Wednesday, August 11, 2010

"Stagecoach" v.2.0



If you get a chance, take a drive out to the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge Mass, in addition to an excellent exhibition of illustrations by William "Shrek" Steig there is also a collection of Norman Rockwell's film poster work.
In particular a huge lobby poster for the now forgotten 1965 remake of "Stagecoach".
I mean look at this bad-baby, the Indian attack the forms the bottom of the poster and the halo of cameo portraits of the cast, it's an amazingly unified piece of work. Never has such excellence been deployed so well to shore up such second rate jobbery.
Alex Cord as the "Ringo Kid"? Ayieeee! okay I grant you Bing Crosby as a boozy sawbones and the ever dependable Slim Pickens but the rest of the casting is plainly inexplicable in extremis. And anyway...why remake "Stagecoach"? What else is there to say after perfection has been achieved?
Still, the poster is a work of art unto itself.

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