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THE DARK CARNIVAL is the permanent exhibition at Galerie filmposter.net. In a way, it is summary of more than forty years of collecting and probably also an expression of some of my personal trials and tribulations.

In a previous post, I told the story of my WARRIORS subway window card. which is part of the ‚Coney Island Line‘ section of the show.

The ‘Anchor Piece’ of this section is a vintage wooden sign that originally showed the way to the Fun House on Coney Island. The original Fun House closed down in the 1960s, so this sign must be from the 1930s or 40s:

As we can see, the young run is running from the rain. A ‘Shadow of Death’ in form of a US premiere poster for Jean-Luc Godards SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL is looming over him, so we already have a feeling that his story might not end too well.

The metal ‚bad weather warning‘ sign was a gift from my ex-wife, and we both have no real clue what this is exactly. She had had it for a long time and eventually gave it to me as a birthday present. Allegedly, this is an actual traffic sign from somewhere in the world, but further details are unknown. It‘s looks great, though and I love it:

Being American, the young man of course came by car. As the license plate illustrates, he apparently came in a 1970 Dodge Challenger originally used in VANISHING POINT:

For those of you who care what happened to Dodge Challengers used in the film later on, click HERE for a sad but rather interesting background story.

Given the parking situation on Coney Island, I guess our hero might’ve had quite a long way to run. On his way, he has to pass the SHE FREAK and other sideshow booths on the Alley of Nightmares:

Good for him, the local gang is of the more friendly persuasion:

Not so good for him, his final destination is not the kind of place he had imagined:

We have no way to tell what exactly happened to him, but legend has it that the young man has not been seen again ever since.

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Following up on last week’s post, I was surprised to learn that Charles Laughton’s HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME actually had a limited regional release on Norderney Island in the 1950s:

Other than the regional title, the Norderney style poster is perfectly identical with the general release German movie poster from the first re-release, c. 1956 from RKO Pictures.

Both styles show the same artwork by Will Williams:

The Norderney version is most likely one of a kind and not for sale. The other one is actually extremely rare as well and will go up on the website with my next update, probably in July. I am open for inquiries, though.

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Norderney is one of the East-Friesian islands in the Northern Sea and was the destination of the Postercowboy‘s latest field trip. It’s only about 50 minutes by ferry from the German mainland, and at some point, it might’ve been the perfect place for time-out. Unfortunately, about twenty years ago, two brothers decided to use a part of their billion dollar inheritance to ‘modernize’ the island. In consequence, everthing has become ridiculously expensive and Norderney is now another hotspot for mass tourism. The approximately 6,000 locals who live on the island (the investor brothers NOT among them) now have to deal with roughly six million tourists every year. Needless to say, real estate prices have gone through the roof as well, so many people who work on the island can’t afford to live there anymore.
The investors’ latest project is another big hotel, which will close the last available open spot. They claim it will NOT be a 5 Star place for the super rich, but it will have large rooms and suites. Plus a shopping mall and a few (no doubt much smaller) rooms for the live-in servants. Uh-huh.

Mrs. Postercowboy overheard a local lady say something like: ‘When I came here in 2002, it seemed a good idea to live in a place where others spend their vacation. These days, it feels a lot like Alcatraz.’ Frankly, I felt the same thing. Just like Alcatraz, Norderney is so close to the mainland that freedom is always in sight. Yet, for those who are stuck there, it can be impossible to reach.

On Norderney, tourists are technically not allowed to drive around in their car, but they are a allowed to bring it over. With the additional foot and bicycle traffic, that’s A LOT of action. Still, all those real-live horrors aside, Norderney does have its charms and it offers lots of inspiration for the movie and movie poster lover.

With all those unusually small houses, narrow streets, the busy buy nevertheless oddly quiet atmosphere and all those Germans strolling about for no good reason, it very much reminded me of ‘The Village’ in the 1967 British TV series THE PRISONER:

With the Postercowboy in the role of Number 6, desperately trying to get back home:

Another letdown was our accommodation. What I had hoped for was something like this:

What I got was this:

The place made me feel like THE HUNCHBACK OF NORDERNEY:

Or perhaps the Somnambule in THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI:

Look at this seemingly harmless picket fence. A place of scenic beauty to some, a reminder of the opening scene of BLUE VELVET to others:

Always a good sport, here‘s the Postercowboy doing his best trying to blend in:

For some reason, Norderneyers are not too fond of street numbers, they prefer to give weird and sometimes creepy names to their houses instead:

As if The Prisoner, Dr. Caligari, Blue Velvet and houses with weird names had not been enough, Mrs. Postercowboy pointed out a building that could have served as the perfect location for Alfred Hitchcock‘s THE BIRDS. With the constantly screaming doves providing the soundtrack.

