Shit Used to be Cooler.

No art in this post, at least none of mine anyway, but I have been looking into a couple of friends' blogs and perhaps I have underused this interweb contraption. I like to talk and to think like most people who actually learned something in school rather than going about it thinking that I knew everything from K through 12 through drive through. So I suppose I may just open up from time to time. Today's itch: shit used to be cooler than it is now.

I came upon this thought while perusing an upcoming dvd/blu-ray forum and catching sight of the cover art for the upcoming Goldfinger release which I am anticipating purchasing on blu-ray. I already have From Russia with Love and have been waiting til the price is right to purchase Dr. No on sale or from Book and Music exchange but I had paid little attention to the homogenous cover art until the Goldfinger release. This may have something to do with the lead females featured on the previous two Connery releases being Natasha Romanova and Honey Ryder, while the third is Pussy Galore, and despite the name, she is undoubtedly the weaker visual of the three ladies. This spurred me onward to realize that the cover artwork for all the releases is really weak. Bond front and to the left, insert female back and just to the right of him, internal gun image with small central image from the film dominating the rest of the cover background, wash, rinse, repeat for all incarnations of film and character.

I'll give minor credit, it's not an eyesore, but that doesn't really draw in the accolades does it? You don't win praise for not having a third nipple when you could be less physically attractive with one.

So the thought hit me, art over photography. Not a profound thought, mind you, but hit me it did. Look at this cover of the Goldfinger novel from a recent Penguin books re-issue.

That shit is baller! I'll grant that it relies on the old ad principle that Sex Sells, but then sexy has always been part and parcel to the entire Bond film enterprise. This cover just reminds me of the cool covers that have been occasionally produced for Criterion collection dvds rather than the mainstay explosive action scene/brooding or otherwise over-emoting character portraits that grace other dvd covers ad nauseum. Now this novel is a part of a series of re-issues that all feature a homogenous theme ot titles scrawled across the female form, and that can be pretty darn droll too, but it works for a release like Goldfinger, what with the famous scene of a vixen murdered by being smothered in gold, her perfect chrome form left lifeless on the bed. All it takes is a slight touch of imagination and the cover jumps to life rather than resting in the company of its clones on the dvd rack. And this is art from a retro re-issue. So what did book covers to similar novels look like back when retro was just the style of the times?

These are just some of the covers for Casino Royale over the years but how sweet would it be to have either the left or center art pieces as DVD covers. I even like this later yellow cover with the silhouette. The fonts on that one pretty much suck ass but the idea itself is still a stark contrast to the lazy photoshop work of 90 % of the dvd covers out there. For the older releases they could at least dig up some of the fresh poster art that was produced at the time and use that as the box-cover but I'm really just sick of the same old thing when there's so much mor creative and eye-catching options. Of course, I'm an artist so perhaps I'm biased. But I'm also a bad artist so perhaps I'm not as biased as I think.