Thoughts and comments about title sequences
Number24
NorwayPosts: 22,340MI6 Agent
Title sequences are avpart of Bond Movies and they are well worth talking about. I imagine this thread being about the title sequences that have been, the sequences of the future and the once that could have been. I'll start by talking about what could have been.
I've recently watched Dalton's two Bonds. I really enjoy them, but Binder was past his most inventive period by then. The only image I really like in TLD's title sequence is the woman in the champagne glass. Wouldn't a naked woman with a cello in front of her be a good image? I think Fleming was inspired by a female cellist he knew who sometimes played in the nude when he wrote the character?
It would be a striking visual:
LTK also has an unimpressive title sequence. It occured to me how circles are often seen in the movie: roulette tables, truck tyres, the cocaine shredding machine, rifle scopes, helicopter rotors, the 007 logo ….
wouldn't it be great to use circles as a motif for the sequence?
I've recently watched Dalton's two Bonds. I really enjoy them, but Binder was past his most inventive period by then. The only image I really like in TLD's title sequence is the woman in the champagne glass. Wouldn't a naked woman with a cello in front of her be a good image? I think Fleming was inspired by a female cellist he knew who sometimes played in the nude when he wrote the character?
It would be a striking visual:
LTK also has an unimpressive title sequence. It occured to me how circles are often seen in the movie: roulette tables, truck tyres, the cocaine shredding machine, rifle scopes, helicopter rotors, the 007 logo ….
wouldn't it be great to use circles as a motif for the sequence?
Comments
Seen here with her Stradivarius. No, I don't know it's name.
In regards to the most recent movies, I loved Casino Royale and Skyfall’s title sequences but was really disappointed by Spectre’s - it didn’t seem to work for me
Like the Barry music or the Adam sets, the opening credit sequence, usually designed by Maurice Binder, is a definitive identifying element of the films, instantly recognisable as a BondThing and much parodied and paid earnest tribute to in many other unrelated films over the years.
We ought to have a few handy youtube links, so we all know what we're talking about.
Here's someone who has uploaded most of them, in groups of three:
Part 1: Dr. No (0:00), From Russia with Love (2:45), Goldfinger (5:05)
Part 2: Thunderball (0:00), You Only Live Twice (3:00), On Her Majesty's Secret Service (5:32)
Part 3: Diamonds Are Forever (0:00), Live and Let Die (2:47), The Man with the Golden Gun (5:25)
Part 4: The Spy Who Loved Me (0:00), Moonraker (2:42), For Your Eyes Only (5:30)
Part 5: Octopussy (0:00), A View to a Kill (2:55), The Living Daylights (6:05)
Part 6: Licence to Kill (0:00), GoldenEye (2:48), Tomorrow Never Dies (5:23)
Part 7: The World Is Not Enough (0:00), Die Another Day (2:51), Casino Royale (6:05)
sorry we'll have to find the last three elsewhere
We can each impose our own value judgements, but that is what they are and I wouldn't want them any other way. They are like a hyper-stylised animated version of pulpy paperback covers from the fifties, in the way they exploit the female form to suggest the type of thrills to be found within.
Note how in many if them, the credits themselves are strategically imposed directly on the naughty bits. Binder knows exactly where the viewers eye is going to focus next, maybe we'll see a nipple, oh no we don't but at least there's the name of the director!
Dr. No didn't have sexy credits, it had jazzy animated circles, echoing the gunbarrel shape and the double oh, and invoking neon displays. More similar to the animated title sequences of Hitchcock films such as Vertigo.
First sexy credit was From Russia with Love, and according to wikipedia, Binder did not do that one, nor Goldfinger. He did Dr. No, then returned with Thunderball, once the sexy credits format was established.
So, although it's Binder's name we associate with this whole opening credit style, it was someone else who first came up with the concept. Wikipedia doesn't tell me who did do the credits for From Russia with Love. Does anybody know who we should be thanking?
Of cource Maurice Binder made some of the most iconice title sequences in the series, do any of the other members agree he should have been replaced earlier?
The first one of Binder's that to me started to look a little tired was TMWTGG, but then his work on TSWLM was quite inventive again, and celebrated at the time, featuring Bond himself. Binder's reported infatuation with Sheena Easton lifts the FYEO credits, but after that he doesn't really seem convincingly to come to terms with the 80s (which was a strange time for pop culture generally). The TLD credits sequence was interestingly weird, but the LTK one is relatively lacklustre. When Danny Kleinman came in, for GE onwards, he was highly respectful of Binder - paying homage but bringing to bear new sets of skills for the digital age and a fresher engagement with each new movie's themes. He was missed on QOS.
I found Brownjohn has own website, with detailed pages explaining how he did the credits for From Russia With Love and Goldfinger
Both ...Russia... and Goldfinger feature two dimensional text and images superimposed on a woman's three dimensional body (and Margaret Nolan from Goldfinger is plenty three dimensional!)
Starting with Thunderball, Binder's aesthetic is different: he really likes silhouettes, the women's figures are repeatedly reduced to flat black negative space cut into an everchanging colourful background. (He also likes a skinnier bodytype than Brownjohn did: that's one thing I would change)
I noticed even in Dr No, starting from the point where the Bond theme crossfades into the percussion, Binder is using silhouettes, though here they are not so eroticised as in his more classic sequences.
For Your Eyes Only is the sequence where I really notice the credits strategically placed on the bits I'm straining my eyes to see better: note where Broccoli's name appears! hey, Cubby, down in front, I'm trying to watch a movie here!
But my favourite title sequence will always be Dr. No’s. I love his use of geometric shapes and colour. For that reason I also love his non-Bond titles for Charade and Billion Dollar Brain (probably my favourite title sequence of his).
Saul Bass’ North By Northwest titles might by my all-time favourite, and they are very geometric.
As to the original post, a naked cellist for the TLD titles would have been brilliant. Using the cello as a motif (it’s shape, women swinging around the bow, vibrating strings) could have made a brilliant and relevant title sequence.
But I think John Barry and a-Ha missed out by not incorporating a cello prominently into the theme. Barry just couldn’t get away from the flute he loved so much. Not even Kara’s theme was played on a cello. Maybe too on the nose? So back to the titles, you can’t use a visual cello motif over music that isn’t cello-centric. It would be confusing.