It’s hard to see on the photo, but they even have frigging birds behind the upper left windows!

Also, take a look at the weird thing in front of the house: MAYBE this is just an oddly shaped street lamp. Compare it to an image of the Martian war machines from THE WAR OF THE WORLDS that can be seen HERE and decide for yourself. What makes this even more disturbing is that these things are buried in the sand all over the island…

As if that had not been enough, I learned that very few people dare to let their dogs run free on Norderney, and apparently for good reason, as they tend to end up like this:

Needless to say, the Postercowboy took the first chance he got to flee from this island of horrors and is now more than happy he made it home safe to Berlin.

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It ain’t always easy…

But you do what you can:

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Another one of my all-time favorite movies is WISE BLOOD, directed by John Huston, released in 1979 and starring Brad Dourif, Dan Shor and Harry Dean Stanton. The film is closely based on the (equally wonderful) Flannery O’Connor novel. Most people would label this a dark comedy, I tend to think of it as a rather close-to-the-facts mockumentary on the American South. Upon its theatrical release, it was a moderate success, and it is still considered a ‘cult favorite’.
A very informative plot outline can be found on WIKIPEDIA. If you haven’t seen it (or want to see it again) the CRITERION DVD is quite amazing.

The film only had a rather limited international release, so very few movie poster designs exist and none of them are overly exciting. (Click HERE for the original release French poster we have for sale. It’s not great, but in my opinion still ‘best of the bunch’.)

The film was a German-American co-production, and it was initially intended for a theatrical release in Germany. In the end, Germany’s ZDF public television bought the rights, so the movie never made to the big screen. In their infinite wisdom, ZDF most likely buried it in one of their late-night screenings.

However, in preparation for an initially planned theatrical release a movie poster was commissioned with German graphic designer Christian Diener. The poster was never printed, but the original concept art has survived. Here it is:

Let’s face it: This is it. Or more exactly ‘this would’ve been it’. I think it’s absolutely amazing and I absolutely love it.

The (obviously) good news is: It has survived. More good news is: Not only do I know the current owner, she’s a very nice person as well. Which is follwed by the (obviously) bad news: She apparently loves the movie at least as much as I do, and she outright REFUSES to sell this one to me! To be honest here, I can’t really blame her.

Speaking as a fan, this piece is absolute gorgeous and it brings me to a rather interesting aspect of collecting original movie graphics I have never fully understood: Collecting movie posters as a somewhat ‘serious’ hobby more or less goes back the 1970s, which is not that much of a history to begin with. In comparison, an ‘active’ collectors market for original concept has only developed about 15 years ago. Two of my personal favorites are the original artwork for the British video poster for KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE (that can be seen HERE) and a Vic Fair design for a British Quad for THE NIGHTPORTER (HERE is an image of that one). Both are now a part of my permanent DARK CARNIVAL shop exhibition and not for sale.

One major difference between these two is: The KILLER KLOWNS artwork actually made it into a poster (the movie was direct-to-video in the UK), while THE NIGHT PORTER concept art was never used. Both designs are ‘best art’ for the movie. In both cases, there is no other existing design that comes even close to it.
For reasons I never fully understood, most concept art collectors exclusively focus on art that eventually made it into a poster. For these two, it means KILLER KLOWNS is worth a small fortune these days. I bought THE NIGHT PORTER in a major US auction a few years ago and I was the only bidder. Amazing as it is, for concept art collectors, it’s still worth next to nothing.

The WISE BLOOD concept art is not for sale, but as a movie poster dealer I can‘t help wonder: How to price a thing like this? The honest answer is: I have no clue.
As a work of original movie poster art it is gorgeous, but since it has not been used, it’s more or less worthless in the current collector’s market. Fortunately, this is a strictly academic question right now.

