‘Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter’ Poster Shows a Badass Abe

There have been excellent trailers (‘Prometheus’) and relentless clips (‘The Avengers’) leading up to the start of the 2012 Summer Movie Season, but Timur Bekmambetov’s ‘Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter’ is winning the war in the battle for Best Poster Campaign.

So far, we’ve seen a shadowy Lincoln seated in a chair as he balanced his axe. It called to mind the Lincoln Memorial, while also hinting at the bizarre historical context Bekmambetov and his team would bring to Seth Grahame-Smith’s genre mash up. And now we have a new poster with “Honest” Abe front and center, walking tall and carrying a big axe. We have it below, courtesy of Empire Online.

That’s Benjamin Walker playing our nation’s 16th president, who – in this offbeat take on American folklore – spent his evenings hunting the undead. The trailer hinted at a thrilling set piece aboard a flaming railroad car, and this poster uses that as a visual cue, as well.

With Bekmambetov, “visual cues” usually drive his narrative (wee ‘Wanted’ for an example). But those who’ve read Grahame-Smith’s novel say ‘Vampire Hunter’ also has a very strong (and very fun) story to work off of. We’ll see once the movie reaches theaters on June 22.