This Week In Movie Posters, May 13

F1, Paul McCartney's animated squirrel movie, and many different kinds of sparks.

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Hyper-Specific Thirst Trap of the Week

Thanks to Elliot on BlueSky for the tip on this, and to Cari for posting it:

For me the interesting part here isn’t so much the “golf dominatrix” angle. “Golf THOT” is actually pretty well-worn territory on social media at this point (there’s a thirst-poster for every stereotypically male interest, including many busty hunters and fisherwomen). I was more fascinated that society seems to have produced a Lady Fedora Guy. A Lady M’Lady, if you will.

She must not golf anywhere windy, there’s no way that thing is staying on. Though maybe that just leads to more “sexily bending over to retrieve her wind-blown-off fedora situations,” which presumably she would want, for additional thirst trap purposes.

This Week In Movie Posters

Welcome to the This Week In Movie Posters, the feature in which we go through all the week’s new movie posters and read way too much into them. Blessed are the paid subscribers, as without them, none of this would be possible. All posters via IMPA.

I like that they led with all the names of the (voice) cast in this High in the Clouds poster. The scroll produces a nice effect. I started moving down getting progressively more curious what the hell kind of project could possibly combine the Yesterday guy, a Ted Lasso lady, multiple Beatles, and Jimmy Fallon. I never could’ve predicted the reveal. But then again, how could anyone ever predict… a Paul McCartney project… about… a hip… uh… squirrel?

(*checks IMDB*) Okay, yes, I was right, it is actually a squirrel. The face is giving rabbit but the bushy tail was a tell.

A squirrel embarks on a journey to find an animal sanctuary.

Not much of a synopsis, and you also have to wonder what kind of movie needs a poster advertising a release two full years from now. 2027?? I’ll be old!

Apparently it’s based on a children’s book McCartney “co-wrote” back in 2005. That’s a little disappointed. I thought maybe he just got high as hell and wrote a concept album about squirrels that someone now had to turn into a movie. “Yeah, man, this is gonna take me at least two years.”

What is it about glowing sunsets that convey “fast cars?” (See also: Gran Turismo, Ford V. Ferrari).

Anyway, I never watched the F1 show and I don’t care that much about it either way, but car-racing movie + Brad Pitt as a grizzled old pro looking for redemption sounds like Dad Movie perfection. Car racing movies are up there with submarine movies in terms of microgenres with an insanely good track record. Has anyone put Brad Pitt in a submarine yet? Get on it.

I’m not sure what the floating bullet fence is doing here that the bullet halo isn’t already doing better. Also, I feel like putting the cheesy URL on the poster cheapens the gravitas of the small movie text. “GetSuperRad.tv” doesn’t sound like something that should go on a movie poster.

The actual URL leads to some tastefully minimalist website for an art collective that I didn’t care to continue researching, but here’s the IMDB synopsis:

Sun was worshiped as a child by a cult. 15 years later, Sun lives on the road hiding from her past. Tormented by memories, she travels back to the compound, unaware that the cult's former leader is on his way back home.

Damn, memories are one of my least favorite things to be tormented by. Right behind gangs of marauders.

For whatever reason, I’m less intrigued by the idea of “Cate Blanchett as a nun” than by “Cate Blanchett doing her natural Australian accent.”

She doesn’t get to let the Aussie rip very often and it’s nice when she does. Does anyone else get to do their natural accent less than Cate Blanchett? Discuss.

Here’s a silhouette-fest for The Conjuring: Last Rites. That’s The Conjuring 4, for those keeping score. I actually didn’t even realize that there was a second face upside down on the left side at first glance. But now I’m trying to figure out of there’s another face up top and I honestly can’t tell. Is that a face? What the hell is that?? I keep tilting my head from side to side like a confused doggy.

I dig the 1970s vibe of this Dolby poster for Hurry Up Tomorrow. Very The Conversation. But again, it’s going to take me a while to get over my automatic association of Abel Tesfaye (The Weeknd) with The Idol. I retained very little of that dopey show but somehow it cemented Abel Tesfaye as “guy who makes Lily-Rose Depp masturbate” in my mind. Something for my therapist, perhaps.

