Ode to an Ad: "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" Poster

THE POSTER

This movie has been on my mind a lot recently. First, my friend Aaron cited it as one of the 10 Best Pop Culture Love Stories of the Last Ten Years. Then I mentioned it in correlation with WALL*E, noting that they both feature the theme of love triumphing over technology.

While the trailer is fantastic in its own right, doing a wonderful job of showing the zany fun the film will have with its concept, I like the simplicity of this picture.

Once you've seen the movie (or at least understand the plot), you can spot a number of elements represented in this poster. I'll start with the obvious:
The poster is mimicking a thought bubble, the image of Joel and Clementine on the ice floating above Joel like a memory, just out of reach. The white color of the ice makes the imagery crystal clear. Although it is a great moment in the film, it was definitely chosen for how it would look on the poster, because, if you recall, this actually happens after they meet for the second time, post-memory erasure.

Even the white credits on the right side fit with the thought bubble pattern, resembling the smaller bubbles that lead to the big picture.

While many instances of the thought bubble feature the character "looking" at his/her thought (as in the cartoon image above), there's a longing in Joel's eyes that makes you immediately empathize with him. This isn't a fantasy, some scenario that Joel wishes would come true. It's an actual memory. And it's not about Joel living in the past, wanting the memory to become reality once again. He simply wants to hold onto the memory, to keep it in his brain, as a part of his life and who he is. He's desperate.

But memory is a fragile thing (even if you aren't having it erased), and the image depicts that with the multi-fissured crack in the ice. In the movie, the revelation of the cracked ice is played as a joke. Joel is nervous about being on the frozen lake. Clementine informs him that it's perfectly safe. And it cuts to an aerial shot. It's a pretty good laugh.

On the poster, however, it shows the delicate nature of memory. At any second, the ice could shatter, the memory falling into the water below, never to be seen again.

We hope more than anything that this doesn't happen, and that's why we watch the movie: to find out.

Ode to an Ad: "The Silence of the Lambs" Poster

THE POSTER

After looking at this poster, you're probably confused and disturbed. That's the effect it goes for, and it achieves it with flying colors. It might not tell you anything about the movie, but it does leave you feeling as if you just got some horrible news about a loved one.

This poster asks a lot of questions: Who is this woman? Why is she so pale? What is she staring at? And most importantly, why is there a freaking moth where her mouth should be?

The image has little to do with the film. The movie DOES feature moths. And the mouthless image conjures the idea of "silence." But that's it. It's all conceptual, based on making you feel a certain way instead of telling you anything about the movie.

What you might not have noticed (and probably can't see in this particular picture) is that the "skull" image on the moth is actually made up of a bundle of naked women. Perhaps one of the only instances in history where a group of naked women have made something creepier instead of sexier.

THE INSPIRATION

While you may not have known it, it should still come as no surprise that the inspiration for the poster was Salvador Dali. After all, he's basically the king of images that are breathtaking, confusing, and unnerving all at the same time.

The "skull" image on the moth is actually a minaturized version of the above Dali portrait, In Voluptas Mors. Somehow it gets even creepier once it's shrunk down.

Though moths are featured in the film, its use on the poster is most likely a reference to images in Luis Bunuel's and Salvador Dali's surrealist film Un chien andalou, which is most famous (or infamous, really) for the scene where a razorblade cuts open a woman's eyeball. (Second would be the scene where ants come out of a man's hand.)

It was a totally natural fit for the creepy, disturbing content of The Silence of the Lambs to be advertised in the vein of Dali and his love of bizarre creations that make you feel weird inside.

THE HOMAGE

I wasn't a fan of The Descent as a film, but I have to admit that this poster is extremely intriguing. To be fair, it's a straight-up reproduction of the Dali portrait with no real ties to The Silence of the Lambs, but I think we all know that they would have never thought to do this without that poster's existence.

In particular, I like what they did with the face of the one woman that we can see. In the Dali portrait, her mouth and eyes are closed in a feeling of contentment. In the above poster, it's a scream of pure terror.

There's also the idea that something is lurking just out of view, in the shadows on the corners of the poster. But you'll have to see the movie to find out what.

THE KNOCK-OFF

When I first saw this poster I laughed to myself, but that laughter immediately became uncomfortable laughter because there's something profoundly disturbing about this image. I've since decided that it's somehow simultaneously completely idiotic and chilling to the bone.

Clearly this was borrowing heavily from The Silence of the Lambs poster. At first glance it seems normal enough, but after a moment you realize that what you're seeing isn't actually what you're seeing.

I haven't seen this film, but I still feel confident enough to say that I'd rather stare at The Silence of the Lambs poster for an hour and a half than watch One Missed Call.