40 Exquisite Independent Film Posters
An independent film, traditionally speaking, is generally referred to as a movie created entirely outside the traditional Hollywood system. It is usually the kind of production where the actors double up as camera men, friends and family provide the bankroll and the director’s mom is in charge of craft services.
Over the last few years, however, the “indie” film has taken on a whole new face. Large productions houses have formed specialty divisions that focus exclusively on “limited run” titles. These are movies that may not have the broad appeal of a summer blockbuster, but still enough demand worth releasing in a limited capacity – often to critical acclaim.
Of course with a limited run comes a limited budget. Luxuries such as wide-spread marketing campaigns are slim-to-none for the indie gem. It is for this reason that poster art plays an particularly significant role in an independent film’s marketing strategy.
Like the movies themselves, poster art for independent films can be especially beautiful and most certainly stand out from the crowd. These posters are imaginative and thoughtful while not forgetting the fundamentals such as color and typography. The result is more often than not an eye catching work of art that sparks your interest and curiosity – which is exactly what it’s supposed to do.
It is in tribute these wonderful works of art that Smashing Magazine has collected 40 Exquisite Independent Film Posters for your enjoyment. We hope they are as inspiring to you as they are to us.
40 Exquisite Independent Film Posters
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007)
The Squid and the Whale (2005)
The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004)
References
- Internet Movie Poster Awards
- Internet Movie Database
- Hand Drawn Posters For Quirky Indie Comedies
- 100 Best Movie Posters of All Time
- Wikipedia’s Independent Film Entry
Related Posts
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LydiaG
November 19th, 2008 2:14 pmNice. Love it! Since I am newly introduced to the design world this site has been a breath of fresh air in helping me not be so overwhelmed….Thanks!
Jidah
November 19th, 2008 2:21 pmThe Motel poster is nice. Never thought something like that would look good for a poster. Great compilation btw
Amanda
November 19th, 2008 2:40 pmMore lovely inspiration! These are my favorite posts from you guys.
Joann Sondy
November 19th, 2008 2:42 pmLove it! Love ‘em all. Great collection of posters and creativity.
GoodBytes.be
November 19th, 2008 2:44 pmGreat stuff. Not really webdesign related, but always nice to get some extra inspiration!
Ben
November 19th, 2008 3:17 pmLove them all. The Motel and Broken Flowers are favourite, Broken Flowers especially since it doesn’t look like a traditional movie poster. But why did you use that version of the Being John Malkovich poster? The mask one is much better.
Okibi
November 19th, 2008 3:26 pmNice collection but it seemed more devoted to well known independent films (with a slight Bill Murray fetish) rather than well designed posters.
Rob
November 19th, 2008 3:46 pmI really don’t see the exquisite in most of these posters.
Come on Smashing Magazine, Once you get a decent fanbase of strong rss readers doesn’t mean you can get lazy and make articles like this. I would of preferred 30 or even 15 well researched and exquisite posters rather then 40 which seem random with no thought into what makes them exquisite.
Nathaniel
November 19th, 2008 3:52 pmDefine “independent film”because “Son of Rambow” is produced by a huge media company. Nice posters though.
Watson
March 2nd, 2012 6:23 pmtruly! most of these films have big-name actors and huge budgets. i don’t believe this qualifies as “indie.”
Azizur Rahman
November 19th, 2008 5:48 pmGlad and really surprised to “Taxi to the Dark Side (2007)” given its due recognition it deserves. Well done smashing Magazine! Hopefully the publisher will get their acts together and so finally we can see it in our local high street soon.
Colin
November 19th, 2008 6:40 pmTo much bloat! Some of these are average at best.
David
November 19th, 2008 6:58 pmExquisite, beautiful, excellent, you guys love your thesaurus.
keepitmassive
November 19th, 2008 10:17 pmStunning article!
Raj
November 19th, 2008 10:57 pmExquisite …? Not really …. Only few are impressive.
Claire Giordano
November 19th, 2008 11:09 pmMy favorite is the poster for The Proposition. The most disturbing is the poster for The Zoo. And the poster for Sideways is gorgeous. Hmmm, they’re all great. Thanks.
speedcu
November 20th, 2008 12:05 amI like most of the posters which are shown here, e.g. Paris je t’ aime, Bug, The Machinist, Broken Flowers, … where can one buy them? Would be nice to have the one in my flat.
