Movie marketing ain’t what it used to be

Put it down to realpolitik—or nostalgia—but movie marketers these days rarely imitate what they most admire. A case in point: the all-time best movie posters (or the best from the past 35 years, anyway), as judged by the Key Art Awards (itself 35 years old), held last Friday in L.A. (For the record, I served as a Key Art judge this year.) The best of the best posters would likely not pass muster in today’s world, where what matters most is the talent, the size of their faces determined by contract pecking order.