25 Best Movie Posters of 2012

25. On the Road

With a cast this big — and this famous — the temptation would be to create a gaudy Photoshopped monstrosity. Instead, this stylish collage brings together the cast and the title in a way that captures the spirit of Jack Kerouac's seminal Beat Generation novel.

24. Hitchcock

What I said about the On the Road poster goes double here: It manages to fit all its stars on a single one sheet that would have felt right at home alongside posters for Alfred Hitchcock's actual cinematic masterpieces.

23. The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

This poster takes the opposite approach, eschewing its Oscar-baiting cast for an eye-popping representation of the film's title. You could fault Fox Searchlight for declining to showcase its more mature actors, but with an image this vibrant and joyful, how could you?

22. The Avengers

There's a great deal going on in this poster, but, like the movie itself, it somehow all comes together quite nicely. One curiosity, though: Why does Thor get more prominent placement than Captain America? Oh, right, the hair.

21. The Paperboy

In this sexy, seedy, pale pink one sheet, we get the kernel of this movie's story: Nicole Kidman's got the hots for Zac Efron, and John Cusack does not like it.

20. The Bourne Legacy

Reminiscent of the film's first teaser trailer, this poster also teases the promise of piecing together more of the Bourne mythology. Also, you cannot go wrong with Jeremy Renner's arms. (See entry no. 22.)

19. The Campaign

In an election year crammed with pseudo-earnest political advertisements, at least we could enjoy the mock campaign between Cam Brady (Will Ferrell) and Marty Huggins (Zach Galifianakis).

18. The Expendables 2

What was I saying before about how gaudy Photoshopped monstrosities are a bad thing? Well, except when they're COMPLETELY AWESOME.

17. Savages

Oliver Stone's drug world thriller may not have exactly resonated at the box office, but this unconventional teaser poster is guaranteed to grab your attention.

16. Silver Linings Playbook

The rare poster that invites moviegoers to stop for a moment and, you know, read — those scribbles in the center feature dialogue from the film — it also communicates the movie's pleasantly unhinged sensibility at a glance.

15. Killing Them Softly

It may have just been for the crime thriller's premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, but it's so unusual to find a one sheet that embraces a simple, graphic image, let alone one that conveys so much with so little. Given its ''F'' CinemaScore, it's too bad the film didn't capture audiences as cleanly as this poster does.

14. Sinister

[Crawls out from under desk...]

[Looks at poster one more time...]

[Crawls back under desk again.]

13. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Dwarves! So many dwarves with so many beards! And so many that are so unexpectedly hot! All beard-related enthusiasm aside, my favorite thing about this poster is that it looks nothing like any of the posters for The Lord of the Rings.

12. Moonrise Kingdom

Evoking the storybooks that fill the yellow suitcase of its young heroine, this nostalgic and lovely one sheet also wins the award for best font of the year.

11. Looper

Beyond the stark, spare imagery and amazing leather jackets, I think Looper may win for the most effective tagline for a movie this year. It boils down this sci-fi thriller's complicated premise into eight simple words: ''Hunted by your future. Haunted by your past.''

10. Wreck-It Ralph

With one look, you know exactly what this uncannily rendered eight-bit image is about: A videogame bad guy with a cute reddish nose.

9. Bachelorette

The only poster on this list to use an image from an actual scene from the movie, and it's easy to see why: It tells you everything you need to know about the characters and their relationship to each other. Bonus points if you can guess the Tony award nominee doing the strip tease in the silver hot pants.

(It's The New Normal and Book of Mormon star Andrew Rannells. I know, right?)

8. Ted

The name of writer-director-star Seth MacFarlane is nowhere to be found on this poster, but this poster is all Seth MacFarlane. The brazen double entendre. The slyly suggestive image. The inexplicably adorable character at the center.

7. Zero Dark Thirty

This one-sheet for director Kathryn Bigelow's recreation of the hunt for Osama bin Laden almost an anti-poster, forcing you to work out the title (unless you decide to cheat and read the website URL at the bottom). But by blacking out even the month of release, it's subtly suggesting that the movie itself will reveal all that classified, redacted information.

6. A Good Day to Die Hard

I said before that Bruce Willis's film Looper had the most effective tagline for a 2012 film. Pretty sure he's got 2013 all sewn up too.

5. The Dark Knight Rises

Of all the dark, gloomy images used to sell Christopher Nolan's final Batman film, this one featuring Catwoman's lethal stiletto heel thankfully reflects the welcome wit and ambiguous motives Anne Hathaway brought to the character.

4. Django Unchained

At least the Zero Dark Thirty teaser poster contained the movie's title. This one sheet's simple, graphic illustration evokes the spirit of the spaghetti Westerns of the 1970s with an image that suggests the film's title. Besides, it may be an ego trip, but ''the new film by Quentin Tarantino'' is also the only selling point this movie needs.

3. The Master

As an expression of its film's coruscating tone and plot, this dizzying poster simply could not be better. That the poster itself is also something of an acquired taste — again, like the film — is what makes it destined for film snob dorm room walls for years to come.

2. The Wolverine

Well, this is certainly a refreshing surprise. This evocative and elegant teaser poster for the Japan-set The Wolverine — which takes place after the events of 2006's X-Men: The Last Stand — manages to (nearly) wash away all the ill feelings about 2009's woefully ham-handed X-Men Origins: Wolverine. That is no small feat.

1. Les Misérables

I didn't think it was possible to find an image to represent Victor Hugo's tale of poverty and revolution as indelible as the illustration of a tattered young Cosette that first appeared in Hugo's novel — and became the ubiquitous symbol for the long-running stage musical. By transmuting that illustration into a flesh-and-blood girl, however, this poster announces that the feature film adaptation will set its own creative identity while also remaining true to its source material. Beyond that, though just look at this face. It's so simple, so haunting and sad, yet so beautiful and strong. It's almost as if...yes! I can hear the people sing, and hear the distant drums....