In 1981, right around the time I stopped collecting sports cards (and in fact stopped following sports altogether) to concentrate on movies and rock 'n' roll, the gods of the bubble gum industry must've been reading my mind. First they put out Chu-Bops, which were small LP-shaped sheets of gum issued in 3x3-inch album cover repicas (I had Blondie's Parallel Lines, Kiss Unmasked and a bunch of others), then the mighty Topps Company came up with a series of 4-way folded 12½" x 20½" movie poster reprints -- for 30 cents each! I never collected all 12 of the posters, just the handful that I really wanted, with SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT (artwork by John Solie) and ANIMAL HOUSE at the top of the list. The other posters in the series were AIRPLANE!, THE BLUE LAGOON, THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK (Style A), GREASE, JAWS, REVENGE OF THE PINK PANTHER, ROCKY, STAR WARS (Style A), SUPERMAN, and YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN.
Speaking of YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, does anyone know the name of those color-your-own movie poster sets that were sold in toy stores in the late '70s? I got the YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN one at a Kay Bee Toy & Hobby in 1977 or '78, but I remember seeing BLAZING SADDLES, THE TOWERING INFERNO, EARTHQUAKE and a few others (possibly THE HINDENBURG?) around for year or so. I think the word "star" was in the name of the product -- like "Star Graphics" or "Star Images" -- and each poster came rolled in a long cardboard tune with magic markers included.
Well holy shit! These are even before my time, but I would'a LOVED 'em. Thanks for the history lesson!
ReplyDeleteI loved those Posters! I was 13 at the time, so it seemed so grown up to put them on my wall. I held a grudge against Blue Lagoon for years, because it's such an uninteresting poster, and for some reason every third package I opened was yet another Blue Lagoon!
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