Back in the 1970s and 80s, a publication I really enjoyed was the “poster magazine”. The format was always the same, an A4 glossy colour magazine which folded out into a (large) A1-sized sheet. One side would be the magazine itself, the covers and articles with plenty of photographs. The reverse side would be a giant poster and, depending on what you’d bought, the image might be a person, an action scene or the film poster. They were really popular and most kids I knew had at least one huge poster on their wall.
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| me, in 1978, with a poster of my hero |
Dez Skinn (who later created
Starburst magazine) produced
Monster Mag from 1973 to 1977 which featured gory movie stills from the likes of Hammer Films and Amicus. TV series offered one or two editions (though some, like
Star Trek, ran to series) and you could pick up issues devoted to
The Six Million Dollar Man,
Doctor Who,
Space: 1999,
The Professionals,
The Hulk,
Battlestar Galactica and
Planet of the Apes. Music got in on the act too but even more popular were the film tie-in’s, featuring the likes of
Star Wars,
Superman,
James Bond,
Jaws,
Alien and
Buck Rogers - if it was a blockbuster, there’d be a poster magazine on the newsagents shelves sooner rather than later.
I haven’t seen one for sale in years (
spacemonstersmag reckons they died out in the 1990s) but still have a few in my collection (though not on the walls of my study) and think they’re great fun, another nostalgic item for film and TV fans of a certain age.
Which ones did you have on your wall?
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| 1976 |
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| 1976 |
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| 1976 |
As I may have mentioned before, I was a huge fan of
The Six Million Dollar Man (as the picture from 1978 duly proves, showing the poster from this magazine on my wall...)
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| 1977 |
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| 1977 |
Star Wars was a natural fit for the poster magazine, hugely popular and full of fantastic imagery. This continued through
The Empire Strikes Back and
Return Of The Jedi (one of the issues for that featured a 50-facts breakdown of the special effects which I loved).
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| 1978 |
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| 1978 |
Then and now, I'm a huge fan of
The Professionals
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| 1979 |
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| 1979 |
I like
Moonraker (
and wrote about it here)
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| 1979 |
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| 1981 |
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| 1981 |
One of my favourite films, I wrote about
Raiders here
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| 1982 |
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| 1982 |
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| 1982 |
with thanks to
spacemonstersmag
I had The Hulk one when it first came out, bought a replacement for it (as an adult) more years ago than I can remember. Never put the original up on my wall though, I just bought it for the photo strip.
ReplyDeleteI saved a few and have re-bought from ebay over the years, but none have gone up on my (study) wall, simply a matter of room and not wanting to ruin the posters. Though if I could afford the Steve Austin one again, I might make an exception!
DeleteJust out of interest, how do you think Lewis Collins would've done as Bond? Good or not so good?
DeleteHard to tell - he had more rough-edge charm than Daniel Craig, could easily do the action and was good with humour too. I think he'd have worked in the Timothy Dalton films, certainly. How about you?
DeleteI don't think Cubby would've thought him tall enough, as he had a thing about the actor physically embodying the role. That's why, had he been alive, I don't think he would ever have cast Daniel Craig as Bond. Height aside, I think Collins would've been a lot better than Dalton as, to me, Dalton looked as if he was acting, whereas Collins would've been more convincing. It's said that he didn't get the role when he auditioned because he was too aggressive as Bond, but I think that was just an excuse. It was probably just that Broccoli considered him too small.
DeleteI don't know about the height thing, but I've definitely read that Collins' aggressiveness put Broccoli off. Which is a shame - rewatching "The Professionals" now, I'm sure he could have carried it off (and his ruthlessness in "Who Dares Wins" would have been good too).
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