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Downloadable movie posters from the 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s (oclc.org)
332 points by bookofjoe 11 hours ago | hide | past | favorite | 63 comments






Thanks for the correct link.

I always wondered if the south by southwest conference was an homage to this movie somehow.

Great finds.


They have Day of the Triffids and The Omega Man as well - it's a neat collection, I've spent a couple of years not deciding what I want on the walls of my home office but some of those kitsch older sci-fi posters are a strong candidate - I saw a fair few of them as a kid.

>Goldfinger

“Miss” Galore they say :)

Apparently leaking her name to the press prevented big wigs from forcing it to be changed.


The ten commandments link just opens the other poster again

Weird, the date and "National Screen Service Number" on North by Northwest is wrong, it's showing 1949 instead of 1959.

I'm assuming entries were done by hand, aa I've noticed a couple typos in my casual browsing.

If you’re ever in Manhattan and you like this stuff, I recommend https://www.posterhouse.org/

Fantastic graphic art and poster museum. Not focused on movies per se but we had a great time there.


+1000 every time I swing by PH I'm impressed. Unlike other NYC museums, there's never a line and you can be in/out in 30-45mins. Also, located on 23rd st right near 3 subway stations serving a slew of lines. It's a regular stop when I have a few minutes to kill on my way to other things.


Related ongoing thread:

Movie posters from Ghana in the 1980s and 90s - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45712807 - Oct 2025 (91 comments)


I had remembered this from two years ago (different URL at the time): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37259525

On a vaguely related note, two accomplished film poster artists passed away in the past month: Renato Casaro [1] and Drew Struzan [2].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renato_Casaro

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drew_Struzan


I recently sold a bunch of movie posters for a relative's estate, and only just came across the name Drew Struzan. Several of his posters were in the collection, including this one [0], and I was stunned by the sale price.

[0]https://auctions.emovieposter.com/Bidding.taf?_function=deta...


I was looking to add a few posters to my room, and this came at the right time. The only one that interested me was: Colossus: The Forbin Project, as I love Michael Colombier's OST in that. Other than that, it's hard for me as a 23-year-old to find movies I've seen here. The earliest I can think of is Indiana Jones, and The Rocketeer, and those are in the 90s.

++ for reference to "Colossus: The Forbin Project"

I only discovered that film about a decade ago, and it quickly became a favorite.

What’s wild is how it’s shifted from pure sci-fi to something that feels eerily plausible, especially with how tech has evolved in just the last five years.

Colossus: In time you will come to regard me not only with respect and awe, but with love. Dr. Forbin: NEVER!

Never ?


You can just google image search the poster, save the image, upload it to a poster printing website and print it.

I've done it 9 times and I've even gotten a 10 x 5 foot poster made of the park city ski map.


Recommendation on a solid online printing shop?

Bay Photo, https://bayphoto.com. Good prices, great service; I use them for my own work, at sizes beyond what I can do in my own shop. Next time they disappoint will be the first.

The first Indiana Jones was released in 1981. Still not 70's but it has stood the time pretty well. Maybe except for some special effects.

I'm fairly familiar with films and I would say a lot of that is relatively obscure. I've certainly seen some but definitely a minority.

The poster for Colossus:Forbin was very disappointing. The title sequence graphics for the movie were great - but the poster doesn’t show a computer at all, although the movie is all about them.

How can I have a rotating version of this in a poster-sized digital frame in the easiest possible way?

Very cool stuff. Brings back a lot of memories from my youth spent in movie theaters on Saturday afternoons watching the sci-fi/horror double features. I have several posters printed by the S2 Art Group (they used to have their lithograph machine in the Paris hotel in Las Vegas), one of my favorites: https://www.cinemasterpieces.com/62014/s2frankteaser.jpg the eyes follow you everywhere.

This reminds me, so many films, so little time.

I confess, I like the style of a lot of the earlier movie posters.


>so many films, so little time

I've started watching one film every day 3 years ago. Much less time investment than one would imagine. It all comes down to finding a good system to plan what to watch not just sit down and have an analysis paralysis. Once (after a few months) I’ve figured out my current plan where I _have to_ watch certain films it became incredibly easy to keep up.


There's the "1001 Movies to See Before You Die", the "AFI 100"…

Neither of these are bad lists to start with. The "AFI 100" is going to be all American films (some Hitchcock films get a pass because they were filmed in the U.S.?).

"1001 Movies…" has a number of film critics contributing — and all the usual suspects are on the list. Fortunately it includes a good deal of foreign films, silent films, art-house films… So it covers a larger gamut of course.

The wife and I are now up to the 1980's and finishing up a Turkish film from 1982. I suppose we're 5 years into this, perhaps a couple years still before we've done the 1000.

