Yes, because I do believe that it is my duty, as one possessing a degree in English, to bring a little more alliteration to your lives, I now bring you Poster Picks (to go along with Flashback Fridays and Gaming Glory).

I love clever posters. I think clever poster designs, however, are slowly dying under the weight of the generic “insert giant photo of star here; add movie/music/theater/television show name here; done” design. Perfect example: Look up the posters for the new Star Trek movie. Those are some of the most boring posters I have ever seen. Head shots of the actors. Wow. I hope the posters aren’t a true reflection of what we’re in for with the new movie. If they are, I better take a pillow.

Posters are supposed to be one of the marketing tools used to draw you in and make you want to see or hear whatever they’re advertising. A giant head shot of Chris Pine with trout pout is not a successful marketing tool. So this is why, every now and again, I’m going to submit to you all a poster that I think truly does justice to mad design skillz.

First submission: The artwork for the 2007 revival of the play Equus. This was Daniel Radcliffe’s chance to prove that he can do more than play with his wand. Er, kind of. I mentioned this poster in my last blog, but I adore this poster so much that it was the first that came to mind when I started thinking about starting this new segment. I don’t own this poster (later segments may focus on some of the pieces that I have purchased), but it is stunning.

I know that other posters from the series focused solely on photos of Radcliffe in various stages of undress, sometimes with a horse and sometimes with a female model…but this is by far the most provocative. It takes the standard celebrity shot and turns it into something hideously alluring. I love, for instance, how the shadows of Radcliffe’s arms become the horse’s ears, and the other bits of alignment between Radcliffe and the horse head that combine into some great PhotoShop morph work. Throw in a Christ-like pose and a horse snout where his groin should be, and you’ve got one hell of a disturbing piece of design work there.

And you know what? It did what it was supposed to do. Had I been in London at the time that this was on the West End (or in NYC when it hit Broadway), I absolutely would have gone to see this. Admittedly, it would have taken quite a bit of mental prep work to get beyond the fact that I would be viewing a former child actor showing me precisely what’s going on under his Hogwarts robes. But I think it would have been possible.

Anyway, I leave you with this amazing poster. Bask in its disturbingly beautiful glory.