Film Preview: Blood Ties (2014)

Poster

Additional posters can be found below.

Trailer Link

Release Date:

February 21, 2014

Synopsis:

From IMDb: “Two brothers, on either side of the law, face off over organized crime in Brooklyn during the 1970s.”

Poster: B / C- / C (8) / D+ / C

Review: (#1-#2) It’s quite unusual for a small crime drama to go to great lengths to create a series of posters, including character posters. The first design probably would have sufficed. It’s simple and explanatory. The second design looks cheap by comparison.

(#3-#10) The remaining eight designs have a unified theme, using the scene from the second poster for the primary and single shots of each character in the subsequent seven designs. You could say they were ambitious, but the simple design and use of stills from the film doesn’t make them very creative.

(#11-#12) The next two are both foreign market designs and judging by these, they aren’t much improved over their American counterparts. The eleventh design is trying hard to seem hip or different from its counterparts, but by doing so, the overly simplistic style just isn’t that notable. The twelfth is more interesting, but is reminiscent of a lot of recent designs, such as the one for The Counselor opting to go for vertical strips to accentuate each actor, a trend that swaps the horizontal trend from a couple of years ago.

Trailer: C

Review: Brother against brother. Two sides of the law. It’s an age-old story and with the ’70s setting, the concept seems even more dated. I like Billy Crudup and some of the other members of the cast, but damned if this doesn’t look like a child’s color-by-number book.