This Week In Movie Posters, May 7th

Action star Kevin James, danglin' Tom Cruise, and the streamers' unconscionable attempt to rob us of tiny movie text.

Welcome to The #Content Report, a newsletter by Vince Mancini. I’ve been writing about movies, culture, and food since the late aughts. Now I’m delivering it straight to you, with none of the autoplay videos, takeover ads, or chumboxes of the ad-ruined internet. Support my work and help me bring back the cool internet by subscribing, sharing, commenting, and keeping it real.

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Quick Plugs!

I wrote two new pieces for GQ.

—A meditation on Andrew Schulz’ viral “Trump is cool ‘cuz he gets pussy” clip, Hegseth, and how we’re generally beset with these guys who represent a middle schooler’s idea of a “cool guy.”

—A quick one about the Trump movie tariffs and whether they all stem from his grudge against Parasite for winning best picture. Remember that?? Weird!

A Great Commercial

I don’t have any hyper-specific thirst traps this week, but in lieu of that, this might be the best commercial I’ve ever seen:

Movie Headline Smorgasborg

— “Final Destinations Bloodlines directors say they broke the world record for oldest person set on fire”.

Oh hell yes. I have no interest in this movie, but the promotions department is really speaking my language with that headline. The article concerns “a 71-year-old stuntwoman who came out of retirement” to film the scene, but the headline is really the main course. I’d love to see this become a whole genre, with different directors trying to outdo each other. What’s the oldest person ever to get thrown off a train? Get kicked by a horse? Jump off a balcony into a pool? Let’s start exercising the demons of gerontocracy with rituals of humiliation! We can never have too many smoldering stunt performers limping off muttering “I’m gettin’ too old for this shit,” I say.

—Shia Labeouf is doing a prison rodeo movie with Mel Gibson’s horse wife.

A few years ago I reviewed a Mark Wahlberg movie called Father Stu. I had no idea going in that the movie would be a hard-sell for Catholicism, or that it had been directed by Mel Gibson’s girlfriend, Rosalind Ross, previously “the most decorated vaulter [the horse kind] of all time.”

Well now, Deadline reports, she’s directing God of the Rodeo, which she also wrote, starring Labeouf. Sounds like she’s putting that horse experience to good use! She’s really making Mitt Romney’s horse wife look like a lazy sack of shit.

Set against the brutal backdrop of Louisiana’s Angola Prison in 1967, God of the Rodeo tells the story of Buckkey, a hardened inmate serving a life sentence who finds a glimmer of redemption in an unlikely opportunity: the prison’s first-ever inmate rodeo. As Buckkey and his fellow inmates prepare for a last grasp at glory, they’re confronted with the reality that the rodeo is nothing more than a gladiatorial showcase — a grueling fight for survival designed to satiate the public’s bloodlust and fulfill the warden’s delusion of godliness.

Ridley Scott is producing, which may explain that weird digression about gladiatorial combat (I think the prison rodeo part was already hook enough?). Anyway, first David Mamet, now Mel Gibson’s girlfriend. Shia has an uncanny way of his every career move feeling like it might be performance art. I’m here for it. Everything about this project seems like it lives right on the edge of cancellation, right down to the extra K in the main character’s name.

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.

We start this week with the new VHS-style poster for Netflix’s new remake (probably?) of Prom Queen. Doesn’t really look like my cup of tea, but at least they kept the small movie text at the bottom. It’s not a movie poster without the small movie text. Also, is the girl on the left holding her boob? I too hold my boob when I’m scared.

“The true story that inspired The Exorcist.”

So… a remake of The Exorcist, then? It’s telling the same true story but not as a documentary? Am I the only one who doesn’t understand the distinction here? It also has the same title as another movie that came out in 2017, which is really here nor there, but like, don’t you guys Google these things first? Sheesh.

Anyway, here’s the trailer:

Yep, looks pretty much like The Exorcist! Good thing there aren’t any other horror movies about demonic possession.

