Poster Comparison

The Italian Job

I chose the movie The Italian Job for my movie poster comparison for the main reason that really liked the remake. I found it very interesting to see that the movie had several diverse posters for their different timeframes of release in theaters and some in different countries.

So let’s start with the older posters from 1969 and then from the rerelease in 1999 of the same movie. In the American released poster, I can see where the stand out eye catcher is the woman dressed in a bikini with her back to you. In 1969 there would have been no way the movie ratings industry would have allowed her to have her scantily covered front side to the poster. You then have Michael Cain in a cutting edge fashion for that timeframe in a turtle neck with his hair is a purposeful mess, almost in a stoic Marlboro Man type pose. The captioning is cutting for its time with some yellow aura around it and throughout the poster. You also have some action in the background in the form of police in riot gear with batons and two mini cars rushing down a stairwell giving some intrigue and showing that this will be an action-packed film worth seeing.

                       I found this poster that was released in 1969 in Italy completely fascinating in that it showcases some serious Roman type architecture in the background that would be found locally lending to the credibility of the name of the movie. There are no sexy selling points on this poster, but it has flowers and lots of color throughout the poster. It looks like the fashion in Italy at that time would have been a long sleeve button down shirt with a vest which leads to a very serious note. Even the border around the picture is serious as it looks like it is a map with no nonsense fonts.

                                     This poster appears to have been released in Japan. It has the sexy girl in it alongside a seriously American gangster looking Cain complete with a cup of tea and a gun. The gun being the epic American Tommy Gun which lends an action from the western civilization that was rarely seen in Southeast Asia. It has a lot of automobile action with the car rushing towards you in the tunnel and several vehicles chasing each other underneath Cain in his leather office chair with my grandpa’s golf shoes on.

                                   This poster looks to be a rerelease from 1999 in the U.K. It has a newer shadowed font in the foreground and the entire poster is comprised of both the English and Italian flags. It again has the stoic Cain looking serious and the cars racing towards you through a tunnel. I find it interesting that there is a huge red arrow pointing to the cars and on the arrow is written “This is the self preservation society”. Not sure what the saying means, it may be something indicative to the location in the U.K.

                              Now for the recent remake posters, this one was the main release poster that I remember from the theaters. Nostalgic that it has the same yellow hue from the first poster in 1969. That’s about where the similarities end though. This poster has everyone dressed in black showing the villainous serious side of them. Wahlberg is in the forefront as the leading actor with Charlize Theron and Jason Statham at his side. Theron has her shirt unbuttoned to reveal her cleavage and that is the sex sales pitch for this poster. Donald Sutherland is in the background which lends a time honored credible actor to this movie. The bottom half has a helicopter, which were not prevalent in 1969, and Mini Coopers, which were ever so popular in 2003 when this movie was released. Then there is the phrase “Get in. Get out. Get even.” that to me means that this will not be some long drawn out movie, but rather a quick paced, action packed film.

                                   I just wanted to include these two posters I found because they exude sexual content. Obviously the one with Theron is intended for the male audience. She has this smoky erotic look like she is in a dream. It is such great idea on the advertiser’s part to put a poster out with Statham for the female demographic. He has that rogue bad boy look that will play to the emotions of women.

                                    

I believe the great variations in movie posters for The Italian Job is due to the fact that we as movie goers have evolved a lot since 1969. The main selling point in 1969 was that it was a serious action movie and since that era our movies have evolved into a more sexy and definitely more comedy filled production. I can see where there are vast differences in these posters as the different time frames themselves would bring about the latest cars, the brightest stars and the hottest fashions. The fonts could not be any more different between the two ages and I believe this to be that in 1969 the viewing public would have wanted more description of the movie in the poster to sell it to them. Also the earlier edition was directed by Peter Collinson (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0172772/) who was famed for making action movies; the 2003 version was directed by F. Gary Gray (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0336620/) who was more into comedies, music videos and some action movies. Whereas in 2003 the movie goers would be relying more on their intuition to read into the movie and with less lettering it leaves room for more action photos. The older ones seemed to rely more on the fonts and shadowing whereas the newer poster have a straight and succinct lettering to them which I believe to be due to the fact that photos in the earlier days were not as glamorous as they are today and in the newer posters we don't rely on lettering to sell us a movie through a poster. There are still the voluptuous women in both posters, but in the older poster her back to us is indicative of the demure views of the general public and having her face forward would detract from the main role of Cain who was the main action selling point of the movie poster. The newer one with Statham plays to the sexual desires of women and in the 1960's that would be completely unheard as the men of that era were the ones to pick out the movies and also pay for the theater tickets; chivalry was still alive in 1969 so I am told. The original posters were designed to be showcased in several different countries with each one specific to that country. The newer ones maintained the same pictures about them throughout distribution as far as I could tell.

