The Beach is a 2000 drama film by Danny Boyle based on The Beach, a 1996 novel by Alex Garland. Richard (Leonardo DiCaprio), a young American backpacking in Thailand, came to Southeast Asia with the intention of experiencing something radically different from his familiar life. He meets Daffy a crazy man (Robert Carlyle) who is…
Company man is a 2000 movie directed by Peter Askin and Douglas McGrath. Washington, 1962: the CIA agent Alan Quimp assisted by is immediate superior, the Officer Hickle are heard by two American Senators: Biggs and Farwoods. Quimp has to explain his implication in the crisis of Bay of Pigs. Two maps appear in the…
National Treasure (released in 2004) and National Treasure: Book of Secrets (released in 2007) are two movies directed by Jon Turteltaub. Both films have the same narrative structure : Benjamin Gates (starring Nicolas Cage) goes to treasure hunt. By solving different clues he finds a treasure map. He succeeds in deciphering it to finally discover…
A lovely article by Gérard Lefort in Libération takes us on a tour of Jacques Demy’s Nantes, on the occasion of a tribute exhibition in the filmmaker’s childhood city. See also this post about the maps in Lola. Un joli papier de Gérard Lefort dans Libération qui nous fait visiter le Nantes de Jacques Demy,…
« The Social Network » . Excerpt of the trailer – Extrait de la bande-annonce How to visualize a virtual network in a movie? It is the question the director David Fincher had to answer with his new film The Social Network, that tells the story of the young and famous Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg. There is…
The Hitch-Hiker is a film noir directed in 1953 by Ida Lupino. Two men in a car give a man a lift but the hitch-hiker turns out to be a psychopath who kidnaps them. The police tracks the criminal. Several maps are used in this movie. Le voyage de la peur est un film noir…
Garri Bardine is a Russian animation director. In 1990 he created Grey Wolf and Little Red Riding Hood (Russian: » Серый волк энд Красная Шапочка, Krasnaya Chapotchka seriy Volk i »), a claymation film. The movie was adapted from the famous children’s story Little Red Riding Hood as a musical. Living in Moscow, the mother of…
The Movie Map is a website created in 2008 as a depository of films locations and other informations related to those locations. It uses Google’s Map API and users and movie fans can contribute. Another website lists films locations: the Movie Locations Guide. It presents maps of 3 towns at this time: New York, Los…
The Parallax View is a 1974 thriller film directed by Alan J. Pakula. Newspaper reporter Joe Frady (Warren Beatty) is investigating a secret organization, the Parallax Corporation, whose objective is political assassination. A cause d’un assassinat est un thriller dirigé par Alan J. Pakula en 1974. Le reporter de presse Joe Frady (Warren Beatty) enquête…
16th June 2010 : the British PM David Cameron apologized to the families of victims for the killings that occurred on 30th January 1972 in Londonderry, Northern Ireland. The film Bloody Sunday directed in 2002 by Paul Greengrass narrates the events that occurred this day. Several scenes depict British officers annotating the progression of the…
In 2005, almost 30 years after Dawn of the dead (see this post) second part of his « Dead series », George Romero directed a fourth movie Land of the dead. No paper maps here … Time has passed and computers and GPS are now available. En 2005, presque 30 ans après avoir réalisé Zombie (voir ce…
The Annuity (1972) is a French comedy directed by Pierre Tchernia and based on a screenplay by Pierre Tchernia and René Goscinny. In this movie, two quick shots (a few seconds each) show two different maps: a school map of France drawn by hand and a topographic map. Le viager est une comédie française réalisée…
M (dir. Fritz Lang 1931) tells the story of a serial killer who preys on children in 1930s Berlin, and who is on the run from police and an organized crime syndicate. The film begins with the murder of Elsie, the eighth child to be murdered. At the crime scene police find a paper bag…
In 2006, Pan’s Labyrinth (dir. Guillermo del Toro) is released. The action takes place in Spain, in 1944, during the franquist period. The fascist army chases rebels hidden in the Spanish Maquis. The Captain Vidal (Sergi López), uses a map to organize the hunt. He reads it with a magnifying glass and puts landmarks on…
Fanfan la Tulipe is a French movie directed by Christian-Jaque, released in 1952. Set during a battle between the French King Louis XV and an unidentified enemy, several scenes take place in the headquarters of both armies. The generals on both sides use maps of the battlefield for discussing tactics and strategies. Fanfan la Tulipe…
