1. The Heat
2. August: Osage County
3. The Wolf of Wall Street
4. The Kings of Summer
5. 42
6. Nebraska
7. The Fault in Our Stars
8. Blue Is the Warmest Color
9. Nymphomaniac
What was that again about erotic power? The teaser poster at the left conveys the subject of director Lars Von Trier's latest cinematic provocation with subtle wit. The main poster at the right is about as subtle as a sledgehammer — and just about as effective. Either way, these are images one is unlikely to forget.
10. The Grand Budapest Hotel
11. 12 Years a Slave
12. Gravity
13. Star Trek Into Darkness
14. X-Men: Days of Future Past
Their eyes, lips, and jawlines may not perfectly match, but who cares when you've got, respectively, Patrick Stewart together with James McAvoy, and Ian McKellan together with Michael Fassbender, on the same posters?
15. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
16. Man of Steel
17. This Is the End
18. Bad Grandpa
19. Despicable Me 2
20. You're Next (and, in a way, The Big Wedding)
21. The Conjuring
22. The Amazing Spider-Man 2
Whereas the previous posters are memorable for their relative simplicity, this triptych manages to make the bigger-and-louder-and-messier-is-better aesthetic endemic to so many forgettable studio posters somehow work in its favor. And look! Is that the Green Goblin?!
23. Divergent
From here on is where things flip from being memorably good to being memorably bad.
On the left, we have one of the moody teaser posters for this long-anticipated adaptation of Veronica Roth's YA best-seller, featuring Shailene Woodley's Tris and her signature tattoo of three ravens. So far, so good.
But then Summit Entertainment debuted the final main poster, with Woodley striking the stereotypical gratuitous-butt-and-side-boob pose that so many women on so many posters have done so many times. Oy.