Peter Strausfeld, the Movie-Poster Master

There is much to be said for temptation in two dimensions. A menu, stuck against the window of a restaurant or framed on the wall outside, calls out to our salivary glands and draws us over the threshold. The same goes for posters at a cinema: their primary purpose, no doubt, is to lure us into the dark. But there’s a difference. Seldom is a menu an object of beauty, whereas the history of movie posters is strewn with images so luscious, or so startling, that they stand proud in their own right and even risk eclipsing the product that they are meant to hawk. The promise of the apple, dangled before us, can be juicier than the flesh.