My Poster Collecting Blog

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2015/05/the-beastmaster-1982-marc-singer.html

This is a 27" x 39" Egyptian one-sheet poster designed by an unknown
artist to promote the 1982 Don Coscarelli film The Beastmaster
adapted by Don Coscarelli and Paul Pepperman from the 1959 Andre
Norton novel, starring Marc Singer as Dar.  Plot summary: Dar has been
raised in exile after escaping sacrifice as an infant to Ar, the god
of the Kingdom of Aruk.  As a child he learns he the ability to
communicate telepathically with animals.  When he is an adult his
people are slaughtered by a horde of barbarians called the Jun and he
vows to take revenge.  On the way he assumes the task of saving a
slave girl named Kiri [Tanya Roberts] from being sacrificed by the
high priest Maax (pronounced mayax) [Rip Torn].  He then
defeats the Jun when they attack Aruk.  After completing that little
job Dar sets off into the wilderness looking for more adventure
accompanied by Kiri, his friend Ruh the black tiger, his golden eagle
Sharak and his ferret Podo, who has just given birth to two baby
ferrets sired by Kodo, her mate who was killed in the fight with the
Jun.  As the film ends the happy couple and their animal friends are
filmed as they stand on a picturesque sandstone desert peak, from a
helicopter that circles around them to the sounds of triumphant
strings and horns, conducted by Lee Holdridge.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2015/06/a-white-dress-for-mariale-1972-ida.html

This is a 14" x 22" Belgian poster for the 1972 Romano Scavolini
film A White Dress for Mariale written by Remigo Del Grosso and
Giuseppe Mangione and starring Ida Galli (credited as Evelyn Stewart)
as both Mariale and her mother. This was the first horror film by
director Romano Scavolini, who later became famous for the slasher
film Nightmare. Plot summary: As a young girl Mariale is driven
out into a wooded area by her father [Franco Colgero], who then
proceeds to shoot her mother, her mother's lover [Giancarlo Bonuglia
Gianni Dei] and then himself while she watches.  Later as an adult
Mariale is living in a gothic castle with her husband Paulo [Luigi
Pistilli].  Paolo does not allow Mariale to leave the castle and
sedates her with drugs because he thinks she is too unstable to mix
with other people.  Because of her need for companionship Mariale
invites some friends over for an evening including her friend Massimo
[Ivan Rassimov], his friend Semy [Shawn Robinson] and a few other
colorful characters.  When Mariale's friends explore the castle with
her and Paolo, in an underground chamber they find the white
bloodstained dress Mariale's mother was wearing when she was murdered.
Mariale decides to wear the dress at dinner that night.  The dinner
event leads to a free-for-all with loud music, promiscuous sex and
a series of vicious murders.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2015/07/king-dinosaur-1955-william-bryant-us.html

This is a 14" x 36" US insert poster for the 1955 Bert I. Gordon
53-minute black-and-white film King Dinosaur based on the story
"Beast from Outer Space" by Bert I. Gordon and Al Zimbalist, with
screenplay by Tom Gries and starring William Bryant as Dr. Ralph
Martin.  Plot summary: In 1960 four astronauts travel to a planet
called Nova known to have plant life that has just entered the Earth's
solar system.  They want to determine if the new planet would be
suitable for a new colony of humans.  They encounter an atmosphere
similar to Earth's with comparable vegetation; after taking off their
space suits and making themselves at home, they are attacked by a
crocodile and then have to fight giant insects and other outsized
creatures such as a snake, an alligator, an armadillo, some
prehistoric wooly mammoths and the king dinosaur himself, a giant
iguana the scientists compare to the prehistoric tyrannosaurus rex;
briefly, with no role to play in the film at all, we are also treated
to a glimpse of the bizarre-looking mata mata turtle.  It took a week
to make this film using borrowed equipment and stock footage.  The
poster, which has become popular among collectors, is quite a bit more
interesting than the film.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2015/08/the-householder-1963-merchantivory-us.html

This is a 27" x 41" US one-sheet poster for the 1964 James Ivory
film The Householder based on novel and screenplay by Ruth
Prawer Jhabvala and starring Shashi Kapoor as Prem Sagar.  This film
was the first collaboration between producer Ismail Merchant and
director James Ivory.  Plot summary: Prem Sagar, a teacher at a
private college in New Delhi, marries Indu [Leela Naidu] in an
arranged marriage.  When Prem's mother [Durga Khote] moves in with
them, her interference is more than Indu can tolerate so she returns
to her family, even though she is pregnant.  Prem is left living alone
with his mother and missing his wife.  He seeks advice from a number
of people how to resolve the problem.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2015/02/the-night-world-exploded-1957-kathryn.html