Dang, look at all those skulls! They’re going to need a really big poster when 28 Decades Later comes out.

Four Score and 28 Years Later.

28 Years, 4 Months, and 3 Days later.

Here’s Echo Valley, with Julianne Moore and Sydney Sweeney. What face is Julianne Moore making here? That barely looks like her, I thought it was Catherine Keener at first.

Kate is dealing with a personal tragedy while owning and training horses in Echo Valley, an isolated and picturesque place, when her daughter, Claire, arrives at her doorstep, frightened, trembling and covered in someone else's blood. [IMDB]

So Echo Valley… Would we describe it as a place where the past comes back?

Here’s an alternate poster for 28 Years Later. I like the verisimilitude of this one. People love their giant towers of skulls, but they never stop to think about the poor guy who has to climb all the way up there to stack more of them. Seems like a pretty dangerous job, to be honest. And no scaffolding?? Skull stackers union when??

Wow, a documentary about the making of John Wick! Aka The Talking Wick.

Guys, can we all maybe calm down about John Wick for a while? This is not a movie, it’s a DVD extra.

Ooh, we haven’t gotten a good through-the-legs poster design in a while. The twist in this poster for The Long Walk is that the legs are a dude. And a troop dude no less.

I’m no body language expert, but the feet angled outward are definitely communicating something. No dong shame on this troop, he’s just laying it right out there. Such confidence. Is it even manspreading if you can’t see an entire column of recruits from behind you??

This poster for The Old Guard 2 has the old “sparks=action” formula, but at least the sparks seem to be coming from somewhere. The helicopter, presumably? Wait, that’s not even a combat helicopter. They tricked me!

Anyway, it’s crazy how well Charlize Theron can do action star, I’m grateful to whoever it was that discovered this. I never saw the first Old Guard, but I like the idea that she’s using that fancy circle axe to keep people away from M. Night Shyamalan’s beach.

“Voted for Bernie,” ha, okay. Ooh, and he smokes American Spirits and does theater? While moonlighting as a Party Down waiter? This poster for The Materialists feels like someone asked an elder Gen X dad who calls everything he doesn’t like “hipster” to design a hipster.

You’d think A24 of all studios would know more about hipsters. (Did I just turn into an elder Gen X dad?? Oh no!!)

I’m lucky enough not to be aware of Gabby’s Dollhouse, but this poster for the Gabby’s Dollhouse movie has the most uncanny picture of Kristen Wiig I’ve ever seen. To not put her name on the poster is just cruel. I would’ve believed anyone from Eva Longoria to Anne Hathaway. This is Schrodinger’s actress.

Here’s another poster for The Materialists, also with keys. Is this some kind of key party movie? Or is it about them switching houses or something? Let’s go to IMDB:

A matchmaker's lucrative business is complicated when she falls into a toxic love triangle that threatens her clients.

Ah, a matchmaker, you say. Sort of a sex-and-money situation, it sounds like.

As for Dakota Johnson’s character, she has a job she loves, but isn’t married. And I guess that’s supposed to explain the sleep shirt? Unmarried career woman, you say? Why, I bet she just got done fucking someone she’s not even in love with! The hussy!

Listen, poster, I don’t need text to tell me that Pedro Pascal is “incredibly attractive.” I feel like the tuxedo for the rich private equity guy is sort of old fashioned though. These days, rich finance guys wear the stupidest-looking vests and quarter zips you can imagine. Also, that boutonniere (could not have spelled this correctly without googling it in a million tries) is a distraction. I thought he had a banana peel on his chest at first. Nice tux, handsome idiot! Your boutonniere looks like shit! (*throws beer can*)

A lot of people even less interested in Marvel’s bullshit than I am asked me what the asterisk in Thunderbolts* was for. I explained that it was that they were the new Avengers. In fact, the whole movie was basically an origin story for the asterisk. And now Marvel has gone and saved everyone the trouble of seeing it and just kinda-sorta retitled their own movie. Nice job saving us the trouble, I guess.