Jake’s Take: One Image from Diamonds Are Forever (Guy Hamilton, 1971)
The praises of production designer Ken Adam are sung at last.
“But surely, sir, there’s no need to involve our section on a relatively simple smuggling matter.”
I chose the image above for two very simple reasons. I love Ken Adam’s production design, and there is little else I’m interested in talking about in Diamonds Are Forever.
Innovative, versatile, and visionary, Ken Adam’s production design is one of the “sine qua non” elements of the franchise. Reflective of the Bond films themselves, Adam’s designs grow more elaborate and more epic over time, and his artistic signature has a formula all its own. Straightforward as it is, I’ve always loved his set from Dr. No in which we hear the titular villain speak to Professor Dent as Dent sits in a practically bare room with a circular opening in the ceiling, the opening filled by a web of metal beams. It is a deceptively simple yet anxiety-triggering design, particularly in the way light through the opening casts shadows of the web across the room. The round open ceiling becomes one of Adam’s design conventions that he returns to again and again in the series.
The image above, inside the penthouse of the Whyte House, literally turns that convention upside down and has the circular design on the floor, with the metal web encased in glass and a detailed model of Whyte’s corporate infrastructure below. Bond pacing over this visually appealing model makes for a much more interesting scene between Bond, Blofeld (Charles Gray) and Blofeld’s double, especially since there is narrative information contained within the model that will be useful later in the film.
I suppose I could say more, but I would encourage you to take a good look at his sketches sometime, which have a magnificence all their own, and then to pay attention to the look he gives his seven Bond films (to say nothing of his other work, especially for Stanley Kubrick).
As for the movie itself, the quote below the image pretty much represents my feelings on it. Coming off the high drama and action of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Diamonds Are Forever feels appallingly slight. Connery is back, sure, but he’s done taking the role seriously. I suppose I can appreciate that, to some degree; it’s clear he’s having fun with it all. Guy Hamilton is back as well, and what appeared to be slight silliness in Goldfinger balloons into camp in this film. I appreciate camp, and at the end of the day, I love all of these movies. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t more invested in the more serious films, and a serious film this is not.
Rankings
2. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
5. From Russia with Love
7. Thunderball
9. Goldfinger
10. Dr. No
17. You Only Live Twice
22. Diamonds Are Forever