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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A fabulous and stunning debut by the Franchis..., May 17, 2002
Rudy and Barbara Franchi have created, in my mind, the most definitive primer to date that deserves a place in the PERMANENT library of EVERY movie poster or memorabilia fan in the world."Miller's Movie Collectibles" packs a wallop - especially for bookish geeks like yours truly who demand a ton of poster and memorabilia images - AS WELL AS fluid prose/text/history laid out beautifully on EVERY page. Clocking in at 144 pages and a whopping 36 chapters, this sturdy volume is hands down, a spectacular compendium of content and images, coherent and accessible, laid out with a sophisticated, contemporary design aesthetic that makes every page a work of art (e.g., as in the use of faint silhouettes on every page, in different colors, mirroring movie icons and other related images). Lavishly printed on heavy paper stock "Movie Collectibles" is an photo- and text-intensive product of the likes rarely seen. It attempts - and succeeds - to cover every slice of our hobby. Color illustrations decorate every page, accompanied by disarmingly breezy and informative text by this husband and wife team (the former a charter popular arts historian featured weekly on PBS' most-watched television series, "The Antiques Roadshow"). There's a timeless quality to this product that makes one wonder if a second edition will ever be necessary. Think of the most desired movie posters in the world, from "The Mummy" to "Tiffany's" to "King Kong." Think of the great cult favorites and hyper-popular genres, from James Bond to Hitchcock to sci-fi to film noir to Disney to foreign classics to horror to musicals to silents. Think of the most obscure, the bizarre, the provocative. You'll find them here, in glorious color, jammed with easy-to-read prose that every collector or dealer, from novice to advanced, will gobble up like inmates ending a hunger strike. It gets better. Rather than sticking with silent and vintage films and dismissing post-1960 products, "Movie Collectibles" devotes special chapters for each decade, from the 60s to the 80s. You wanna know more about special illustrators, from Vargas to Brown to Bass to Peak to Frazetta? Yeah, they get their own chapter. What about repros, re-issues, pressbooks, programs, stills, slides, lobby cards, sheet music, film books, autographs, promos, and props? What about signed contracts, Academy Awards and other ultra-rare items that we see, oh, once every solar eclipse over the continental USA? What about restoration services, types, styles, what's bad, what's good, etc.? Taken as a whole, Franchi's inaugural edition of "Miller's Movie Collectibles" represents a stunning debut, an opulently produced yet slim enough volume to carry in your satchel. The authors have a way with prose that is unlike most other books about movie posters and related collectibles. And its contents are akin to what you'd find in a product costing much more. "Miller's Movie Collectibles" is a keeper.
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