This is a 27" x 41" US one-sheet for the 1957 Fred F. Sears
film The Night the World Exploded based on a story by Jack
Natteford and Luci Ward and starring Kathryn Grant as Laura
Hutchinson.  Plot summary: Just when Dr. David Conway [William Leslie]
has perfected a machine that can predict earthquakes, multiple
earthquakes begin occurring that herald the end of the world.
Fortunately a way of preventing the catastrophe is discovered that
involves blasting deep trenches in the earth so artificial rain can be
used to flood subterranean deposits of a mysterious newly discovered
addition to the atomic table.  While these events are unfolding
Dr. Conway and his assistant Laura Hutchinson gradually realize they
are in love and have a nice long kiss in the final scene after they
assure each other the world has been saved.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2015/01/bailout-at-43000-1957-john-payne.html

This is a 29" x 43" Argentine one-sheet for the 1957 Francis D. Lyon
film Bailout at 43000 written by Paul Monash and starring John
Payne as Major Paul Peterson.  Plot summary: Major Paul Peterson is
excused from a dangerous test flight of a new aircraft, but his
feelings about it are mixed.

[okiehawker]

Thanks for unleashing so many goodies, DarvishJo!  Okie

[DarvishJo]

Thanks for looking Okie!

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2012/03/klefty-2004.html

This is the somewhat scarce poster for the late Mohamed Khan's [1942-2016] 2004 film Klefty [swindler]. The star Bassem Samra is shown with Rola Mahmoud, who plays the part of the woman who was his main love interest in the film. There are many things I really like about this film. Samra's character is an orphan who has been homeless and without family virtually his entire life in Cairo, which is a terrible place to be when that is your lot in life. No one in the film ever addresses him by name and he never introduces himself to anyone so we don't ever hear his name. We hear things like a shopkeeper telling someone "that boy is a swindler." The movie is an episodic, plotless narrative of a clever thief who has no real aims in life. The guy is a real charmer and most women seem to like him; at moments he looks like he wants be part of Rola's family. He seems genuinely upset when she gives up on him and accepts a proposal from someone else, but he takes that in stride like everything else in his roller coaster existence. The way Khan expertly stitches everything together and Samra's portrayal of the clever vagabond are wonderful. I don't have any information on what kind of release or popularity the film had, but I suspect it did not get as much attention as Khan's other films have gotten. The poster was designed by Kamal Abdel Aziz, who was later the cinematographer for Khan's 2005 film Downtown Girls starring Hind Sabry and Menna Shalaby.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2007/11/mystery-persian-poster.html

The language is Persian, but there is very little written information; we can see it was made for distribution in northern Iran.  Thanks to Susan Poole for locating the film this poster advertises,  listed by the Film & TV Database here.  The top line says "When my father returns" [vaqti pedaram bar migardad or ВОТ ВЕРНЕТСЯ ПАПА].  This is both a caption for the painting and a Persian translation of the Russian title of the film, which is set in World War II.  In the painting the girl seems to be saying this to the boy, while a side image seems to be saying her father is coming home on a train with a missing leg.  The characters in red on the right side say "Eastman color" and the black characters on the source line at the bottom left say "Product of Turkman Films" [mahsul torkman film].  The poster measures 26.5" x 38.5", but there is no artist credit for the painting.

On the Kinopoisk site I found this plot summary in Russian: The film is dedicated to the boys who have matured in the war. In the center of the narration is the thrush Bahar and the aul postman Merdan. They are not yet nine, but they know that every passing day, every good deed accomplished brings the Day of Victory closer and the day of the return of the fathers.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2009/04/hands-of-steel-release-in-egypt-1986.html



Egyptian poster for the 1986 Sergio Martino film Vendetta del futuro, aka Hands of Steel

This film, like all films shown in Egypt, had to get an official exhibition release permit from the Supreme Culture Assembly Office of Foreign Films Supervision under the General Office of Technical Works Supervision.
This is what the release permit looked like:



The form measures 6.5" x 8.5" inches and has lots of technical information about the film, including the weight (16.3 kg) of the 5 reels holding the acetate.  On the back of the form, the supervisor of the Foreign Films Supervision Office (Madiha al-Garia) wrote remarks about how the content of the film's fourth and fifth reels was excised:



You don't find notes about the censor's cuts on the back of every Egyptian film release permit.  Here's what she said:

Fourth Reel: After the beginning in the nightclub two nearly naked girls were doing a strip tease dance; two scenes were omitted.  Two shots were cut out after the middle showing the hero cutting off the bionic woman's head, which fell on the floor while she was talking.

Fifth Reel: At the beginning a shot was omitted showing blood coming out of the truck driver's mouth after the hero pressed his head.  Then two sentences with Arabic subtitles were cut with the man speaking to the hero:  "You grabbed my throat and were about to kill me" and "I will not have another one like you." Then scenes were cut that showed the hero pulling the man's heart out of his chest with his hands and throwing it on the floor while continuing to beat him on the chest.

