Another superb design by Martin Ansin on this screen print for the original 1968 sci-fi classic Planet of the Apes, which was released in January 2012 as part of a series of Apes inspired prints by Mondo, the celebrated Austin-based limited-edition art boutique. A true cult classic, the first Planet of the Apes was adapted from the book La Planète des singes by the French author Pierre Boulle and went through several iterations at the scripting stage, with the first draft handled by American TV legend Rod Serling, plus a few potential directors before Franklin J. Schaffner was handed the job and production began. The film was shot mostly on location and used some stunning locales, including Lake Powell in Utah/Arizona and along the Colorado river.

Charlton Heston stars as George Taylor, one of a group of astronauts who awake from deep space hibernation to discover that their craft has crash landed on an alien planet 2000 years into the future. The group set-off across the barren landscape in search of life. Eventually they come to an area with lush vegetation and fresh-water lake, which they dive into with relief. Soon afterwards they come across a group of primitive, mute humans but suddenly the whole group is attacked and rounded up by talking, armed, unif0rm-wearing gorillas. One of the astronauts is killed by gunfire, Taylor is shot in the throat and he and his friend are captured and taken back to Ape City. There he meets chimpanzee archaeologist Cornelius (Roddy McDowall) and his fiancee, animal psychologist Zira (Kim Hunter), who soon discover Taylor is not like the other primitives. Eventually he regains his ability to talk and must answer to the President of the apes Assembly Dr. Zaius (James Whitmore) who is determined to discover Taylor’s origins at any cost.

Fearing his life is in danger, Cornelius and Zira help Taylor escape the city and lead him to a cave by the sea in which the history of the planet’s inhabitants is shown to be at odds with the Assembly’s teachings. After an ambush by the Dr Zaius and his gorilla troops, Taylor is eventually allowed to leave and before long he has made a horrifying discovery about the planet, in what is arguably the most famous twist ending in the history of cinema. The film was a success worldwide and spawned a number of sequels of varying quality, plus a short-lived TV series, and a whole raft of merchandising, including what is often cited as the first action-figures tied to a film property, certainly pre-dating the phenomenally successful Star Wars figures.

One of my favourite artists working today, Martin Ansin‘s work has graced many of the best posters released by Mondo, including several in the Universal Monsters series like this amazing Phantom of the Opera print and an excellent Dracula (1931) one. You only have to look at the gallery on his official site to see how talented an artist he is, with an eye for composition and detail unmatched by most of the artists in Mondo’s roster. To see the other posters I’ve collected so far that were designed by Ansin, click here.

An excellent portrait of action legend Charles Bronson features on this 30×40 poster for the 1984 thriller The Evil That Men Do. One of several collaborations between the star and director J. Lee Thompson, the film sees Bronson star as a retired hitman known as Holland who is living a relaxed life on a West Indies Island when he is approached by former associates who persuade him to take on one last job. The target is the sadistic torturer, Dr. Clement Molloch, a Welshman who is often hired by political regimes to help them keep dissidents in check and has consequently left a trail of enemies in his wake.

Holland discovers that Molloch has killed his old friend Jorge Hidalgo at the behest of the Surinamese regime and he agrees to set off to Guatemala, the last known location of his target, with Hidalgo’s wife and daughter agreeing to pose as his family to protect his cover. Holland uses his old skills to take out various criminal associates as he works his way up the chain to exact revenge against Molloch. The film was released to weak reviews and it’s definitely not Bronson’s finest hour, or the best collaboration with J Lee Thompson.

Frustratingly I’ve been unable to find out who was responsible for the artwork on this poster so if you have any ideas please get in touch. The same art also featured on the Japanese B2 poster which can be seen here.

The film’s trailer can be viewed here.