In 1985, George Romero directed Day of the dead, the 3rd episode of his « Dead series ». In this episode, the spatial machinery is not as sophisticated as it was in Dawn of the dead. The function of the four maps dispayed in the movie is mainly decorative. En 1985, Georges Romero réalisait Le Jour des…
Between Toy Story 2 and 3, eleven years have passed and mapping techniques have tremendously changed. The inevitable G* Maps has replaced the paper map. Incidentally, is it possible to localize Tri County, the place of the movie, in the United-States ? Entre Toy Story 2 et 3, onze ans ont passé et les techniques…
In the name of the father (1993) is an Irish-British film directed by Jim Sheridan and adapted from the autobiographical book Proved Innocent by Gerry Conlon. In 1975, Gerry Conlon, a small time thief from Belfast, is arrested by the Police of London. He is accused of being the author of the IRA bombing in…
WithTournée (2010), M. Amalric received the Award for Best Director at Cannes Festival. This road movie tells the story of a team of New Burlesque US strip-tease performers on a tour across western France. The comedians hope to visit the country before to go to Paris, but they are puzzled by the erratic and irritable…
In 1974, French Director Jean Yanne revisits the period of the occupation in France with a comedy where the Chinese army invades Europe. From Beijing, the ‘Central Revolutionary Committee is setting up its strategy. In committee’s premises, two types of maps are presented. En 1974, Jean Yanne revisite la période de l’occupation dans cette comédie…
Avatar – James Cameron’s film released in 2009 – takes place on the planet Pandora. The human coveted ore located beneath the natives’ village ground. At a briefing, soldiers try to localize their position with an interactive 3D holographic maps. Its handling is rather technical and tricky. The head of the crew fails to navigate…
Mercury Rising is a movie released in 1998 and directed by Harold Becker. In this film, the character played by Bruce Willis protects an autistic child who threatens the national security of the United States by deciphering « Mercury », the most advanced and expensive encryption algorithm developed ever. In an early scene, we see the young…
In his movie Detour, Edgar G. Ulmer uses some very original « spatial machineries », especially to represent the distance between Al Roberts (Tom Neal) and his fiancée Sue Harvey (Claudia Drake). Dans Detour, Edgar G. Ulmer utilise quelques dispositifs spatiaux très originaux pour matérialiser notamment la distance qui sépare Al Roberts (Tom Neal) de sa fiancée…
In 1982, the members of an U.S. Antarctica research program are confronted with bizarre phenomena. A Norwegian team not far from them has been decimated. While watching videos collected in the Norwegian camp, the heroes are intrigued by their discovery and decide to get there. They consult a map for preparing their journey. En 1982,…
The stylistic innovations that made the success of the TV series 24 are now influencing movies. A very clear example is Greenzone, the movie of Paul Greengrass. It is saturated with maps, navigation softwares, satellite images and many other representations of the space of action. Of course Green Zone is based on a true story…
In the movie High and Low – original title “Tengoku to jigoku”- (dir. Akira Kurosawa 1963), the police searches the kidnappers of the son of Gondo, the executive director of a shoe company in Japan (the child of Gondo’s chauffeur was in fact kidnapped by mistake). What’s interesting in this movie in terms of spatial…
In his movie Die Hard, John MacTierman has to face a difficult problem: how to allow John MacClane (Bruce Willis) to locate in a tower where all floors are designed on a similar plan. He has also to be sure that the spectator will not get lost when the hero passes from a level to…
In Sneakers, a 1992 film, Robert Redford is the leader of a security expert team. We can notice 2 spatial machineries that are complete opposites (and some other stuff, too). Quand Robert Redford est à la tête d’une bande de « spécialistes » en sécurité, cela donne « Les experts » (à ne pas confondre avec la série !),…
Navigation tools in a helicopter, map and plans… many spatial devices are used by the 4 heroes of George Romero’s Dawn of the dead (the second part of his « Dead series ») for escaping from zombies and getting to the mall which will become their sanctuary. It is interesting to notice that the relationship to space…
The film Dogville directed by Lars Von Trier (2003) takes literally place on a map. The action unfolds in a small town in the U.S. The houses are drawn on the ground, some elements are represented by symbols (e.g. some bushes), and the names of the streets are written on the ground. Only few pieces…
(e)space & fiction 