The Eyelet.

Anyone who has ever stepped foot in our conference room has seen the rules we live by broken down into small digestible snippets of information. One of our personal favorites is “Saying very little, often speaks volumes.” In other words, simpler is sometimes better.

Part of what we do when starting a project is break it down to its simplest form and begin there. Whether it’s the brand thinking behind a logo or the theme that underlies a corporate brochure, the ability to communicate a complicated message in a simple manner is a hallmark of a great designer. Or illustrator. Or actor. Or quarterback. Or pilot. Or anyone, really.

That is why, when someone takes something as beloved and complicated as the plot to entire movie and re-imagines it as a simple and graphic poster, we have to see what the fuss is all about. Sure, minimalist movie posters seem to be everywhere nowadays, but some recent work by Olly Moss for the “We are all workers” Rolling Roadshow really made us stop and gawk and ooh and ahh. Maybe it’s because everyone has a favorite movie, or that movies themselves simply resonate with each person in one way or another. But when you can look at a feature length film, pull out one message or one key scene that you think summarizes the entire experience and emotion associated with the movie and then graphically represent that in a way that resonates with the viewer/fan, something magical happens. You seemingly get pulled right back into the theater – popcorn, Junior Mints and a half gallon of Diet Coke in hand – and you remember the first time you saw that on the big screen. You remember laughing or crying or screaming or cringing or booing or closing your eyes. And you remember why you and a million other people love that movie.

It’s what everyone wants their brand to do – trigger an emotional response. Whether it is 2 days or 2 decades later, you want people to remember that feeling associated with your brand. It’s one of the many ways you build trust and strength around it. And just like movies themselves, it can be pretty magical when it works.

Check out some other minimalist movie posters from Olly Moss, as well.

On the other side of the spectrum, any big movie fan will tell you about “floating head” syndrome that infects movie poster design. All you have to do is just look at the posters for any Nicholas Cage movie in the past few years. Even Funny or Die poked fun at the design process/output. Sure, it is probably stated somewhere in the actors contracts that A) their name needs to appear first or B) that they want a giant photo of their mug on the promotional materials, but where is the fun in that?