Every time we see a cover of the Japanese celeb/cinema magazine Movie Information/Movie Pictorial we find ourselves thinking how cool they look. It’s a publication that goes all the way back to the early 1950s, and it had a few different periods, graphically speaking, but for some reason we always preferred these clean, colorful late-1960s early-1970s covers. So we thought we’d upload a few fronts and backs we’ve found over the years and see if you agree. As far as the name goes, we usually see the magazine referred to in English as Movie Pictorial, and in fact the back cover does say that, obviously. But the front cover writing definitely says “Movie Information.” So there you go. But we’ve actually turned screwing up these translations into a fine art, so we won’t be heartbroken if we’re wrong. Anyway, see below. And FYI, the girl in the scuba tank is Barbara Bouchet, so she’s on three covers. The scuba image is a promo shot from Voyage To the Bottom of the Sea. You can see two more front covers here and here.
1957—Sputnik Circles Earth
The Soviet Union launches the satellite Sputnik I, which becomes the first artificial object to orbit the Earth. It orbits for two months and provides valuable information about the density of the upper atmosphere. It also panics the United States into a space race that eventually culminates in the U.S. moon landing.