This is the Japanese B2 poster for the release of The Man With the Golden Gun, the ninth James Bond film and the second to star Roger Moore as the legendary secret agent. It’s definitely one of the weaker films in the long-running series and certainly not Moore’s finest hour, but it has several elements that make it worth watching, including a host of interesting far-eastern locales, strong production design and a very memorable bad guy in the shape of Christopher Lee‘s Scaramanga. Guy Hamilton returned as director for the fourth and last time in the series and the script, written by Richard Maibaum and Tom Mankiewicz, takes place amidst the climate of energy worries that followed the 1973 oil crisis. It also reflected the then craze for martial arts movies that followed the release of films like Bruce Lee’s Enter the Dragon with several kung-fu sequences and exotic locations.

The story starts as MI6 receive a golden bullet with 007 etched into it, leading them to believe that Bond’s life is at threat from the notorious international assassin Scaramanga so they decide to remove him from active duty. The agent was on the trail of a scientist who it is thought could help with the energy crisis and he is frustrated to have been stopped in his pursuit so he sets off to find Scaramanga without official approval. Bond follows a trail of assassinations which lead him from Macau to Bangkok and eventually to Scaramanga’s private island hideout where he discovers that the master assassin has an interest in solar power. Soon Bond is challenged to a duel to the death and he must use his wits to survive the traps set around Scaramanga’s hideout. Dwarf actor Hervé Villechaize has a memorable role as the assassin’s servant Nick Nack, and Clifton James returns as the (perhaps ill-advised) comic relief figure of Sheriff J.W. Pepper, as featured in Live and Let Die.

The artwork on this poster also features on the US one sheet and was painted by Robert McGinnis who is responsible for some of the best James Bond posters, including Thunderball, Live and Let Die and Diamonds are Forever as well as multiple other classic posters from the 60s, 70s and 80s. He was born in Cincinatti, Ohio in 1926 and was given an apprenticeship at Walt Disney studios before studying fine art at Ohio State University. After serving in the Merchant Marines during World War II, he started work in the advertising industry and later moved into painting book jackets for several notable authors, as well as editorial artwork for the likes of Good Housekeeping, TIME and The Saturday Evening Post. McGinnis’ first film poster was the now iconic one sheet for Breakfast at Tiffany’s, painted in 1962, and he went on to paint over 40 others during his career, including one for The Incredibles in 2004.

To see the other posters I’ve collected that were painted by McGinnis click here and to see the other James Bond posters in the Film on Paper collection click here.

Something of a cult classic, Escape to Victory is arguably the most famous film to revolve around The Beautiful Game. Based on 1962 Hungarian film called Két félidő a pokolban by director Zoltán Fábri the film, which is set during WWII, tells the story of a football match played in Paris by a team of Prisoners of War against a German side, seen as a propaganda event. The team is led by John Colby (Michael Caine) who is determined to win the game despite the distraction of other POWs who want to use the cover of the game to escape. Sylvester Stallone plays Hatch, an American POW who is at the vanguard of the escape attempt and actually manages to get out of the camp prior to the game to meet up with resistance leaders in Paris. After planning the big breakout, Hatch must get recaptured and returned to the POW camp in order to communicate the plans to the others. When the big day arrives, Hatch is put into goal and Colby persuades the team to see the match through to the final whistle before they make their escape.

The film notoriously features a host of real life professional footballers who were involved in the game and doubled for the actors or played on the German team, including the Brazilian superstar Pelé, Bobby Moore, Osvaldo Ardiles and a whole host of players from the English team Ipswich Town, who were one of the most successful British sides at the time of the film’s release. English goalkeeping legend Gordon Banks, who played during the 1966 world cup that England won, worked behind the scenes and coached Stallone to ensure his scenes in goal were realistic enough for the film’s audience.

This UK quad takes the central figures from the US one sheet (where the film was titled simply Victory) that were painted by the artist David Jarvis and adds a montage that was illustrated by the British designer Vic Fair, who also designed the poster. Jarvis is perhaps best known for his illustration on the US one sheet for Walter Hill’s The Warriors. Having completed a degree in illustration at the Los Angeles Art Center College of Design, Jarvis went on to work as a freelance illustrator producing over thirty designs for film posters, as well as record sleeves, magazine covers and more. He also worked as an artist for Disney studios on the films Mulan and Tarzan. The other posters I’ve collected by him can be seen here.