Here’s one of the new posters for Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning. I’m against Trump’s movie tariffs, but I do think there should be a law that you have to put the numbers next to your sequels. You really expect me to be able to keep track of the Mission Impossible movies? For the record, this is the eighth of them. It is, unfortunately, a sequel to Dead Reckoning, which was one of my least favorite of the Missions Impossible. And I loved Fallout. Maybe calm down with the plot twists, you’re makin’ me tired. I just want to watch Tom Cruise run fast and almost die.

Anyway, I don’t remember this character or what her deal is from the last movie (which I don’t remember much of in general. I think there was a killer AI doohickey?). Was she the subject of government experiments? Forced to give up a child? Maybe she just got a hernia trying to lift up Tom Cruise so he reach the high shelf?

Mamma mia, that’s una gran-a capello! (That’s Italian for “hat,” I know things). If I know one thing about white ladies on vacation, it’s that they love wearing huge hats and taking pictures of themselves sitting in giant chairs. Really nailed the target demo there.

Credit where credit is due though, I do appreciate the maxi hat. Also, very reminiscent of the Lenny Kravitz’ scarf. The hat imagery must’ve worked too, because I put this movie on the other night, but then I realized that it was a sequel to some other movie that I haven’t seen and turned it off. I guess the “another” in the title should’ve been a clue, but if we passed my numbers-in-sequels law we wouldn’t have this problem.

Also, what was I just saying about the tiny text? Nothing makes a movie seem more disposable than replacing the little movie text with your goofy streaming logo. We used to be a proper country.

So Blake Lively gets a massive hat but Anna Kendrick just gets a regular sundress? That doesn’t seem fair, does it?

If Tom Cruise doesn’t die while filming a Mission Impossible movie he will have failed both himself and cinema. Mission Impossible: Death Drive! I love that for him, everyone should have a purpose in life.

Also, is it racist to point out that Tom Cruise looks really Korean in this picture?

This is a really nice picture of Big Ben, and I like that they included a running tom Cruise for scale. Love to give my landmarks some context like that.

Sidenote: what do we think Tom Cruise is doing to his face these days? Botox? Fillers? There’s something, because it’s not moving like it used to. Just let yourselves become grizzled, it adds character!

This is one of those posters that seems to have all the elements of a successful poster but somehow doesn’t quite come together. They went pretty literal here, which makes it shocking that they didn’t include an on-the-nose tagline too. “Her foster parents are screwed!” You know, something like that.

Oh, I guess I should include the synopsis:

Unable to conceive, a couple seeks to build a family with a young orphan, survivor of tragic childhood. But their act of love turns to horror when they realize the violence in their foster's past has returned to destroy the new family.

I had to include that because I didn’t want you to think that I just assumed she was a foster child, which would be kind of weird.

God dammit, Apple! You are the best streaming service, do not copy Prime’s unconscionable exclusion of the small movie text! Just look how much jankier this poster looks without the small movie text. Without the movie text it goes from “cool new teaser for a Spike Lee movie” to “my nephew made this on a deadline.”

Great poster for Weapons here. The posters these days all try to play it coy, but this one shows that if you’ve got a good concept, sometimes it’s best to just lay it all out there. I like the idea of harkening back to mid-century advertising, where every print ad had like two full paragraphs of copy. Harken, you designers! Harken for all you’re worth!

Ballerina. You had me at “Ana De Armas” and lost me with “From the world of John Wick.”

I’m sorry, but we hit peak John Wick lore a few movies ago. It was better when it was just a movie about a guy who was mad about his dog.

Hmm, interesting concept, but I don’t think the plane is really selling that it’s supposed to be a stand-in for the letter I. This looks like M to the power of t. Maybe the T is Tom Cruise’s testosterone replacement injections? Jeez, I’m going really hard on Tom Cruise this week, aren’t I. I swear I didn’t intend for that to happen. I love that lil’ daredevil!

