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Perhaps the Certified Copy cover is supposed to look like the book he gives a presentation about at the start of the film?

I'd admit that I'm really looking forward to the inevitable apologists, but I don't think that's going to be an issue this time

What.

Here's my explanation for these covers:

Criterion, having already gone through the problematic Valentine's Day sale, forgot to make the final covers for the May titles. Once they realized this, it was close to the announcement, so they threw together some covers (and maybe hired F. Ron Miller at the last minute for the Bergmans) and called it a day.

Finch wrote:Perhaps the Certified Copy cover is supposed to look like the book he gives a presentation about at the start of the film?

Precisely. It's a copy of it, if you will. A copy, perhaps, is just as valid as the real thing.

Damn that are some awful covers...

LQ wrote:They've put up "placeholder" cover art on announcement day before, right? They're all bad, but that Certified Copy cover can not be the final product.

The Darjeeling Limited was announced with placeholder cover art, FWIW, and I'm sure there are other examples that I'm not thinking of at the moment. Let's not give up hope. YET. Of course, even the Darjeeling Ltd placeholder art was approx. 1000000% better than these....

I think Peter Becker had a hand in the Certified Copy design, because no one would want to buy it with that cover.

Jeff wrote:

Finch wrote:Perhaps the Certified Copy cover is supposed to look like the book he gives a presentation about at the start of the film?

Precisely.

Is your argument that this is merely minor terrible?

Is it finally time to merge this thread with The Worst DVD Covers Ever?

domino harvey wrote:

Askew wrote:This is easily the month with the worst covers since the early spine numbers.

I know I bitch a lot, but this is legitimately the worst batch of covers ever ever ever. I mean, holy shit

Certified Copy looks like something *I* would make in about 7 minutes in photoshop. and i'm barely competent with it. Just awful. I suppose it was bound to happen considering the amazing work they've done in recent months (Frampton, The Organizer, Alambrista!), but this is truly pathetic.

And again with only one upgrade? wtf?

These can't be final. I'm sure the big sale threw the whole office into chaos and they had to rush to throw up placeholders (hence the delay). I mean, I think swimminghorses honestly used the same concepts (person in eye, !mirror images!) for other movies. Malkovich is salvageable, but the background and font are hideously bland, and Certified Copy is worse. The Bergmans are boring but at least not hideous.

But La Haine's still great.

I think Peter Becker had a hand in the Certified Copy design, because no one would want to buy it with that cover.

To be fair, it resembles the cover of the book that the male lead is promoting in the film. (Indeed it resembles the functional book covers that are ubiquitous in Europe.)

Honestly, the Malkovich cover is the tipping point. If they'd knocked that one out of the park (and I've seen a couple of fake covers for it that would have fit the bill), the others would probably do, even if they're a little boring. But as it stands, the Malkovich cover just exposes all the ugliness around it.

Jeff wrote:

Finch wrote:Perhaps the Certified Copy cover is supposed to look like the book he gives a presentation about at the start of the film?

Precisely. It's a copy of it, if you will. A copy, perhaps, is just as valid as the real thing.

Pretty much, yup.

swo17 wrote:Honestly, the Malkovich cover is the tipping point. If they'd knocked that one out of the park (and I've seen a couple of fake covers for it that would have fit the bill), the others would probably do, even if they're a little boring. But as it stands, the Malkovich cover just exposes all the ugliness around it.

It's not like there's that much creative imagery from that film they could've used though

I don't love the Certified Copy cover, but I understand where they were going with it. (See pzadvance's post two above)

The BJM is the most swimminghorseesque. I'm pretty sure he used that same clipart for his Chinatown cover.

They're all pretty ridiculous this month. No wonder Criterion held off another day. If these had been released in the wake of the Valentine's Day Massacre, people would have stormed the gates.

Tribe's prediction came true!

Tribe wrote:All this goodwill towards CC...watch 'em turn tomorrow when they see the covers!

I'm guessing that Certified Copy is supposed to look like the guy's book - which must have come from the incredibly unimaginative house designer of an academic publisher - but I don't think it even works on those grounds. Considering the visual sophistication and beauty of the film, it's a bit of a slap in the face - and, I'd say, commercially counterproductive. Aren't there swathes of people who'll pick up anything that smacks of Tuscany? That's a big part of the film's whole inspired bait and switch. Now, all the people doing a "tuscany dvd" search on Amazon are going to see that. (The other covers don't really bother me.)

EDIT: I see - copy confirmed above

Of course if a Chaplin title was announced for May, the covers would be just that much worse.

If they released The Gold Rush in May, its cover would be a picture of Charlie Chaplin next to a clip art image of gold.

Askew wrote:Of course if a Chaplin title was announced for May, the covers would be just that much worse.

Ha! Too true.

At the very least, this month has provided us with a ground zero for covers which all forthcoming months will forever be referenced against in relative terms

The Kiarostami, it's theme to the content notwithstanding, looks amazingly like a really bad Facets cover. I've seen better covers from Alpha.

Italy. The film is set in Italy. How could they go so wrong?

I'm going to stick my neck out and admit that I like the Certified Copy cover, and was for some reason surprised to come here and see everyone getting the vapors over it.

I'm not going to go full-on contrarian, though - I think Being John Malkovich is a kinda sad.

When people watch Certified Copy and see the what appears to be an image of their DVD sitting there on the dais, minds will be blown. Or something.