Abram Sauer Online

Back in June 2008, Print Magazine put together an impressive collection of the “A Frame.”

Print Mag: “But on book covers and on film and theater posters, the leg has evolved very little. In fact, the “A-Frame,” a cut off-torso-spread-leg framing device, is the most frequently copied trope ever use… The earliest known uses were 19th-century engravings that showed spread-legged, Simon Legree–type slave masters lording over cowering victims. In Westerns, the quintessential showdown frames one duelist through the legs of the other, and mid-20th-century pulp magazine covers were known for their noir images of recoiling women seen through the legs of menacing men. Eventually, designers used the conceit to frame all manner of things…” 

I remembered this gallery when I came upon several spectacular examples of the A Frame, which, unsurprisingly given their extremely niche B-film nature, Print missed. By all means check out Print’s gallries. (To the left, the current cover of Psychology Today, which, unfortunately, does not feature an investigation into the latent meanings of the A Frame means)

After the jump, the two A Frame film posters, one very notable because it features some absurd product placement for Bud (and Nike) and because it’s (maybe) the most offensively suggestive A Frame I’ve ever seen..