Before any movie goes on the big screen, the official trailer precedes it, closely followed by the movie poster, usually plastered all over to bring our attention to the movie. Traditionally, movie posters, especially for blockbusters, are used lock, stock and barrel from their origin. In recent years, the trend has changed. We start seeing the effort to localise movie posters, especially for the Chinese market.
Here are some official (and one fan-made) movie posters with awesome localisation efforts in China.
Spiderman: Far From home
Do we really need another poster of Spidey front and centre in the poster slinging from one building to another? No, the Chinese fans of Spidey didn’t think so. A particularly talented fan made a series of Spidey posters related to Chinese culture. One sees Spidey doing a stance in Chinese Opera style, complete with his “spidey legs” carrying flags typically carried by generals in Chinese opera. Another sees him crouching on the tiled roof-top of a traditional Chinese structure. Yet another is with Spidey soaring among clouds, along with traditional Chinese kites. Make them official already!
Men in Black: International
What a refreshing change to not see the Men (and Women) in Black just looking cool in the movie posters. Instead, this exclusive-for-China poster sees Tessa Thompson, Chris Hemsworth and Liam Neeson fighting something dark and ominous in huge waves illustrated in artistic Chinese styles.
Godzilla
Godzilla, released around the Lunar New Year period, got a Chinese makeover to reflect the festivities during the period. Stylish and modern yet reflecting the Chinese traditions,Godzilla never looked so good!
There are many mythical beasts in ancient Chinese stories and some of them are brought to life in the movie posters for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Each beast has its own portrait, illustrated in the style found in ancient Chinese mythical books. What a refreshing change from the usual dark and brooding posters for the movie.
The superheroes look pretty heroic and cool in the character portraits in Justice League, but their cool factor was upped in the ones released in China. Not only were they cooler, but they are also definitely more stylish as well.
Each of the six character portraits is painted in black and white Chinese watercolour style, with accents of colour based on the character’s symbol. To make the characters more meaningful, Chinese script was added by the side, alluding to the powers of each character.
Have you come across any cool localised posters not mentioned above?
