about the movie, and I'm too busy stifling a yawn to care.

A movie poster is supposed to pique the audience's curiosity— to the point where they HAVE to see the movie to find out what the images are all about.

Are any of these so-called posters compelling you to see the movie? Or are they just making you scratch your head in confusion for a few minutes before you go back to arguing with anti-maskers on Facebook?