Why go in order? Partly context — you can see how films have "evolved", see when new ideas show up. But also there is some pragmatism: if left to my own devices, skipping around, I might leave until last the silent films, the French New Wave (sorry, I've been only slowly coming to enjoy them), the several-hours-long films, Warhol's films, etc.


The nice thing about films is that they're generally pretty much self-contained. A lot of modern TV series are serialized and committing to a multi-season set of episodes is a big chunk of time.

Yeah I could never really get into any TV show at all for this very reason

So now having watched over 1k movies in the past 3 years, what are you favorites?

(I know you didn't ask me.)

To pick a decade, the 1930's surprised me with a number of good films that I had not seen. It's also the first "modern" decade in a sense — the films are starting to have the kind of narrative you expect from a film (and have sound).

"Love Me Tonight" (1932), "Stella Dallas" (1937) were new to me and enjoyable.

It was the era of the classic big-spectacle Hollywood dance numbers that I knew of but had not seen. These greats from 1933 alone: "42nd Street", "Footlight Parade", "Gold Diggers of 1933".

Fritz Lang's "M" (1931) if you have not seen it. The infamous "Freaks" (1932) that, by its reputation, I thought would disturb me more than it did. "Captain Blood" and the "The Adventures of Robin Hood" are Errol Flynn in his prime…

Bonus link: Ginger Rogers in the classic opening to "Gold Diggers" — and her impromptu Pig Latin verse: https://youtu.be/UJOjTNuuEVw


Honestly there are just too many good ones, I could give a list of at least 50 films I'd recommend without any hesitation at all. But I try to watch as little Hollywood as possible, mostly asian and european cinema.

Right now I'd say Tokyo Story (1953) is the best film I've ever seen.


It’s all a blur. ;)

(not the OP)


I'm not sure that art deco is really the right term but there's definitely a 30s/40s poster styleI find quite attractive. You also see it wit a lot of travel/national park/etc. posters from that era.

The National Parks poster style is often called the Work Progress Administration (WPA) style. There was a series of these done for astronomy education in the early 2010's that are wonderful examples of the style: https://www.wired.com/2013/12/nordgren-planetary-posters/

Yeah, definitely WPA style for the US but there's a lot of other poster art that is similar.

Minimal palette for easy screening…

Anyone know of a similar site for mid-century Airline and Train travel posters?

The Library of Congress has a bunch at

https://guides.loc.gov/travel-posters/sample-images

and this site got some traction here recently:

David Klein's TWA Posters - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44952696 - Aug 2025 (9 comments)


What's the best open weights AI upscaler?


No 2001, Star Wars, Godfather..

I really want to see The Shoemaker and the Elves!

For a moment the art style on that one made me think of Maurice Sendak.

Good find, already added Shaft in Africa to my wallpaper.

How much is a large digital picture frame,I guess just mounting a tv sideways could work.


The coolest way to display these is to have them sublimation-printed onto fabric (not silkscreened; silkscreening applies the ink heavily enough to reflect sound, while sublimation printing leaves the fabric still soft and porous), then wrap them onto frames containing sound-absorbing material. Hang them around the place and they improve your acoustics and aesthetics simultaneously.

https://www.avsforum.com/threads/diy-custom-printed-movie-po...


LED walls are cool (and cheap via China) otherwise, and you can start small and then expand if you want since it's relatively modular, just a bunch of square LED panels linked together. You would need a driver though which you may or may not be able to hide behind/somewhere else, makes it kind of bulky compared to just a vertical TV :)

“The Soul of - “, who now? My lord, different times for sure.

Great website also.

How boringly US centric :(

Different subject matter (space), but if anyone has recommendations, I would love love love the chance to see a poster form childhood.

It was sometime around international space year ish (1992), and was a poster of a hybrid ship, part Space Shuttle and part large sailing ship, a gallon or what not.

I kept it for many years as it fell apart but ultimately got rid of it. I love the motif, the idea of endless exploration. Every now and then I do a little web-searching for it, but no luck. Any suggestions welcome!




You might try posting this question on https://www.reddit.com/r/tipofmytongue/

They specialize in finding and identifying obscure childhood memories like this. Good luck!


Many of them seem to be trying to exploit women’s or men’s sexuality.

Because sexuality equals exploitation?

In the commercial context of movies and advertising, yes?

Particularly where depictions of non-white women and "degenerate" lesbians are concerned, depictions of female sexuality are almost always exploitative.


Precisely how do you define "exploitative?" In the commercial context of movies and advertising, every depiction of anything is "exploitative," in that it is leveraging the depiction to make money for the movie financiers or advertisers.

who's gonna train a model on these?

I honestly feel like switching to photography imperceptibly destroyed the art of the poster compared to elaborate detailed posters (theater, circus, ads) of the 19th century. And this continues to this day.

Very cool



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