Easily among my top my films of the 2009, I’m glad to see that the surreal, whimsical, weird and highly imaginative qualities of the Sophie Barthes‘ Cold Souls [August 7th – Samuel Goldwyn Films] are somehow retained/reflected in the film’s poster one sheet. I’m already imagining construction sites’ wood paneling in Gotham plastered with this in repetition. The production offices of Touchy Feely Films (the Giamattis) will probably do the same with this beaut.
The poster takes the central idea of soul extraction and applies it with the coolest souvenir (after a bottle of vodka) you can bring back from Russia: a matryoshka doll. A small percentage of the film actually takes place in Russia – and the borders of the poster use some of the drab, saturation of pale pastels that are found in the film’s backdrops – expertly captured by Barthes’ DP/hubby Andrij Parekh.
Cold Souls finds Giamatti in the midst of an existential crisis, and when the famous American actor stumbles upon a Soul Storage, a private lab offering New Yorkers a relief from the burden of their souls – he becomes the first celeb to sign up for the process.
The Sundance hit will next be shown at the Los Angeles Film Festival later this month.
