finally watched gary hustwit’s documentary film helvetica about the typeface and then typography generally over the last fifty years.

this film is primarily for fans of design but even if you don’t consider yourself a fan but just have a nerdy interest in design i recommend it. it ties together a number of things, the pacing is a little slow in spots but mostly it moves along. the interviews with some of the biggest names in typography are wonderful, one can get a real sense of the people and their philosophies behind the designs.

one dimension that it connects with is the influence of modernism and post-modernism in typography, and then the reconstitutive overtures occurring more recently. another dimension is a political sense of corporate capitalism and the evolution of brand identity, globalization, and mass market. we hear one designer refuse to use helvetica because it represents the corporations that got us into the vietnam war, for example. and the movie spends much time on aesthetics and dances with the idea that only a fine line exists between powerful or bold and plain boring.

this entry, in honor of the subject, is rendered in helvetica. you’ll notice other entries in this blog currently using verdana, and the designer of verdana is interviewed in the film.