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Glenn,
First of all, if you're looking at a 20-year holding period, make condition
your first priority in making a purchase decision. Go for the best-quality
unrestored and preferably not-linenbacked one-sheets you can find. I know some
people question the "one-sheet is god" mentality, and I love inserts and
half-sheets myself, but one-sheets will continue to be the most popular size in
all but a few unique titles. But the condition is critical. 20 years is a good
long time for a poster that is already maybe 50 years old or more.
Then, of course, you need to have your choices cleaned and de-acidified by
reliable experts. Then you need to put them in high-quality archival frames. For
your stated purpose, I would not linenback them or buy any poster that is
already linenbacked. Why? Because it's hard to tell how much restoration has
been done -- but this thorny question about restoration will become more of
an issue in the future and you don't want to get stuck with something that has
had so much restoration done that future concerns about this issue affect its
value. Plus, in most cases you don't know who did the restoration or if the
linenbacking was done "correctly" or not. You could end up with a linenbacked
poster that starts deteriorating over the years and requires expensive rescue
and repair. Sadly, you can't just take the dealer's word on these issues unless
they have a verifiable certificate from the restorer/backer or you can
contact the restorer/backer directly and confirm what work they did
yourself and get them to send you a certified letter to that effect).
No offense meant to restorers or backers or those who collect linenbacked
posters or like to linenback their posters. But we all know now that all
restoration is not done to the same quality standards and that all
linenbackers do not use the same techniques and materials and that there still
is no widely accepted system of grading or certification for either one. This
makes the area a minefield if we're talking strictly investment concerns over
the next 20 years. Glenn asked for "investment-grade" advice and this is the
best advice for strictly investment purposes. If we're talking normal
"collecting" then restoration and backing are perfectly fine and I have a lot of
same in my own collection and will continue to buy them. But I am buying as a
collector, not an investor. For pure "investment-grade" quality you want
unrestored, unbacked posters in the best possible condition.
Now, as to which posters to get:
If you are doing it strictly for investment purposes, then you probably
only buy 2 to 5 posters with the 10 grand. You pick some titles from the
usual list of already-expensive suspects. This means 1950s sci-fi, horror, noir,
and some non-genre films with big name actors still popular today, etc. with
really good looking, wall-worthy artwork..Why just the 1950's? Because that is
as far back as you can go and still figure on having lots of collector's around
20 years from now who remember those films and feel nostalgic enough about
them to pay big bucks for the posters. Yes, there is some great stuff from
the 1940's, 1930's and even earlier that will also retain and appreciate in
value over the next 20 years, but, let's face it: Most of those titles are
already into the $10,000-plus price range already. In the 1950's you can
still pick up some great stuff in the $500 to $2,500 price range and know that
there will be people who still love those titles around 20 years from now.
You then take your list of maybe 100 titles and go through Bruce's on-line
and maybe Kisch's printed price guides and compare prices from the
late 1990's to those being realized on the same titles in the last couple
of years.
You will find some that have gone up significantly.
You will find some that have actually gone down a little, in a
few cases quite a lot.
You will find some that have not changed very much.
Then, you have a tricky decision to make: Do you buy those that have
appreciated in the last 5 to 7 years, or do you buy those that have
remained pretty solid in their pricing over the years? I would say split the
difference and buy a couple from each area.
This is basically what investment professionals do when they put together a
stock portfolio. They pick some "blue chips" which will almost certainly hold
their value and appreciate some, and they pick a few "rising stars" in hopes of
some spectacular future growth in value. ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS is one that
fits this bill, as recent price increases have shown.
But that's a lot of work. The short answer: You could just go
with a couple of perennial favorites that will always continue to rise in value,
even if a bit slower than some newer "rising stars", and probably do very
well.
-- JR
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- [MOPO] Things seem slow here on MOPO so.... Glenn Taranto
- Re: [MOPO] Things seem slow here on MOPO so..... Freedom Lover
- Re: [MOPO] Things seem slow here on MOPO ... Greg Douglass
- Re: [MOPO] Things seem slow here on MOPO so..... Roger Kim
- Re: [MOPO] Things seem slow here on MOPO ... Alan Adler
- Re: [MOPO] Things seem slow here on MOPO ... Planetbiz
- JRS MoviePosterBid.com