Then and Now

Dad-21 years ago

I chose to interview my dad, he has a different point of view than most other people I know. He is the son of immigrant Italians and has a strong work ethic and sense of family and he is about 21 years older than me. So 21 years ago pretty much takes us back to 1991 & 1992.

The popular culture as he remembers:

        VHS Tapes & cassette tapes, CD’s emerging- these were popular as you could record or buy the movies you wanted instead of going to the theater.

     Family TV-Dallas and Cheers he began to watch-TV was different back then as to the graphic content and the morals and values portrayed. Families actually sat down together to watch a show and this way before cable, so you only had about five channels to choose from. MTV was only starting to emerge and it was all videos...no commercials or reality shows

          Blockbuster rentals-this was the way that people could stay at home, save money and spend “quality family time” at home. It made watching movies so much more convenient.

         Beepers/pagers-this era was obviously prior to cell phones and almost all of your contact away from home or office was through a pager. The problem therein lies if you were away from your home or office you had to find a pay phone and have some change. It’s hard even now to find a pay phone….you gotta look really hard.

        

    

    Desert Storm ending, country uniting, parades-this was important for him  as I was coming home safe from Desert Shield/Desert Storm. Also the country hadn’t seen a war since Vietnam really and this fight didn’t last long and there weren’t as many casualties as Vietnam. The country really came together; there were parades everywhere and I can see where the proponent for all the festivities came from the Vietnam vets that had gotten a crappy return from America after the war.

                          

Seattle Grunge music-dirty flannels and greasy hair-my dad says that he    can remember this music coming out and some of it did appeal to him, but mostly he didn’t understand the look of the “greasy bed head of hair” and flannel shirts. But he could see how the music swept through the country and changed not just the music scene, but how kids of the younger generation changed their clothing and appearance.

      

       

Terminator 2 & Silence of the Lambs & Dutch(my dad still has it on VHS!)-movies were a lot different 20 years ago as there was no PG-13 and the movie ratings kept a lot of the sex and nudity out of the theaters or at least contained it to being rated R.

Rodney King –my dad can remember the whole thing unfolding as America became black and white, literally as there was a divide among the color lines throughout the country. This effected his business as he was to be working a few jobs in the L.A. area and when the court found those officers not guilty and the race riots began, he just let those jobs go. He can remember there being some protesters down in Phoenix, but nothing to the extent of what happened in California with the looting, vandalism, arson and eventually assault and murder.

Here are the current Popular Cultures in our family:

1.     Internet-it is pop culture in that I am not sure how I would survive without. It has streamlined my life in ways of communication (Skype & Yahoo messenger from when my wife was in Iraq, it was our only way to communicate a lot of the time), banking, FB(which allows me to see other family and friends and what is happening in their lives.)

2.    Netflix/Roku-we got a Roku system last Christmas and we can now stream movies from the internet to our TV. We are actually thinking of completely disconnecting our satellite TV provider because of the ease and cost effectiveness of the Roku. We have a multitude of channels like Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, several weather and sports channels. Some are free and some have a small fee, but regardless we can sit down as a family and watch shows that we choose to watch.

3.    RZR 4-I know it is not mainstream pop culture yet, but for us it is. We surround ourselves with people that also own them and take their families out camping. We spend a lot of time out in the sand dunes with this adrenaline junkie community, this is our version of quality family time. The best part for me is that we have four seats, so my wife and two sons can ride and spend time in the outdoors with me.

