Destello de la Espada de Ichi - Bachs 1969

The late 60s is the era when Cuban posters were at their most colourful, wild and inventive. This Bachs poster for the 1964 Japanese film Zatoichi's Flashing Sword pushes the boundaries with great text design, mad colours (the protagonist in the film wears white, not green, purple and pink) and shapes, and a freedom and confidence that speak of Cuba's positivity. 

Los Hermanastros - Bachs 1969

Bachs' poster for this 1957 Japanese production features his trademark style to illustrate the tyrannical military officer at the centre of the film. Los Hermanastros (Stepbrothers) is a critique of male dominated Japanese society. The poster artwork is restrained yet creative, using limited colours and shapes to illustrate the aggressive face of the protagonist and the bright colours of his outfit.

Fantomas Contra Scotland Yard - Bachs 1968

A great mix of photo montage and cartoon-style imagery collide in this 1968 poster by Bachs for a French crime caper film. The plot of the film revolves around multiple disguises adopted by Fantomas, the anti-hero of a series of James Bond knock-off comedies. The poster is a classic, and simple by Bachs usual standards. This poster has been torn in half at some time in its life and put back together with tape.

Ella y El - Bachs 1969

Bachs' poster for this Japanese drama Kanojo to Kare (She and He) is minimal and classy, using bold colours and simple shapes to illustrate the subjects of the film. The drama focuses on the growing stature of the female protagonist as she explores new interests and love, becoming more independent while her husband's status diminishes. Bachs illustration has her looking sassy, bold, colourful and in charge, while her husband is reduced to a character-less head, barely included in the design.

La Cura y La Muchacha - Bachs 1968

This is a really nice poster by Bachs demonstrating how the most simple of Cuban poster designs can often be the most beautiful. This is a poster for the Brazilian film O Padre e a Moça (The Priest and the Girl) about a passionate relationship between a young priest and a girl in a small town. The poster isn't too subtle in its interpretation of the subject of the film - two hearts against a cross - but the execution is excellent and this is a vibrant and pretty poster design.

La Vieja Dama Indigna - Bachs 1966

This early poster by Bachs is less adventurous than his work of the late 60s. It is restrained, using a standard black font and straight layout, and follows the style of many early 60s international film and cultural posters by artists such as Saul Bass. The film is The Shameless Old Lady (La Vieille Dame Indigne) a 1965 French film from a Bertold Brecht story, about an old widow who blows her life savings as she ventures into the modern world to have fun, escaping her long life of living in qualor and poverty.

Cine Movil - Bachs 1969

A classic of classics of Cuban posters, this 1969 poster for the ICAIC's Cine Movil (Mobile Cinema) project is simplicity itself. Charlie Chaplin on wheels represents the mobile cinema - a lorry that travelled into the Cuban interior to show films to the campesinos. Bachs' poster for the ICAIC is great. Confident, fun and nicely childish. As a designer Bachs' preferred to produce posters for childrens' films and this is typical of his cheeky design ideas.

El Viento Distante - Bachs 1970

A Mexican experimental film with three directors and three parts sounds like a wacky idea but Bachs' poster for the ICAIC is restrained and formal with a proper typeface and simple three column layout. Once again his trademark use of simple colours and shapes define characters and make great use of silkscreen printing.

Los Vengadores Incapturables - Bachs 1968

Edmond Keosaian's 1966 Soviet western Elusive Avengers (Неуловимые мстители) is a colour cult classic featuring a gang of four protecting a village from bandits. Working with silkscreen printing creates major limitations for artists, who find that having to stick to flat colours and simple shapes can be restrictive. As the Cuban poster artists grew into the medium they started to create work that made the most of the limitations. In this poster Bachs has used very simple shapes to create a vibrant image to represent the simple peasant dress of the film's characters. The artistic style and shape of the text is Bachs' trademark.

 

Here's the opening five minutes, courtesy of YouTube:

El Gran Robo del Tren de San Trinian - Bachs 1968

El Gran Robo del Tren de San Trinian (The St Trinians Great Train Robbery) is a 1966 British comedy about the pupils of a girls school who thwart the attempts by the great train robbers to recover the loot from their heist, which happens to be stashed in the girls' school building. Bachs' 1968 ICAIC silkscreen poster is a classic with simple but effective cartoon graphics and his trademark homemade text.


This poster is printed on brown paper rather than the usual white.

El Azote de Dios - Bachs 1968

El Azote de Dios (God's Whip or Bicz Bozy) is a 1967 Polish comedy. Regular ICAIC designer Bachs has gone for a very crazy cartoon style with this poster with the text at jagged angles and a lot of playful graphics.



Here's the original Polish poster for comparison:

El Hijo Prodigo - Bachs 1969

A poster from Bachs that references the style of Polish movie posters, El Hijo Prodigo (Return of the Prodigal Son) is feature examining the soul of a man who attempts suicide. Bachs Cuban poster for the ICAIC centres on the man and his desire for flight or escape represented by the butterfly. The Polish poster featured below has almost the same visual idea of a dark character with bright colourful wings.

Viento Negro - Bachs 1968

With lots of bold colour and a very confident cartoon style this is typical of Bachs style in the late 60s. This ICAIC silkscreen is for a Mexican film about a group of men trying to prevent the railroad being built in the desert. The main character is the mayor played by David Reynoso is depicted in the poster.

Tropico - Bachs 1970

Gianni Amico's Tropico (Tropics or Tropici in Italian) is a fictional 1968 film portraying the injustice of working conditions in Brazil and the plight of the country's underclass. Bach's 1970 poster for the ICAIC features sinister and dramatic artwork using gold tributaries in the mind of the mind of the nearly faceless peasant.

Les Puños en el Bolsillo - Bachs 1968

Les Puños en el Bolsillo (Fists in the Pocket or I Pugni in Tasca in Italian) is a 1965 film by Italian director Marco Bellocchio. The film concerns a disturbed young man who murders members of his family. Bachs' interpretation of the film as as simple as it gets - murder in the mind. This is very wild and colourful poster using the Orbit font and allowing parts of the words to spill over onto the next line in the title, a common feature of Cuban posters. Notice the spillage of blue ink onto the nose of the face.

Here's a You Tube clip of the film: