Worst DVD covers!

#91

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4/27/04 at 5:12am

Colin Jacobson
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Quote:

The cover of the upcoming Stay Hungry DVD seems to focus

Of course it does - Arnie's a huge star and might actually attract people to buy the DVD. Bridges and Field have nowhere near the same level of star power...

Colin Jacobson
http://www.DVDMG.com

#92

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4/27/04 at 11:36am

Joe Caps
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Most dissapointing covers - terrible - both from fox -
Demetrius and the Gladiators and the new Prince Valiant due in two weeks from Fox. Both films had great art in both dometic and foreing markets and there is much to chose from. Mediocre from Fox - Star!!, Hello Dolly, and Cleopatra.
How to do an oldie the right way - Warners does NOT use the original poster art for Helen of Tory (frankly it was just OK) - the new DVD uses an Italian reissue poster - Beautiful.

#93

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4/27/04 at 12:07pm

Anthony Neilson
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Am I going crazy or does anyone else think the artwork for the upcoming STAR WARS box set looks s**t ?

The characters on it remind me of those chocolate bars that used to have raised pictures on them - same kind of likenesses. Perhaps it'll look better in reality but I just think it's a really unexciting design.

I\'ve been going to bed early . . .

#94

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4/27/04 at 12:45pm

Dennis
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If they want to "attract" buyers, pick either that applies:

Fire everyone in the Art Department, regardless who actually made the cover, shame on all of them for letting it leave the room in that condition.

Hire an Art Department, we certainly don't need an executive's 5 year old nephew experimenting with Adobe Photoshop for us to make a purchase.

You want new cover art to attract new buyers? Fine, but these covers are awful, pure garbage. Unfortunately, some of us like the films so much we buy the movies because of the movie so there doesn't seem to be much incentive for them to change their practices.

I like my DVD covers like my LP covers, they're not only there to protect the media, they're nice to look at.

I am officially offering my services, at a reasonable price, to the main offenders. Heck, I'll do it for free till they show a profit. I couldn't do any worse.

#95

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4/27/04 at 1:03pm

Zachary Cohen
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The Open Range cover was pretty awful compared to the theatrical poster.

#96

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4/27/04 at 1:12pm

DannyS
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Quote:

Am I going crazy or does anyone else think the artwork for the upcoming STAR WARS box set looks s**t ?

Quote:

The characters on it remind me of those chocolate bars that used to have raised pictures on them - same kind of likenesses. Perhaps it'll look better in reality but I just think it's a really unexciting design.

Spot on!

Why on earth they don't go with the original art is beyond me!

Retro classic!

even a stopped clock tells the right time twice a day

My DVD collection

#97

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4/27/04 at 1:40pm

Jefferson Morris
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My question is why can't studio's just stick with the theatrical posters? For the most part, they're as good as, if not better, than DVD cover art.

Forgive me if someone else has said this, but I think it simply has to do with size. Marketeers make the faces of the actors more prominent on DVD cases because the overall area they have to work with is much smaller than on a movie poster, yet they want to make sure that the actors remain recognizable at a reasonable distance.

To simply miniaturize some movie posters might make certain details so small that they'd escape the eye of the average Joe/Jane strolling the aisles at Wal-Mart. Clearly, those Joes and Janes are the intended audience for these aesthetically unimaginative, and often outright dreadful, DVD covers.

It's a well-worn truism in the magazine industry that people like to look at pictures of other people on magazine covers (unless they're avid readers of Aviation Week), and the same is true of movie ads, I'm afraid. As a mass consumer product, DVD covers are viewed as advertisements rather than an aesthetic representation of a film's content that should be pleasing in its own right.

--Jefferson Morris

"If fakes, they were masterpieces."

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#98

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4/27/04 at 1:45pm

Richard Kim
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Why on earth they don't go with the original art is beyond me!

Actually, the SW box art IS based on the original poster art from 1977.

#99

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4/27/04 at 2:13pm

Dennis
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Quote:

It's a well-worn truism in the magazine industry that people like to look at pictures of other people on magazine covers (unless they're avid readers of Aviation Week), and the same is true of movie ads, I'm afraid. As a mass consumer product, DVD covers are viewed as advertisements rather than an aesthetic representation of a film's convent that should be pleasing in its own right.

I guess that's why the posters you see in the movie theater are a little more subdued, imagine those DVD covers 10-20 times the size.

#100

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4/27/04 at 2:30pm

MuneebM
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Some of the custom covers up at DVDcoverart for the Matrix:revolutions are 5,000 times better than the brain-dead effort by WB.

This is the wickedest Matrix Revolutions cover I've seen and should've been used by WB over the crap they published!

#101

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4/27/04 at 2:52pm

Richard_D_Ramirez
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Not just one big noggin, how 'bout three? (Courtesy of www.dvdtimes.org)

Aaaaaagggghhhh!

(And this was the orginal DVD cover design!

)

8^B

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#102

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4/27/04 at 3:55pm

Jason Harbaugh
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Now this would have been perfect, the original poster art but then they have to ruin it with more text than is on the back of most dvd's.

