Outline:
• Skyfall as a case study
• Promotion
• Reception and success
• Bond legacy
• Consideration of genre, narrative, representations
• Key sequence 1: Casino
• Key sequence 2: Tube
Skyfall as a “rich text”
•
Contemporary film production, distribution and
exhibition
•
The problems of defining a British film
•
Star study – Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Javier
Bardem
•
Audience reception and fandom
•
Representations of Britishness and British
national identity
•
Representations of gender, class, ethnicity
•
Genre classification and its problems -is Bond
a genre in its own right?
Skyfall (Mendes, 2012)
• Released in the UK on October 26, 2012
• Highest grossing film at the UK box office
(over £94m)
• The first Bond film to have an IMAX release
• Eon Productions, MGM Studios, and Sony
Pictures Entertainment
Skyfall as a British film (?)
“It can be argued that they are not really British at all, given that they are
backed by American dollars. By this token, however, films such as Tom Jones,
A Hard Day’s Night and Chariots of Fire would not qualify as British either. Ever
since the 1930s, American studios have provided financial backing for British
productions”
“The Britishness of Bond films has been one of their main selling points, a
factor which differentiates them from all other action movies which have
followed in their wake”
What is British about Bond?
• Production base
• Most of the technical personnel
• Generic roots
• Ideology of national identity
James Chapman, 2009, p.13
Promotion
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainm
ent-arts-15579556
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yb_
WDsg9oxg
BBC News: Teaser trailer release
Trailers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ4dAY3DW4c
Teaser trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgr2syY_OU4
International trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFNv5nDYMsU
USA – TV spot aired on NBC during Olympic Opening Ceremony
Cross-promotion
Synergy
Global Heineken Campaign
•
•
•
Launched 20 September 2012
TV commercial and ‘Interactive experience – Crack the Case
Created by advertising agency Wieden + Kennedy, Amsterdam
Alexis Nasard, Chief Commercial Officer of HEINEKEN said: "The creativity and progressiveness of
the Heineken brand combined with the legendary James Bond franchise will provide viewers with high
entertainment values. Not only a hero, Bond is the ultimate 'Man of the World' – confident, resourceful
and ready for new experiences, personifying the values of the Heineken brand."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txTdiofEJwQ
Fans’ reaction
•
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txTdiofEJwQ
BBC News: Is Beer Damaging ‘Brand Bond’?
Success
Box Office Mojo (Online)
Success
•
The most successful series of films in box office history.
•
Consistently successful over a long period of time.
•
Skyfall – The most successful film at the UK box office
“Despite their political correctness – or perhaps even because of it – the Bond
films have been enormously popular with cinema-goers around the world,
suggesting that either audiences do not pay as much heed to the ideological
content of the films as do academics, or that the films provide a particular sort of
pleasure which mediates their sexist and racist overtones.”
“It has been estimated that between a quarter and a half of the world’s population
has seen a Bond film, either in the cinema or on television, video or DVD.”
Chapman, J. (2009), p.12
Analysis
• Representations: gender, age, ethnicity,
national identity, social class.
• Narrative: story and plot, binary
oppositions, characterisation.
• Genre: ‘Bond film’, thriller, action,
blockbuster.
Representations: Eve Moneypenny
Representations: Masculinity
Representations: Masculinity
Representations: The monstrous ‘other’
Britishness
“The connection between James Bond and British identity is visually achieved through the alignment
of the title character with notable British popular cultural iconography, including images of Big Ben, the
Thames, and Whitehall.”
Funnell, Lisa (2011) ‘‘I Know Where You Keep Your Gun’’: Daniel Craig as the Bond–Bond Girl Hybrid
in Casino Royale. The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 44, No. 3, p.458
Britishness
•
•
Nostalgia
Austerity Britain: ‘Keep calm and carry on’ mentality.
Britishness
• Visit Britain advert
Representations of London
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dl218z68iC4#t=82
Skyfall London Videoblog
Genre
•
•
Self-reflexive anniversary film
Nostalgia
Generic contexts:
1.
The British imperialist spy thriller
1.
Cliff-hanger adventure serial (“thrills, spills, master criminals and imperiled
heroines”)
1.
Hollywood action film:
-emphasis on action over plotting and characterisation
-reduction of narrative complexity to series of set-pieces
-foregrounding of technology and firepower
-dispatching of the villain with a witty one-liner
4. The ‘Bondian’
-a series or subgenre in its own right
-development of a ‘production ideology’ –a set of expectations about what a Bond
movie should be like
James Chapman, 2009.