4.    Music-what can I say, we listen to the recent popular music in our house from country to dance to rock. With 7 kids ranging from 21 to 1, we get a copious amount of music playing in our house. Although it is funny to watch the 3 year old sing “I’m sexy and I know it” while my 1 year old son does his best “shuffle” to it.

5.    Reality shows- we mostly watch the cooking type reality shows such as Top Chef, Kitchen Nightmares, Iron Chef and the girls like Cake Boss and I like Bitchin Kitchen. We do a lot of cooking and the whole family spends time in the kitchen so we get some good ideas on what to cook next as a family from some of these shows.

Deadly Fad

Deadly Fad

                To me I see the video game fad as of lately becoming the most detrimental in our society today. The games have become so realistic that it seems there are people becoming “lost” in these fantasy games. There have been a multitude of deaths and suicides directly linked to these games by the gamer themselves by either their own admonition or through their suicide notes. The even bigger problem in my eyes is that these games keep the youth of our generation glued to the couch or monitor. There is such a lack of motivation to do anything else but sit and game all day and night. The lackadaisical attitude goes hand in hand with a poor diet and missing, sometimes altogether, physical exercise.  Then, the lack of exercise and poor nutrition lead to a multitude of physical illnesses such as diabetes type 2, obesity, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder(COPD), congestive heart failure(CGF). These previously mentioned ailments are just the biomechanical issues, what about the mental and emotional issues that are becoming more prevalent in these gamers; they are becoming rapidly more anti social. Look at the high rate of growth in online dating and dating from chat rooms. This is taken from Articlebase online “Online dating is more popular than it has ever been, and the numbers are growing. The number of people signing up for free dating sites is growing, and the number of marriages attributed to online dating with it. In 2008, over 100,000 marriages were credited to free dating sites, that is a lot of people who have found love online! Recent statistics show that over 30% of all Americans have either used an internet dating site or know someone who has. There are over 300 million people in the United States, That means over 90 million people have dove into the world of online dating!”

            That’s great that so many people are making that “connection” online, but where are their social skills? Gone! According to enrichment journal on the divorce rate in America:
“The divorce rate in America for first marriage is 41%, the divorce rate in America for second marriage is 60%, the divorce rate in America for third marriage is 73%.”

                All in all, I can see where there are a multitude of gamers that are responsible and do have jobs, relationships and are positive members of their society. I feel the breakdown is in some gamers inability to manage to have an equal balance in their lives and they would benefit greatly from becoming unplugged for a while.

5. 13-Year-Old Murders Woman for Subscription Money

In 2007, A 13-year-old boy named Dinh The Dan killed an 81-year-old woman and stole her money in order to fund an online gaming addiction. Vietnamese police report that Dan strangled the woman with a piece of rope, then buried her in a pile of sand in front of his house. Owing to his age, he was not sent to prison, but to a reeducation camp from which he will be released after good behavior.

4. Man Kills Toddler Over Broken Xbox

Tyrone Spellman, 27, played long hours on his Xbox. So, when his 17-month-old daughter pulled on some cords and tipped the Xbox to the ground, breaking it, he become completely enraged. He struck her with such force that it “cracked her skull several times.” The autopsy, too, revealed a broken arm that was at least two weeks old which social workers had failed to identify previously.

3. Daniel Petric Kills Mother Over Halo 3

After his mother and father took Halo 3 away from him, Daniel Petric, 17, unlocked the safe in which they’d hidden it. Also in the safe was a 9mm pistol. He then took the game and the pistol to his parent’s room, asked them to close their eyes because he had a surprise for them, and shot them both in the head. The father survived with critical injuries, but his mother died instantly.

2. Toddler Beaten to Death with Game Controller

Darisabel Baez, the 2-year-old daughter to 19-year-old Neida E. Baez, was beaten to death with a video game controller by Neida’s then boyfriend, Harve L. Johnson, in April of last year. Bizarrely, the girl was brought to her mother unconscious and soaking wet because Howard had tried to revive her in the bathtub. He refused to tell police his reason for beating the girl.