The End.

#103

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4/27/04 at 5:12pm

Chris Rein
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The cover for Big Fish has varied ever so slightly from that picture. They did away with the awful yellow on the text, made the colors more dark and added a HUGE gold banner at the top going off on the Academy Awards it was up for. And it's in a clear case. Hmm.

#104

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4/27/04 at 8:06pm

Ben_@
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Especially when it comes to the older poster art, there are quite a few that wound up looking the same (particularly in the 30s and 40s). Its a case by case basis I think. And sometimes, no matter how much you try, you can't do better than the original.

Something that I think would make for good DVD covers are simply the poster art from other regions. They usually rearrange similar themes in a different way. Something different to look at, but still something you'd recognize. (Nevermind the potential for region encoding confusion)

I also wish that they took a cue from anime DVDs and include reversable cover art, at least then they have the potential to please discerning fans.

My modest collection

#105

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4/28/04 at 3:28am

JulianK
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The company involved abandoned this design, and replaced it with something better, but not before they'd sent it out with the press release...

Forthcoming UK DVD releases database: Incoming.
Forthcoming UK Blu-ray releases database: Incoming.

#106

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10/5/04 at 10:31am

JeremySt
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..if only they told us WHO the star of this movie is... Maybe then I'd buy it.

#107

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10/5/04 at 12:44pm

Kristen
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You can kind of forgive the first of these Jet Li covers, seeing as it's from an obscure import company. But for Miramax to make a cover that is almost as bad is inexcusable.

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#108

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10/5/04 at 12:46pm

Robert Holloway
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The poster for the just released "Highwaymen" is outstanding. The DVD cover is dreadful.

Sorry, but I don't know how to embed the images. Otherwise I would.

Rob

I dream in HD
.....of Branagh's Hamlet

Member since
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#109

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10/5/04 at 1:26pm

Gareth Flynn
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Photoshop crashed, so they had to use Paint.

Gareth Flynn

#110

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10/5/04 at 1:27pm

Kenneth English
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#111

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10/5/04 at 2:24pm

Eric Chang
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i don't really have a problem with cover art, but the one for Ocean's 11 really pissed me off, since the original poster was just awesome.

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#112

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10/5/04 at 2:49pm

Fred Mitchell
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I hear ya. Oceans 11 is the biggest example to me. It was gonna be the first cover I replaced then dvdcoverart got shut down.

I was a little frustrated. Anyone know where you can still get original dvd covers?

#113

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10/5/04 at 4:02pm

Ben_@
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You'd be hard pressed to find a large website like Dvdcoverart. The threat of lawsuits is too much for small webmasters.
However, i did happen upon CDcovers.com. They actually have a very large archive of DVD covers, some of which are custom- most of which are simply alternate foreign covers. Its not the easiest to navigate, but its the largest one I could find in a quick Googling. Hope that helps.

My modest collection

#114

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10/5/04 at 4:16pm

JeremySt
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and I thought the first editon of this DVD had bad cover art.

STARRING SEAN PENN
fast times at ridgemont high

#115

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10/5/04 at 5:00pm

Will_B
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I have to call attention to the cover of The Girl Next Door. I've got the unrated cover, I don't know if the PG cover is the same.

If you have the Unrated cover of The Girl Next Door, take a look at Elisha Cuthbert's shoulders. Now imagine the hair isn't flowing over the back and TRY to figure out how in the HECK her arms are attached to her body!

They photoshopped her so much that they actually moved her shoulderblades and collar bone half way up her neck! The hair ALMOST hides this gross error, but once you notice this error of anatomy, you can't look at the image the same way again.

That is the gross error. The more subtle changes include they took her photo and replaced her top clothing, reshaped her breasts completely (they're completely animated), flattened her stomach and narrowed her stomach, and changed her long pants that she actually wore in the photoshoot to shorts. So her legs are animated too. But that's expected, that's usual. It's the bizarre anatomy that is the reason this cover deserves mention as one of the Worst DVD Covers Ever.

Shoulders up in her neck in the photoshopped version:

Before:

"Scientists are saying the future is going to be far more futuristic than they originally predicted." -Krysta Now

#116

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10/5/04 at 7:57pm

MarcoBiscotti
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GANGS OF NEW YORK.

#117

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10/5/04 at 8:35pm

RobertM.Fleming
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I have to agree with the hero cover...it makes the same terrible mistake the US theatrical poster makes...

Jet Li is holding the wrong sword. totally kills it for me.

#118

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10/5/04 at 8:49pm

RyanAn
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I HATE the faces... Just use their real faces!

Ryan

Take a look at my DVDs/Blurays/Various Other formats for sale... If you're cool!a>

#119

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10/5/04 at 9:18pm

Patrick McCart
Patrick J. McCart
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Tell The Weinstein Company to release Richard Williams' animated masterpiece The Thief and the Cobbler on DVD in Panavision widescreen and uncut! See and hear what you're missing from their Bitsy Award winner of Worst Standard Edition DVD of 2006 on YouTube!

#120

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10/5/04 at 11:33pm