Escape From New York movie titles
The ‘J’ in JOHN is a titling form, which is now an alternate but originally the only form in the first release of Albertus (1936). Two years later, the lowercase was added as well as ‘J’ and ‘Q’ with descender, which have become the default.
In John Carpenter’s films, the typeface choice in the opening sequence is quite consistent. Albertus seems to be his favourite, appearing more than any other typefaces in his filmography. Escape From New York seems to be the first and most playful of all.
Carpenter, or whoever was going to be his long-time credit typesetter colleague, knew there were some alternate capital letters, and made spontaneous use of them in Escape From New York.
According to the credits, the titles are done by the company called Pacific Title.
Notice the alternate M in the first line, while all other M’s are the standard one.
Second appearance of his name uses the descending J.
During the film, this reverse stress lettering is prominent. It is unidentified at the time of writing.
The film ends with Helvetica.