One of the most important designer/artists ever to work on British film marketing, Vic Fair is responsible for several iconic posters, including The Man Who Fell To Earth, posters for Hammer horrors like Vampire Circus, and the withdrawn advance one sheet for A View to a Kill. I interviewed the artist for this site and that article can be viewed by clicking here.

This is the original Polish poster for the first release (in 1984) of Steven Spielberg’s sci-fi masterpiece, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. The story of a small alien who gets stranded on earth and meets a young boy called Elliot (Henry Thomas) touched the hearts of millions of movie-goers around the world. Within a year of its release it was crowned the highest-grossing film of all time, overtaking the previous leader, George Lucas’ Star Wars (this record has since been bested by over forty films in the intervening years). 2012 saw E.T. celebrate its 30th anniversary and having watched the blu-ray release recently there’s no question that it has stood the test of time well.

This poster is one of only a few from the worldwide marketing campaign to feature a full depiction of E.T. and this was likely okayed because it’s release in Poland came two years after most other territories and revealing the alien would have been less of an issue. Note that the top part of the poster is slightly blurry around the text but this is the case on every copy of the poster I’ve seen. As is typical of Polish posters printed around this period, the paper is of a lower grade and the printing processes meant that images were never as sharp as they would be elsewhere in the world.

This poster was created by the designer and artist Jakub Erol who was born in Zamość in 1941 and graduated from the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts in 1968. He worked as a prolific poster artist for over 25 years and designed several iconic images for both Polish and American films. Some of his other poster highlights include the bizarre image he conjured up for Ridley Scott’s Alien, a striking design for James Cameron’s The Terminator and the poster for Robocop. One of his best, in my opinion, is the skull-style poster he created for the release of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The Polishposter.com website features many of his designs, several which are for sale, and the Polish cinemaposter.com website also features three pages of his work. This list of his designs on the same website gives you an idea of how prolific an artist he was.

Christopher Nolan’s incredible Batman trilogy launched in 2005 with Batman Begins and ended with The Dark Knight Rises in 2012. The final instalment was following on from arguably the greatest film based on a comic book character yet to be released, The Dark Knight, which featured Heath Ledger’s unforgettable performance as the villainous Joker. The actor’s tragic demise meant the character would not be returning for what Nolan decided, after a deliberation of a few months following the second film’s release, would be the final entry in his series of films.

Set a few years after the events in The Dark Knight, the film opens with a jaw-dropping mid-air sequence onboard a plane during which we’re introduced to the film’s big bad, comic book favourite character Bane (played by Tom Hardy), who sets in motion a plan that will threaten Gotham and the reclusive, physically ailing Batman. At first it seems as though Bane is acting alone but soon a sinister plot is revealed that sees Gotham literally isolated from the rest of the world with Batman unable to help. The film also features Anne Hathaway’s Catwoman, initially a selfish thief but later an ally of the Dark Knight, keen to help prevent a terrible explosive disaster.

Following on from the second film was always going to be a tricky prospect and some filmgoers were not as impressed with the final film in the trilogy. But many, including me, felt it was pretty much the perfect end to Nolan’s take on DC Comics’ most beloved character. The only thing which I did find somewhat lacklustre was the marketing campaign, especially in comparison to the host of posters printed for The Dark Knight. A fairly intriguing teaser gave way to a number of rather less interesting one sheets and the British quads weren’t great.

Not all of the posters were disappointing, however, and this was one of three international advance character one sheets that were designed by Ignition Creative and printed for use in international English-speaking territories. This particular set came to me from Singapore and features a URL with ‘Asia’ in it but I have also seen UK versions of the same posters.

Ignition are a creative agency based in Los Angeles and London and they offer print, audio/visual (including trailers) and interactive (websites) for film, TV and games. Their official site features hundreds of examples of their work and you only have to look at the gallery of their work on IMPAwards to see how prolific they are. The firm worked on the majority of the posters for The Dark Knight Rises and often generates lots of posters for each campaign it works on.

To see the other posters I’ve collected that were designed by Ignition click here.