[DarvishJo]

https://www.mopopoc.com/2009/05/contract-to-print-poster.html

Most of us who collect film posters are interested in them because they are nice to display and perhaps also because they are investments. We usually realize those collecting ideas are transmutations. Most film posters were not made for collectors. They were made to perform a business function--to help sell theater tickets--and were considered part of a film's marketing cost. After being used in that capacity they were usually thrown out, at least in the old days. There is a greater tendency to hang on to posters now, but most of them are still practically worthless and probably deserve to be thrown out.

It is interesting, to add background and depth to the hobby, to look whenever possible at information about the transactions that led to a poster's design and production. I have here a rare pairing of an 33-year-old Egyptian poster and a contract for its production:



I Am Neither Sane nor Insane [ana la 'aqela wa la magnuna] (1976) - (Mahmoud Yassine)



Contract dated 10/4/1975 between Arabic Cinema Printers and Ibrahim Shusha Films to print the above poster

The film was done by Houssam El-Din Mustafa, one of Egypt's greatest directors, and stars Mahmoud Yassine, then a major leading actor in Egypt.  It is based on a story by Ihsan Abd al-Qudus (1919-1990), renowned Egyptian novelist and journalist who edited the Cairo newspapers Al-Akhbar and Al-Ahram.

The contract is the only one of its kind I've seen so far, done by Gasour, the most famous movie poster printer and artist in Egypt and the only one ever to receive an Egyptian academy award for poster design.  A contract signed by him is itself something special to have for a poster collector!  The director of Arabic Cinema Printers is named in the contract as Hassan Mazhar Gasour, but the printer company logo on the poster itself has the name H.H. Gasour.  H.H. Gasour is the name Mr. Gasour used for his Oraby Street shop in downtown Cairo; "H.H." are the initials of his daughters, Hala and Hanna. 

The contract provides that Arabic Cinema Printers will design and print 7,000 one-sheet posters, 400 24-sheet posters and 1,000 lobby cards at a cost of 1,208 Egyptian pounds, which includes a fee of 100 pounds (about $250 at that time) for designing the posters and lobby cards.  The contract also says the task of designing and printing the posters and lobby cards will be completed 25 days after the contract is signed, and gives a schedule of installment payments to be made to the printer. It is signed by Hassan Mazhar Gasour (with the Arabic Cinema Printers official rubber stamp) and Ibrahim Shusha, the film's distributor.

[okiehawker]

You are documenting some great Egytian poster history with your knowledge, research, and original documentation, DarvishJo!  It is pretty darn cool that you have the original contract to print the poster!  Wow! And, you know H.H. stands for Hala and Hanna.  Well done!   Okie

[DarvishJo]

Thanks Okie!  Hala Gasour told me about the use of "H.H. Gasour" during a meeting I had with her in Cairo a few years ago.  I would like to see her again so I could ask more questions but I doubt if it will ever happen.  It is beginning to look like I'll never get back to Egypt, and even if I did it would be difficult to pin Hala down for another interview, just as it was the first time.  She's a busy woman!  What I'd most like to do is look at the original Gasour print shop on Oraby Street, which still has all the old stone litho and offset presses right where they were when the place was a hive of poster production. 

[okiehawker]

Thanks Okie!  Hala Gasour told me about the use of "H.H. Gasour" during a meeting I had with her in Cairo a few years ago.  I would like to see her again so I could ask more questions but I doubt if it will ever happen.  It is beginning to look like I'll never get back to Egypt, and even if I did it would be difficult to pin Hala down for another interview, just as it was the first time.  She's a busy woman!  What I'd most like to do is look at the original Gasour print shop on Oraby Street, which still has all the old stone litho and offset presses right where they were when the place was a hive of poster production.

Hi DarvishJo,  Wow, it would be amazing to see the Gasour stone litho presses!  Do you have friends there that might take some pictures for you of the print shop?  It is very exciting to think the shop is still there.  Okie

[DarvishJo]

Hi Okie, 

I somehow think that has already been done.  There are quite a few good photographers in Cairo and Mr. Gasour was a legend there for many years.  I'll ask around to see if anybody knows about any published pictures. The old stone litho presses Cairo poster printers used were simple and primitive-looking.  I'll look around for pictures of those too.

[DarvishJo]

I just found this documentary in Arabic by Al-Jazeera called "The World of Posters" which shows footage of the inside of the old Gasour print shop (alas with no stone litho presses in operation).  It tells us a lot about a few of the people who painted some of the great Arabic posters, including the Cairo-born Greek painter Stamatis Vassiliou, Gasour himself and his daughter Hala, Morteda Anise and Wahib Fahmy.  I appear at the very beginning of the film showing posters via Skype to my friend Sameh Fathy of Cairo (my face is not visible--no great loss) and I'm also credited in Arabic at the end. 



It has been 7 or 8 years since I was in Cairo and my information has become dated.  I hear the contents of the old Gasour print shop have been evacuated.