Mr Katz
November 20th, 2008 1:10 amI love independent movies, but most of the posters are poor copies. E.g. The Descent is a copy of the Philippe Halsman and Salvador Dalí Project called The Skull.
Hm, maybe i sould write an article about that…
jim
November 20th, 2008 1:37 amHonestly these are a very poor and undistinguished selection of posters (with the exception of ‘Birds of America’ and a couple of others). Maybe you can point us to what you thought was special about each of them?
LOFer
November 20th, 2008 1:53 amAhhh, some of these are really “exquisite” but some are not. That is the beauty of opinion and of course, the subjectivity of art in and of itself.
Smashing Magazine is a great resource and has some wonderful collections of stuff, images, ideas and what-not. I don’t like them all. Entitled as we all are to our opinions about whether this is a good article or not it seems a little churlish to make a point of criticising the editors of this blog for doing something “you” don’t like or think worthy of your time.
Some articles I like, some I don’t but why bad-mouth an article like this – why not move and leave it alone?
Meh – there is a delicious irony in my comments I think…moving on….
@15 (Claire) I find myself in agreement with your choices :)
Paul
November 20th, 2008 2:20 amThis kind of post seems to split opinion every time you publish one. I originally subscribed to Smashing Mag because it was a great resource for web developers, with thoroughly researched and well written technical or design related posts, and I must say I think that you still do that very well.
But now it seems like these posts are becoming overshadowed by the 50 most stunning/beautiful/inspiring/… photos/posters/album covers/cereal boxes… posts. Personally, I’m very interested in photography, but I think there are other blogs out there which do this kind of thing better. But I appreciate that a lot of your readers love this kind of thing…
Have you considered publishing two or more feeds to keep these things separate. That way your readers could choose to subscribe to the one that most interested them, or to several posts if their interests spanned more than one subject area.
That way you might avoid all the negative posts that dominate the comments after every article.
verheesj
November 20th, 2008 4:03 amVery good :)
Rob
November 20th, 2008 5:26 amBill Murray gets around a bit eh?!
madeofsquares
November 20th, 2008 5:48 amSome great posters (and films) here. I especially like the poster for Birds of America, reminds me of the classic old Penguin book covers.
Andris
November 20th, 2008 6:05 amNice posters and good films, as well.
pica-ae
November 20th, 2008 6:12 amnice collection
Leo Ferreira
November 20th, 2008 6:19 amDouble A for Smashing!
They’re great movies, someones very confuse and bizarre. It could be interesting inform who create them.
DDDepressionnn
November 20th, 2008 7:01 amThere has come winter :(
It became cold and cloudy!
Mood very bad :(
Depression Begins
Dibergio
November 20th, 2008 7:01 amNice.
Does anyone know the font for the title on The Savages?
Thanks!
devsoft.mobi
November 20th, 2008 7:52 amVery nice Film Posters
devSoft.Mobi
Arthur Brown
November 20th, 2008 8:36 amGreat set of posters. Never seen many of these movies but the posters look awesome.
Jaybert
November 20th, 2008 8:54 amFilthy Richmond
cheeba
November 20th, 2008 8:54 amI myself am a fan of “independent” films, especially those featuring indie greats Matthew Perry, Lauren Bacall, Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson.
Lanz Mraz
November 20th, 2008 8:56 amgreat list.love it!
Jessica
November 20th, 2008 9:02 amGreat collection!
Lars and the Real Girl is a hilarious movie. I highly recommend it.
Ravi Vora
November 20th, 2008 10:06 amLove this post. Great indie posters deserve credit.
Rhagen
November 20th, 2008 10:40 amMy Blueberry Nights was one of the worst movies I’ve seen in a long, long time. I didn’t even get all the way through it. Yuck.
The second and third posters on this list are awesome.
Andrew
November 20th, 2008 11:17 amThe Descent is a rip off of an old Salvador Dali work: http://www.planetperplex.com/en/item89
R Rothchild
November 20th, 2008 12:52 pmI’m not quite sure how the “Akeelah and the Bee” (worst title for a movie ever) poster makes this list. Can someone please explain?
