Hallo MOPO-ers
It's hard to be depressed about the death of Tony Curtis, in the sense that he
lived a full, long and largely happy life in the company of some beautiful
women and left us with several films to treasure.
That said, he is one of my favourite actors of all time and - frankly -
blistered the screen in (one of my All Time Top 5 films) The Sweet Smell Of
Success. It was a risky move for a teenster icon to be cast against type and -
in retrospect - the film's failure at the time can probably be traced to the
public's unwillingness to accept Curtis as anything other than "the boy with
the ice cream face."
Bringing things back on topic: I think that the campaign for TSSOS is
fascinating in that this unsuccessful film had a fantastic print campaign. In
this sense, the film's failure is markedly dissimilar to the
contemporaneous-ish Night Of The Hunter (great film / diabolical, garish,
inappropriate, awful campaign).
I own a window card for TSSOS and I think this is the best paper for the film,
in that it features the key "21" scene between JJ and Sidney. This may be the
only time I have ever favoured a WC over other paper. It also has some great
'hep' blurb.
http://granadamovieposters.com/photos/sweetsmellwcreduced.jpg
After the WC I think the Style B half-sheet is very strong: both our 'heroes'
look good, it references several of the key scenes and feels very New York.
There's great (and different) 'hep' blurb here also:
http://movieposters.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=694&Lot_No=28800
It's much stronger than the 1/2 sheet Style A which seems a bit arty and
oblique and doesn't convey any of the energy of the film.
http://www.emovieposter.com/imagearchive/poster/158745.html
Likewise, I can't warm to the 1sh. The faces - especially Curtis - are not
particularly well rendered or specific to the film. Curtis looks like Liberace:
http://movieposters.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=58021&Lot_No=51354
In fact, I even prefer the military 1sh to the regular 1sh:
http://www.movieposterdb.com/poster/8eabb542
After the WC and the Style B 1/2 sheet, I think the best poster is the insert:
http://movieposters.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=510073&Lot_No=53364
the three sheet is similar, but it dispenses with Sidney's cigarette (big
mistake) which makes (for me) the insert much more desirable.
http://movieposters.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=510091&Lot_No=51372
also, the insert has it's own 'hep' blurb (again different to the other
styles!) whereas the 3sh is merely 'the motion picture that will never be
forgiven or forgotten'
http://movieposters.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=510091&Lot_No=51372
the 6sh and 24sh merely pose the lead's faces against eachother from across the
paper without any of the whipcrack, pseud-odets blurb that the better paper
carries in spades. that said, i think the 6sh is far more successful.
http://www.emovieposter.com/imagearchive/poster/158167.html
the rendering of the star's faces on the 24sh (especially in the case of
Lancaster) - much like the 1sh - make this poster feel like a design for a
different film (although at least Sidney's cigarette is back in his mouth).
http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/sweet-smell-of-success-lancaster-curtis-57-24
Those are just my thoughts on this classic film/campaign. I'm sure many will
disagree. And ignore what I said in my opening sentence, I'm totally gutted
that TC is dead.
Neil
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