As you may have noticed, this blog is intended to be both educational and also occasionally serves as a public diary of sorts. This post was spawned by a stroll on Berlin’s Kurfüstendamm last week: I was somewhat early for an appointment, so when I passed by at a shop named NOBLE OPTIC HOUSE I had the somewhat unfortunate idea to ring the bell and pay them a visit. This is the kind of place that sells sunglasses that cost more than an average used car. Spoiler alert: Bad idea for my wallet, great idea for my style…

Noble Optic House is a family business, not some faceless company store, and the people who greeted me were both super nice and highly competent. I passed on a €1700 model (which turned out to be their ‘mid-level’ price range), but was clearly too 1980s for my taste. And let’s face it, even I have to draw a line somewhere. They also had me try a very simple but elegant pair of John Lennon type sunglasses, made by GERNOT LINDNER in Germany. Needless to say, I had never heard of him, but Mr. Lindner is apparently quite famous for his sterling silver eyewear which he both develops and manufactures in Passau, Germany. According to his website, Mr. Lindner has a large collection of historic glasses and his own designs are based on those historic models. My kinda guy! What I really like about these glasses is that they look perfectly contemporary, but would’ve also been perfectly in style back in the 1930s.

To cut a long story short, on the way back from my appointment I walked in again and bought them. I still love my Steve McQueen Persol sunglasses (which I discussed in an earlier post that you find HERE) but these are not only extremely lightweight but also totally different. A rather unexpected find, but a very nice and most welcome addition to my wardrobe.

Regardless of their income level, everybody loves a small gift: At NOBLE OPTIC HOUSE they give you a spray bottle of lens cleaner (‘When you have finished this, please come back and we will give you a free refill’) and a tiny box with two small (and very tasty!) chocolates, one with the Maybach logo (the luxury car brand, as they also sell their merchandise) and the other one with their company logo. How nice is that?

Back to the topic at hand: Nothing wrong with John Lennon of course, but what truly sold me on these is that they remind me of Harry Dean Stanton as the (fake) blind Southern preacher in, ta-taa: WISE BLOOD.

I still can’t have the concept art, but now I can now re-enact the movie. What more could you ask for?

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The Rockin’ H Boot Company may well be the world’s smallest cowboy boot factory (official production run in 2024 was one pair) BUT we now have an ‘official’ custom made enamel sign. Take that, Lucchese!

This is a traditional, slightly curved enamel sign. In the old days, these metal signs were an advertising staple for big brands and small businesses alike. Until the 1970s, these signs were handpainted, so no two copies were exactly identical. Today, they are silkscreened, but the materials used and the production process has not really changed over the last hundreds years.

This sign was made by Ernst Schmitt in Germany whose company has been in the enamel business for more than 100 years. Needless to say, I am EXTREMELY pleased with the result. Thanks again to owner Markus Schmitt and the nice lady who answers his phone for working with me on this project. It has been a pleasure to do business with you.

Rockin’ H Boots may be a small firm so far, but let’s not forget: Bill Gates also started in a garage…

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Always a good approach when framing movie poster is to keep it simple. It does not get much simpler than the two frames shown here. First one is an original direct-to-video German A1 poster for Stephen King’s IT, in a very basic black aluminium frame:

KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE was also direct-to-video in Germany, here’s the A1 poster in the same frame, this time in silver:

From what I hear, certain video posters are actually collectible these days and fetch high prices, some of them apparently sell for several hundred Euros. As of this writing, these two are still very affordable, in both cases the frame is considerably more expensive than the poster. I still love them.

What we see here: This is the Nielsen Classic frame. It comes in many colors and many different sizes. Their A1 size frame fits perfectly for almost every modern German 23×33 in movie poster. (Sometime in the 1960s, printers started to cut the posters to the exact standard size, or at least very close to it. Before that, posters were trimmed by hand, so older German movie posters often differ in size by a half inch or more. For many of those posters, a custom framed is required as they are often slightly bigger than A1.

What I like about this frame: Simple yet elegant, high quality, easily available, very affordable.

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Here’s another personal favorite, the French Mini Poster for JAZZ ON A SUMMER’S DAY from 1960, in a retro style Art Nouveau frame:

What we see here: A handmade wood frame with a hand-applied black shellac surface and a hand-tooled real silver inner border and a narrow black matting. This frame was made about 20 years ago, by the exact same artisan standards and technics they would have applied a hundred years ago.

What I like about this frame: What’s NOT to like about this one?

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