Your IRS forms are printed in Helvetica. So is the signage of the New York City subway system. The corporate logos of Target, JC Penney, American Airlines, and Crate & Barrel are all in Helvetica. Since it was invented in 1957, Helvetica has been ubiquitous; so much so that finding anything interesting to say about Helvetica is, in the words of one type designer, like saying something about off-white paint.
It doesn't seem like much to build a documentary on, but Gary Hustwit's film does a marvelous job of explaining how Helvetica came to be so popular. Even better, he uses Helvetica as a backdrop against which we get the history of graphic design for the last half-century -- the rise of the typeface in the 50s as part of the realist movement; the sweeping adoption of Helvetica by the corporate world in the 60s; the revolt against it in the 70s and 80s, culminating in the grunge design movement of the early 90s; and the somewhat grudging realization among today's designers that Helvetica really was a damned fine typeface after all.
Visually, the movie's a bit of a snooze -- one talking head after another -- but Hustwit has chosen his talking heads very well; they're lively, quirky people with strong opinions and interesting ways of expressing them. Aside from a few film festivals, Helvetica never really had a theatrical release, but it's available now on DVD (and if you're a Netflix subscriber, it's available for online viewing). It's well worth renting.
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