Repro Hammer Quads
Hammer has announced the release of a series of repro British quads posters from some of their classic Horror films from the 50s to the 70s. Titles include Curse of Frankenstein, Countess Dracula, Vampire Circus and culminating with the release of Dracula in 2008 to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the film.
Now that all sounds fine but there has been considerable discussion and concern on some of the forums and various other sites about the fact that the posters will be almost exact replicas to the originals with little or no identifying marks on the front of the posters.
Part of the publicity for these posters states:
"Each title in the series has been scanned from an original poster at a very high resolution. They are then digitally restored. All the creases and fold marks are removed along with any pin holes, tears, dirty marks, etc.."
I would have thought that the sensible approach would have been to include some identifying mark on the front of the poster which would clearly indicate that it was a repro without detracting from the image. Perhaps they could have included the date, or a notation that the poster was an officially authorised Hammer reproduction. Apparently, they may have a stamp on the back but no mark at all on the front.
Collectors would be well aware that many hundreds of reproduction posters have been sold on internet auctions as original. Many are deliberate attempts to deceive whilst others are simply an example of a lack of knowledge from the seller. One striking example has been various Portal reproduction posters that were printed about 30 years ago. Although these are not the size of the standard movie posters, they still get misprepresented on a regular basis, despite the fact that many have the name "Portal" on the base of the poster and sometimes the zip code.
The Portal posters are often described in terms such as...
"this is a very old poster that was recently found in my grandfathers attic. He has had the poster for many years and, although it is showing some signs of age, it displays remarkably well. Although I am not a poster dealer, I have been told that this is a very rare original piece etc etc, blah, blah"
Many dealers over the years have cringed as they see these repros sell for huge prices to unsuspecting buyers.
Well now, Hammer will be producing replica British Quads. I wonder how many will eventually turn up on eBay or other sites represented as originals. Unscrupulous sellers might fold them, and perhaps remove the stamp from the back, throw in a few pinholes and add some writing on the back to make them look original. They could also linen back them and, although I havent actually touched the repros, I imagine that it might be difficult to tell the difference between the repros and the originals once they have been backed. Goodness knows, they might even start turning up at major auctions.
I suppose Hammer have the right to do what they like when producing these quads but surely they could have added a date to the poster without detracting from the quality.
Let me know what you think.
Regards
John
