Most new collectors are surprised to discover that there are some old posters with excellent images that sell for very little, and that there are other old posters with inferior images that sell for a LOT, and the reason why is almost always due to how RARE those items are!

And usually, after some investigation (first and foremost, by checking our Auction History database at http://www.emovieposter.com/agallery/archive.html, which contains over 1.640,000 REAL auction results!) they soon find out that there are many posters and movie paper that are much more rare than others. The most obvious reason is due to how old the items are, but there are other factors as well. There are five basic broad categories of posters:

1) pre-1919 - These items are mostly insanely rare, likely related to World War I paper drives; for a large percentage of items from this period, either none or one example are known!
2) 1919 to 1934 - These items are mostly extremely rare; for a large percentage of items from this period, between one and five examples are known!
3) 1935 to 1939 - These items are mostly quite rare (only slightly less rare than the category above; but for a fair percentage of items from this period, between a few and a dozen examples are known!
4) 1940 to 1964 or so - "can be found" (due to the existence of National Screen Service (or NSS); for a large percentage of items from this period, between dozens and hundreds of examples are known!
5) 1965 or so to 1979 or so - "can easily be found"; for a large percentage of items from this period, between 100 and many hundreds of examples are known!
6) 1980 or so to present - "can be found in quantity (due to many theaters saving all posters AND printers doing overruns for the collectors' market); for a large percentage of items from this period, many hundreds of examples are known!

The above clearly explains why those collectors who prize rarity soon gravitate to older posters, because, for the most part, the older the movie, the more scarce the first release paper. But of course there are always "exceptions" ("newer" posters that are incredibly rare, and "older" posters that are relatively common).

But for just a few hundred movies from all years, virtually NO first release movie paper is known to exist! There will be a title from say 1945, where we have auctioned many examples of first release paper from other movies made the same year from the same studio, but for that exact title only, we have only auctioned ONE first release item ever!

Sometimes this may possibly be explained by the fact that the movie had an extremely quick re-release, just a few years after the first release. Maybe all the original posters were used up or thrown out during that re-release. Or maybe the movie had a very limited first release, and just a few posters were made. There are also some titles where it is likely non-poster collectors bought them and removed them all from the hobby. One of many examples would be the "Nancy Drew" titles, based on the popular children's books.

Unfortunately, we have no public records available to explain these rarities, and the individuals who could explain this have almost surely all passed on. So whenever we encounter a title like this, and we have an item for auction, we add to the auction something like: "First release movie paper from this title (for unknown reasons) is EXTREMELY rare. In all our years of auctioning we have never previously auctioned one first release item."

IN OUR SOON-TO-START DECEMBER 2019 AUCTION WE HAVE A LOT OF CONSIGNMENTS FROM VERY LONGTIME COLLECTORS WHO SEARCHED FOR DECADES FOR ULTRA-RARE ITEMS, AND IF YOU TOO LIKE GREAT RARITIES, YOU WILL BE AMAZED AT HOW MANY THIS AUCTION CONTAINS!

There are also a limited number of titles where the first release items from those titles were found in large quantities in "warehouse" finds (sometimes hundreds of each item). Those titles are easy to spot because they come up for auction again and again!