First Hunt. Last Chance. This headline also works weirdly well for the Mission Impossible movie. (Tom Cruise plays Ethan Hunt, remember?).

Anyway, what is that font called? That is the dark sci-fi font.

Great poster for The Smashing Machine, though admittedly, the star, vehicle, and director kind of do all the work. I also like that the gloves are a main detail. I’ve been watching UFC since UFC 1 and I’ve seen the Smashing Machine documentary multiple times, and even I didn’t remember how shitty those first-generation MMA gloves looked. Imagine getting your ass beat with someone’s crafts project. Brutal.

What is her shirt supposed to say? “I am tunnel?” This looks like one of those AI-generated images where they just sort of stick letters together in ways that don’t make sense.

Also, the first name on this is “Spooky Madison?” Get outta here, this is fake. What is even the plot, Thunderdome for goth kids?

I absolutely love how sad Kevin James looks to be starring in an action movie. (Also: sparks!)

Maybe it’s the Rambo Last Blood connection, but I suddenly got the sense that this is a movie in which Paul Blart has to rescue someone from being human trafficked by Mexican cartels. Please tell me that’s it!

When a job goes horribly wrong, an ex-cop and family man who moonlights as a mob henchman has one night to get his family out of the city. [IMDB]

Ah, well. Alas. By the way, what’s the track record on action movies with “gun” or “shoot” in the title? Can’t be good.

Oh no, Dreamworks is doing the “live-action” remakes of their back catalogue thing now too? Woof. Sometimes I think the movie industry deserves to die.

Also: sparks!

Well well well, looks like ol’ danglin’ Tom is back again! Buildings, planes, mountains, helicopters, cars — ain’t nothing the man can’t dangle off of! He’s a danglin’ fool, he is! Can’t stop him from danglin! Dangle, young man, dangle!

I’m a little color blind so it’s possible I’m missing something here, but to me it kind of just looks like he has a red booger? I don’t get the red reflection if it’s not going to convey anything.

Okay, so it’s a coming-of-age movie about a girl who learns to be a little slutty from a stripper? Sure, why not.

Abby seeks to impress her crush by learning a specific sexual position, enlisting a stripper's help. However, she realizes true self-discovery and lasting friendship are more valuable. [IMDB]

Oh wow, the title is apparently even more on-the-nose than I was predicting. And it’s directed by Jillian Bell from Workaholics. Seems like enough to give it a chance, but again, they gotta stop leaving out the tiny text. No tiny text + A Hulu Original is like shouting “this content is disposable!”

The lack of tiny text is killing me. Also, can we get Krasinski a different facial expression? I will even chip in.

By the way, has any director had a weirder career than Guy Ritchie? I understand that some people just like to work, but he is very hard to pin down. And I say that as someone who thinks The Man From UNCLE was the best Bond film of the last 20 years.

Two estranged siblings join forces to seek the legendary Fountain of Youth. Using historical clues, they embark on an epic quest filled with adventure. If successful, the mythical fountain could grant them immortality.

I’m guessing this is like a Night at the Museum kind of a thing? I feel like Hollywood keeps trying to make this video game-y take on Indiana Jones and it never really works. (Remember Uncharted? Probably not).

None of these posters for Wes Anderson’s new movie, the Phoenician Scheme have revealed much in the way of plot, but they’ve certainly been strong on selling “this is a Wes Anderson movie,” which I suppose is fitting for possibly the most on-brand human on Earth.

Incidentally, is “Mia Threapleton” not the most Wes Anderson-actor-sounding name you’ve ever heard? (She’s Kate Winslet’s daughter, by the way).

I don’t know that I would’ve pegged Pierce Brosnan and Samuel L. Jackson as two guys who can wear the shit out of a cowboy hat, but here we are. I also usually have a one-ascot-per-crew rule, but I’ll happily make an exception this duo of interracial silver foxes.