Ivo
November 20th, 2008 1:59 pmlove it!
Yahir Vite
November 20th, 2008 2:14 pmWhat have happended to the Font of the month?
Jhay
November 20th, 2008 9:02 pmAwesome poster design!!
yaara
November 21st, 2008 5:51 amWhat about Big Fish?
http://www.impawards.com/2003/big_fish.html
Amazing poster & a movie.
heather van de mark
November 21st, 2008 7:25 amDefinitely seems like SM started strong and the got weaker. I know nothing about The Machinist but that poster alone makes me want to watch so I can fill in the blanks. The flag as the shadow of Taxi to the Dark Side is brilliant.
Mel
November 21st, 2008 8:36 amhelpful as always! I just worked on a movie poster for an independent film for a friend and I always find great inspiration here. There is something about the independent films that I love. The style, writing and everything down to their creative posters. Me gusta! :)
leigh ann
November 21st, 2008 8:42 amthat transamerica poster is quite possibly the worst photoshop job ive ever seen. that woman is completely out of proportion – how does that make for an exquisite poster?
Elle Driver
November 21st, 2008 12:23 pmIt’s too bad you didn’t include the names of the designers who created these posters – but I suppose that would have required some extra sleuthing.
c wylie
November 21st, 2008 6:16 pmi haven’t seen a lot of these.. which is good b/c my netflix queue is getting low.
Ann
November 22nd, 2008 1:05 amThat is a really interesting collection. Honestly I did not know all these films yet, but will try to do so the soonest. Was also interesting to see the posters for such films also I knew, as I did not really remember the belonging poster picture. Anyway, great idea, congratulations!
Ann
Kola
November 22nd, 2008 2:47 amI’ve watched all those films. :<
Jeff
November 22nd, 2008 5:53 pmWhy are these great? Cause I’m not all that impressed with most of them. How about some explanation please? Seems like all they did was a Google search for “indie film posters”, and put the first 40 results up here.
Sara
November 23rd, 2008 5:38 amI’m so happy to see Hard Candy up there… that’s one awesome poster with one awesome actress on it! (Ellen Page). Love the posters. They’re so inspiring for all different kinds of artists. Thanks!
WilhelmR
November 23rd, 2008 7:00 pmMy favs from the list:
Birds of America
Whale Rider
Before the devil knows you’re dead
Sideways (also the cover of the book = great)
Requiem for a dream (GREAT movie)
Hard Candy = bad-ass
I’m not really impressed with the Brick poster, but I’ll check the movie just because the poster is hand made (or so it seems!)
I like much better the other posters of Eagle vs shark, this one is a bit more out of the box, but not as attractive i think.
That’s it, longer comment than usual.. :)
Moqbali.com
November 24th, 2008 7:07 amVery nice powerful posters design.
Thank you.
lenny
November 24th, 2008 1:31 pmBeautiful Losers def needs to be on this list:
http://www.impawards.com/2008/posters/beautiful_losers.jpg
nick
November 24th, 2008 8:39 pmFor “Funny Games”, I would have expected the 1970′s throwback poster with Naomi Watts instead.
http://www.impawards.com/2008/posters/funny_games.jpg
nona sheila
November 25th, 2008 3:19 amhey, the descent poster looks alike silence of the lamb unreleased poster.
eoin
February 11th, 2009 12:43 pmThe Funny Games poster featured is rubbish. The one with just Naomi Watts’s face is much better and possibly best poster of last year!
Is the Savages one illustrated by Chris Ware?
P.S. Would love to see the designers names for each poster.
duduhrened
July 7th, 2009 6:23 amNice Post ! www
max
September 13th, 2009 12:42 pmAnyone got an idea where I could get the Funny Games Poster? Searched so many postershops, but couldn’t find one selling it.
Corin
September 18th, 2009 5:36 pmI loved that poster for ‘Zoo’ from the first time I saw it. Awesome artwork, and so very evocative.
Ryan Harper Gray
October 31st, 2009 8:22 pmWish you had listed who made each poster.