1. GTA-Inspired Cop Killing

There is little doubt that Devin Moore’s cop-killing spree and subsequent theft of a police cruiser were inspired by the ultraviolent video game series Grand Theft Auto. Moore took one gun from an officer, shot three others with it, and fled the station in a police cruiser. Moore was a obsessed with the GTA series of video games, and, once captured, he told police "Life's like a video game. You've got to die sometime."

Lovemark

I can see that my Lovemark is the Polaris brand. We have owned their snow mobiles, quads and the new RZR-4. I can see where some of the other companies have their own versions of the atv, utv and snow machine and they are pretty close in comparison so I would say at this point the playing ground is level with them all. Then you have all of us out racing each other, some of whom have Kawasaki Teryxs, Arctic Cat Wildcats or Can-Am Commanders and at that point it becomes a competition. The competition leads to some smack talking and you had better be able to stand behind your brand of machine and you definitely better have that machine able to back you up on the trail. It becomes an emotional challenge at this point.

Does Polaris play on these emotional ties and mental attachments?  Oh yes they do! If you watch the following links you can see how they are “The world’s most powerful ATV”, “It has the best power steering”, “The highest horsepower and the smoothest ride.” How could you possibly choose any other manufacturer over them? Even their ending caption of "Winning Performance" eludes to the fact that if you don't buy their brand then you will not be a winner; hence a loser. Nobody wants to be a loser and the latter portion of the caption, performance, means that you are getting a quality product, a smarter choice and   more capable machine. Hard to say no to all that. Even on the first video it challenges the two other leading competitors' side by sides and they can only fit two riders, while the RZR 4 can fit four riders. The RZR 4 screams that it is for a family and that there is no other chioce if you have a wife/husband and kids....or a really cool dog. This is the main video that I played for my wife to convince her that the RZR 4 was the toy for our family.

http://youtu.be/U4kr9YEaSwc

http://youtu.be/4DqBsNG5VtQ

http://youtu.be/Lk37M2_IqXw

              

        We have owned the Polaris brand in our family for as long as I can remember. My dad, uncles and brother still own them and the Polaris name has bred a familiarity within our scope of family and friends.  My father has used a quad or Rhino for his work for a long time, so there is an association that the Polaris brand is part of our livelihoods. Sounds a bit cliché, but it has helped to put food on the table and clothes on our backs.

                Do I have an emotional bond with the Polaris name? I would undoubtedly have to say yes to that! It is hard not to have some sort of ties with the machine that you spend your weekends, family vacations and trail runs with. The RZR-4 and our quads have taken us to places that would have never been seen or experienced by us without them. After you have ridden into the middle of the desert to Antelope Falls and then swam in the pond, it is hard not to be bonded to that machine.  Currently my 4 year old has a Polaris 50 quad that he is learning to ride. This is my greatest moment or joy, as a father, to be able to teach him how it all works. Showing him how to put it all together with the throttle, brakes, leaning in turns and so forth is my paternal apex. How could I not have an emotional tie to something after that? Hard not to, I know.

                Then once you have owned a quad or RZR, you eventually journey to Glamis or Moab or some other off road park near you and you meet all the other owners of the same brand. Having the same brand or machine enables you to fit in, start a conversation and make friends. We make the trek to Glamis about 5 times a year during the winter months and we almost always stick with our same group of people, and yes we all own RZR’s. Owning the same machines makes repairs and upgrades so much easier as everyone is so willing to jump in and help you fix it or adjust clutch or throw on a new exhaust.

        I see riding this machine as expressing myself as a father to my boys as with a four-seater, they go everywhere with me. I explain to my older kids while we are out riding that if you want to have the toys and fun like we are having; then you need to be educated and work hard. Sounds strange, but this one of the ways that I show them some motivation to better themselves through higher learning.

                It would be hard for me to imagine not having an ATV or UTV to spend quality time with my family and friends. Yes, I could walk around the block with them and take them to the local park, but getting away from the city and being on our own is what fun and family is for us. Wouldn’t trade it for the world, but a little more speed wouldn’t hurt.