Apocalypse Now
地獄の黙示録
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| Poster Origin : | Japan |
| Poster Size : | Japanese B0 / 1456 x 1030mm |
| Poster Design : | Eiko Ishioka |
| Poster Artist : | Haruo Takino |
| Poster Year : | 1979 |
| Poster Version : | First Release |
| Film Origin : | United States |
| Film Director : | Francis Ford Coppola |
| Film Year : | 1979 |
This breathtaking art is unique to this poster, not featured on any other Apocalypse Now promo and only available in this unusual B0 sheet size. Its success is largely down to the dramatic perspective and magnificent rendering of Haruo Takino’s painting. The disproportionate foreshortened scale reflects the film’s heightened sense of surrealism and absurdity.
The tiny surfing figure is of course taken straight from the film, a grotesque metaphor for America’s involvement in Vietnam, a peculiar juxtaposition that writer John Milius had explored in Big Wednesday. Riding the exaggerated waves here, dwarfed beneath the enormous choppers and egotistic pomposity of the military strike it looks all the more preposterous (this attack was not a military strategy; it was simply to secure access to the best beach for Colonel Kilgore, an avid surfer). Contrasting viewpoints interpret the film as pro and anti-war, and this symbol fosters both ideas.
Illustrator Takino is credited on the poster, as is layout artist Kyoko Inui, but this work is usually attributed to celebrated art director Eiko Ishioka alone. Eiko certainly had the name and the pedigree, and she may well have conceived this design, but this is as much Takino’s triumph, and credit is always due.