Bugged Thoughts…about DVD cover artwork…
Welcome to the first of what (I hope) will be a new weekly column on things that just BUG me about this movie industry that we all love…and hopefully it will be entertaining to read…
So let’s get started…
I’ve got a gripe to bring up to everyone else…wanna see if everyone else agrees with me…or if I’m just way way WAAAAAAAY too anal when it comes to this kind of thing…
I just have ONE SIMPLE QUESTION –
Why is it that when a movie is released to DVD, the studios releasing the movie always feel a need to change the artwork for the DVD cover?
Especially when what they choose doesn’t even come close to the artwork on the movie posters?
I can think of three recent examples which just get under my skin.
First, there’s The King Of Kong. Its movie poster was fantastic, an awesome piece of pseudo-neon 1980’s stylized artwork with sketches of Billy Mitchell and Steve Wiebe and was absolutely fantastic.
When the movie hit DVD, that glorious artwork was nowhere to be seen. Instead of this retro-inspired graphic, we got a long shot of the back end of someone (presumably Steve Wiebe) sitting in front of a Donkey Kong arcade game. The wonderful blues and oranges of the original poster was gone, replaced by this boring and static shot.
What was worse was that the DVD came with "Alternative Artwork" stickered all over the case, saying there was great alternative cover art for the movie on the flipside of the showing artwork. Naturally, I thought it was the original art, but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO…it’s another piece of artwork, which while nice is STILL not the original art that was on the movie poster.
The second example is the wonderful indie film Fierce People. This little movie had a visually cool release poster, stylized like a portrait family tree, with the movie’s star Anton Yelchin in the foreground, looking up and around at the other portraits on the tree, and surrounded by portraits of costars Donald Sutherland, Diane Lane, Kristin Stewart, and Chris Evans, among others.
When the DVD was released in February, not only had the artwork been completely ditched, what was worse is that the incredibly yawn-inducing static photo of co-stars Donald Sutherland and Diane Lane IS the whole DVD cover. It’s NOT even shots or scenes from the movie – it’s a FREAKING PUBLICITY STILL!!! And it’s not really indicitive of the movie’s contents, since although they DO get the billing (let’s hear it for seniority!), they really both play more supporting than leading roles. And the TRUE star of the movie, Anton Yelchin, is NOWHERE to be seen – in fact he’s NOT EVEN MENTIONED on the front cover.
But the one that really gets me – although it has it’s reasons – is the cover for the just-released on DVD Wristcutters: A Love Story.
The cover photo, featuring Patrick Fugit and Shannon Sossomon, was obviously a recent shot because Patrick didn’t cut his hair until about a year AFTER Wristcutters was shot. But i’ll forgive them that – it’s NOT how Zia, Fugit’s character, appears in the movie, but its tolerable.
In this case, I can’t blame them for not using the movie’s artwork, which was a dark poster with a single symbol and the stylized title on it. It’s a cool poster, but I can see why it wouldn’t necessarily work as a DVD cover without adding maybe a few pictures or something. I don’t remember that signpost on the DVD cover from the movie either, but I find two or three new visual items every time I watch the film – it’s very "Airplane" that way.
But what REALLY Got me was the shot on the back cover. You see the three stars – Fugit, Sossoman, and Shea Whigham – inside of a car sitting on top of a forklift. OK, that’s a very cute image. And YES, it does play into a scene in the movie. But call me a nitpicker if you like (Ok, you’re a nitpicker), but it’s NOT RIGHT! Or as Mythbusters‘ Adam Savage might say, It’s "Wrongity Wrong Wrong"!
WHy is that, you may ask, dear reader?
Ok, you asked for it…(heh heh heh)
Number one – The shot clearly shows the forklift on the right (passenger) side of the car. In the scene from the movie, it was on the left (driver’s) side of the car – if it was on the passenger side, Zia (Fugit) wouldn’t have been able to open the car door, and promptly fall out of the car (which was raised up by a couple of mechanics while he and Eugene (Whigham) were sleeping in the car), because the forklift would have been in the way…
Number two – The car in the shot on the DVD’s back cover is this kind of lemon yellow – in the movie, Eugene’s car is ORANGE…and not the same model, either, if i’m not mistaken…
Number three – Mikal (Sossoman) could NOT have been in the car with Zia and Eugene when the forklift incident happened… because they HADN’T EVEN MET HER YET – she isn’t introduced until the FOLLOWING scene…
Ok, I admit it – i’ve officially turned into a Wristcutters-version of a fanboy, but i’m SORRY – that one little picture bugs the HELL out of me because some (supposedly) smart marketing executive somewhere didn’t bother to do ANY research, and probably hasn’t even SEEN what was arguably the BEST MOVIE OF 2007 and didn’t CARE how one little mistake could SO upset one of the movie’s biggest supporters, and trigger a little rant that the supporter has been contemplating for sometime but didn’t really have the time to do it….oh, excuse me…did I say that out loud?
Come on, that scene that they TRIED to depict was hilarious, but at LEAST take the time to depict it correctly…
More Bugged Thoughts next week…
