Helvetica: Is there meaning in the typeface?

Helvetica surprised me.  That is, the 2007 documentary about the ubiquitous typeface surprised me.  Gary Hustwit released his film on the 50th anniversary of the typeface's introduction, an anniversary most of us probably missed.  Entry into the world of those who didn't miss this anniversary is one of the surprises of Helvetica.  This is a world of designers and typesetters, of art and advertising.  These are men and women for whom the shapes and sizes of type reflect a much larger conversation about the place and purpose of design.  Are words on a page a means to communicate or are they the communication?  Should a typeface's meaning come from its design or from the words its letters form?  In Helvetica this debate between modernists and postmodernists takes place in public view in the form of corporate logos, advertisement, and your computer's library of fonts.

Designed in a Swiss foundry in 1957, Helvetica was eventually seen by many designers as the quintessential modern typeface.  Like all things modern, Hustwit shows how the typeface has been both revered and reviled.  Interviews with many well-known designers tell the history of this debate in a manner that intrigues even the least design conscious viewer.  Helvetica increased my awareness of the intricacies of typeface and, more significantly, gave me a way to talk about the design and meaning of letters and symbols.

Befitting its subject, Helvetica is as beautiful a documentary as I've seen.  Given how much of typesetting is related to advertising- Helvetica is the sans-serif choice of Apple, BMW, and AT&T among others- this beauty surprised me.  The passion of the designers and the meticulous attention paid to the smallest details of a typeface offer a new way of seeing and interpreting the ads that surround us.  Beautiful too is the film's soundtrack, including songs by rednoW-favorite Album Leaf.

Helvetica explores the way we create and interpret each others' creations.  While each of us creates and interprets, Helvetica invites us to do so with more intentionality.  Like the film itself, we may be surprised with what we find.