the Mystery of the Lord of the Rings ROTK poster

[MoviePosterBid.com]

posters and posters and posters and posters
that's what I got when I bought all the poster sizes from Eric Caidin's estate sale auction at Profiles in History

this deal was spectacular for a variety of reasons, one reason being that I got a good amount of posters that I had not seen for sale often (if ever in some cases)

One poster is this Lord of the Rings: Return of the King poster (shown below) that presents some mystery.

For instance, Eric's people were pretty good about identifying material on the tube that they had posters in. They would have tubes marked "first teaser, second teaser" etc.
others would be noted as "final version" or 'final US version"

it was naturally helpful when they would have posters identified as "commercial posters", esp when they also had original posters for the same.

This poster was in a box marked "LOTR ROTK Final Us Version" which is at odds with the description of commercial poster as sold by one auction.

Also, while there were plenty of commercial posters for this title in this buy, they were clearly marked on the boxes as commercial posters. They all bear a Sonis emblem and they are not full size 27x40 posters. This poster does not bear any commercial logos and is 27x40. The paper is right for a theatrical poster. So this creates a conundrum

on ebay, there are only 2 sellers with the poster, both describe it as an original theatrical poster. One is Movieposterzone (is that Greg E.?)

my problem is clear - I think it is an original theatrical poster, but in keeping with my ideal that I cannot offer posters that I can't properly identify, I can't reliably sell this poster, which I think is one of the best for the title. I don't believe in adding disclaimers to items, because that's what people do when they sell (for instance) Portal posters.
like "I don't know if this Frankenstein is an original poster or not, but it says 1931". Not my deal. Either you know as a professional, or you don't.

lenticular Jason says he never saw this poster when he was doing film promotion and of course, Eric is gone.
Does anyone have any reliable information on this poster that they can add?
I'd appreciate any information

[erik1925]

No idea about the background of this poster.. but it's sharp looking.

[MoviePosterBid.com]

No idea about the background of this poster.. but it's sharp looking.

I think it's pretty cool.

I messaged a friend who worked for Eric, and hope he can tell me.
movieposter.com has them id'd as theatrical also

I really need to find out

[skyjackers]

If I remember correctly this was one of a few posters offered on the Lord of the Rings website when the Lord of the Rings films were released. I believe they were only sold through this site, similar to how some Star Wars theatrical looking posters were sold through the Star Wars site.

[MoviePosterBid.com]

If I remember correctly this was one of a few posters offered on the Lord of the Rings website when the Lord of the Rings films were released. I believe they were only sold through this site, similar to how some Star Wars theatrical looking posters were sold through the Star Wars site.

so you think it was some sort of 'fanclub' type poster?

let's go looking at the Wayback machine & see if I can find something

[MoviePosterBid.com]

so you think it was some sort of 'fanclub' type poster?

let's go looking at the Wayback machine & see if I can find something

eh.. the site isn't properly crawled, so it's impossible to search

[timelessmoviemagic]

I'm sure what skyjackers said is correct as well. I remember seeing this poster on that site if I recall correctly.

I do know a LOTR super fan and collector who may own one of these so I'll ask him. (On holiday atm so won't get an answer until next Tuesday)

Marc

[skyjackers]

so you think it was some sort of 'fanclub' type poster?

let's go looking at the Wayback machine & see if I can find something

Exactly, there were a few different styles. I remember seeing them clearly and considered buying them, but never did.

[hepcatpunk]

I worked for a theater chain at that time and oversaw a few theaters, and this is a poster that we never received.  Fan club makes sense.

[MoviePosterBid.com]

if it's a fanclub poster of sorts would make lots of sense, considering the size of the poster
while I do have commercial reprints that are 27x40, they aren't common in such a size, but fanclub posters generally try to appear like real theatrical posters..

not appearing on the IMP of course was an indication it could be something else, other than theatrical, but it doesn't appear to be a straight-up commercial poster. I'd like to hear from anyone who knows more, including Marc's friend.

this is of course, why I ask. The information has to be available, might as well seek out those that may know

thanks fellers

[MoviePosterBid.com]

New Line Cinema Store on the Wayback Machine

the poster is shown but the link is dead, it is however described as this one, a poster only available from the store

http://web.archive.org/web/20060508001906/http://shop.newline.com:80/catalog/product.xml?product_id=18651;category_id=2488;pcid1=2472;pcid2=

[Crazy Vick]

nice Rich, the one poster that will rule them all

[MoviePosterBid.com]

nice Rich, the one poster that will rule them all

it is a cool poster, maybe better than the theatrical posters.
I needed to be sure what it was though, so I had to crowdsource here and Facebook to get what was needed!

[jpicken]

Hi Rich,

I don't know if it was a "fan club" poster, but I think it was was available at either a new line online store or through thonering.net. There were many official posters for RotK including a character set, but I don't remember that poster anywhere else other than the online store.

John

[MoviePosterBid.com]

Hi Rich,

I don't know if it was a "fan club" poster, but I think it was was available at either a new line online store or through thonering.net. There were many official posters for RotK including a character set, but I don't remember that poster anywhere else other than the online store.

John

John, I posted a link a couple comments up to the New Line site where it was offered as an exclusive poster
so (for instance) like the AMC Exclusive posters, this one should be called a New Line Exclusive poster, which was what I needed to know

thanks to everyone who had a comment here, helping me close in on the origin of the poster