Okay, so I went back for another helping of SKYFALL this week (that makes four, since I’m counting). I figured it was my last chance to see the IMAX version before the auditorium was commandeered by THE HOBBIT. I arrived fifteen minutes after the start time, perfectly coinciding with the last bits of the needlessly lengthy trailer reel.
We all know by now why Sam Mendes yanked the intro gun barrel and placed it at the tail of the film, but as the new MGM logo pulled out from the eye of Leo the Lion, I wondered how well the gun barrel intro would’ve played BEFORE the two studio logos and still preserved the impact of the first amazing corridor shot. Food for thought…
Anyway, here’s why I’m posting: With gun barrels, irises and “007” on my mind, I couldn’t help but notice a sneakily brilliant visual flourish during the pre-credits sequence. Look carefully at the anachronistic speaker box at MI6, and you’ll notice it’s adorned with two giant chrome O’s. It’s placed next to a microphone on its stand that looks like an upside-down “7.” Maybe I was just seeing things, maybe I WANTED to see it, but I thought, How brilliant that Mendes, Deakins and the production designers managed to work in a subliminal “007” into the intro.
After the title sequence, still buzzing over the found “007” in the set design, I started to look for them in every scene.
Guess what? I found plenty of zeros and sevens—everywhere. During every scene. In just about every shot.
Consider the design of the wall molding in Mallory’s office: a triple square “zero” pattern, but filmed so that the third “0” is cropped thinner to make a squared-off “7.”
The way a shot of any computer screen reveals a double-iris pattern, with a hard-edge "7" adjacent.
The “0” design of the door handles in the Shanghai skyscraper sequence, with one cropped to make a subliminal “7.” Also, the way the light in this scene catches the edges of the glass panes. Zeros and sevens galore.
The square telescoping triple-iris pattern of florescent light tubes in the new MI6.
The shot of Bond's Walther case, showing the gun (the "7"), the tiny radio (a "0") held in his fingers, and the empty space in the case that holds the radio (the other "0").
The sequence of two flip-up glass escape hatches in MI6 when Silva escapes (two zeros), with the third popped-up door cropped to look like a seven.
Even during basic talking-head two-shots, I noticed a pattern of two irises (the heads) with a subtle “7” evident in the negative space next to them, carved by light and shadow or integrated into the set design.
Rare is the shot when I couldn’t make out a rough “007.” Typically the shots of Craig didn’t reveal a hidden “007,” but since he *IS* 007 the pattern of a “007” in nearly every shot pretty much holds. (Plus, his close-ups make out a distinct “7007,” though I’m really not having a go at his ears.)
Am I crazy, or have Mendes, Deakins and the production designers managed to work a subtle “007” into just about every gorgeous shot of the film? Do you really need another reason to go see SKYFALL again?
Thoughts?
Edited by Ste7en, 15 December 2012 - 11:01 PM.
