Design I Like: "Castle in the Sky" Poster

One of my favorite movie posters is for a classic Japanese animated film called “Castle in the Sky” (1986) by my favorite director Hayao Miyazaki. The poster is immediately striking for its vibrant, warm colors and complex imagery. It has a strong look of fine artistry that is rarely seen in the vapid movie posters of today, but there is also something to be said for it as a functional piece of graphic design. The two main characters, the boy Pazu and the girl Sheeta, are featured prominently in the poster floating high above a canyon landscape and gazing upwards with smiling faces that convey a sense of optimism and wonder. Flying below them, but still high above the village in the canyon, there is the pirate airship and several of its pirates on board, who start out as pursuers of the main characters in the movie but end up forming an unusual friendship with them. This spectacular and unexpected aerial perspective serves to grab people’s attention and give them a sense of the adventure they can expect when they watch the film. The fact that the two main children’s faces are featured very near the center of the frame also accentuates their glowing expressions and indicates who the main characters are. The magical stone on Sheeta’s necklace is also glowing in the center near her face, perhaps representing the idea that this jewel is indeed the “MacGuffin” of the film’s story. The bright colors on the children’s clothes, in contrast to the brown tones of the pirate ship and village below, separate them from the background and also suggest how their grand adventure brings them to wondrous new places far removed from the industrial-looking village that they leave behind.