FILM: Bad Day at Black RockYEAR: 1955DIRECTOR: John SturgesPINBALL MODEL(S): 'Follies of 1940' (1939, Genco)GAME LOCATION: SaloonNOTES: Once again we have a Robert Ryan/Pinball connection in a film! This Sturges classic is essential viewing for any fan of investigative cinema, but the presence of this pin-table makes it essential viewing for the pinball junkie as well.
In this film, Black Rock is a town torn between two eras: one marked by the self-policing, pre-war, pre-modern anonymity afforded by living in the American west, and a new era in which the encroachment of modernity is unavoidable. Here, the personal and cultural scars of United States involvement in WWII are hiding in plain sight (vertical surfaces are adorned by remembrances of wartime), and even the pin-table model name serves to call-to-attention the world events that derailed America's isolationist mentality.
FILM: AugustYEAR: 2008DIRECTOR: Austin ChickPINBALL MODEL(S): High Roller Casino (2001, Stern)GAME LOCATION: Bar/TavernNOTES: Going beyond the familiar visual presence of a "pinball table at the pub," production designers occasionally take care in aligning the theme of the pin model to the central theme of the film itself. This movie—which deals with the the uncertain and fleeting nature of success within the internet startup industry—finds an ideal thematic parallel in this casino-themed pin. If pinball and gambling are matters governed more by chance than by control, then the appearance of this particular pin can be read as a passive, non-verbal manifestation of the film's attitudes toward the nature of the startup industry.
FILM: Winter's BoneYEAR: 2010DIRECTOR: Debra GranikPINBALL MODEL(S): unknownGAME LOCATION: Bar/TavernNOTES: Winter's Bone offers a (fictionalized) glimpse into an otherwise impermeable subculture; one marked by its fierce defense of the liberties of isolation. If home and family provide the framework for this ideal, then this tavern setting is a more neutrally coded (certainly non-domestic) space. As part of the mise-en-scene, the pinball machine we see here acts as visual cue in establishing the setting, but it is also a culturally-charged object; never fully disengaged from its historical role as an object of both vice and criminality.
FILM: A Woman Under the InfluenceYEAR: 1974DIRECTOR: John CassavetesPINBALL MODEL(S): It is difficult to know for sure, but it is likely a Williams 'Lucky Strike' or 'Bowl a Strike' model.GAME LOCATION: Bar/TavernNOTES: Cassavetes' films rarely stray far from the "familiar," but part of his great genius as a filmmaker is his ability to nudge the familiar into the social margins. In this story of a woman succumbing to the traumas of a mental breakdown, the local pub becomes an environment of vulnerability. The pinball machine itself has nothing to do with the story, but does achieve a spatially locative effect (along with the cigarette machine). The pin also serves to increase the density of the filmic space by saturating the frame with more of the red/blue accents of the scene's color palate.
FILM: Carnival of Souls
YEAR: 1962
DIRECTOR: Herk Harvey
PINBALL MODEL(S): The backglass cannot be seen, but the cabinet art suggests that this is a 1958 'Double Action' model from Gottlieb.
GAME LOCATION: Diner/Bar
NOTES: Though this scene is not necessarily metaphorically loaded in terms of its inclusion of a pin within the frame, it was an interesting choice of the director to use the cross-angle of both the table and the pin to create a symmetric division between the two sides of the shot. This implied division between the man and woman subtly reinforces their inability to connect.
It should also be noted that the man playing the pinball machine eventually makes an attempt to meet and proposition the film's heroine (on the right), but is dissuaded from doing so and returns to playing the game alone. In a room full of social interaction, the use of the pin is seen as anti-social, as opposed to the more common strategy of filmmakers (Godard, for example) to employ pinball as a conduit for social interaction.
FILM: Diva
YEAR: 1981
DIRECTOR: Jean-Jacques Beineix
PINBALL MODEL(S): Space Mission (Williams, 1976), Buck Rogers (Gottlieb, 1980), Genie (Gottlieb, 1979), Panthera (1980, Gottlieb), The Amazing Spider-Man (1980, Gottlieb), Counterforce (1980, Gottlieb)
GAME LOCATION: Bowling Alley
NOTES: Once again we find the youth/pinball connection in a film, but this time the recreation space is configured as a place of vulnerability and disconnection. The arcade in this underground bowling alley is saturated with audio-visual energy, imparting an almost psychedelic atmosphere to the scene; effectively mirroring the fading consciousness of the film's bullet-wounded hero (whose physical condition is mistaken for drunkenness by the arcade's patrons). When we consider pinball as a game of collisions between opposing forces, settings such as this provide an ideal metaphorical environment for violent human conflicts to unfold.
FILM: Salem's Lot
YEAR: 1979
DIRECTOR: Tobe Hooper
PINBALL MODEL(S): Jacks Open (1977, Gottlieb) & Big Brave (1974, Gottlieb)
GAME LOCATION: Diner
NOTES: The three consecutive shots that feature pinball in this (still ridiculously terrifying) Stephen King adaptation are not merely incidental, but actually serve a pair of useful functions. The first shot (not pictured) is of a hand releasing the plunger on the Big Brave pin, cutting to the table action on the Jacks Open playfield, and lastly to a follow shot that surveys the space of the diner. When paired with the preceding shot of the hero staring at the haunted mansion on the hill from the diner window, we realize that the plunger shot launches us (pun intended) into a new act of the story; presumably following a commercial break.
The playfield shot—as with many such shots in cinema—is coded to promote a sense of seemingly chaotic action, with a player doing their best to manipulate this action in their favor. So too does the film's hero effort to resist the negative forces at work within the narrative.
Lastly, the presence of pinball within the diner serves to imbue a sense of the cultural normalcy of this space. The central conflict of the film involves an invading (foreign) evil—one that seeks to destroy an otherwise idyllic New England town; thus alluding to a broader cultural vulnerability and the disruption of small-town America's tendency toward isolationism.
FILM: 25 Watts
YEAR: 2001
DIRECTORS: Juan Pablo Rebella & Pablo Stoll
PINBALL MODEL(S): Dr. Dude (1990, Midway Mfg.)
GAME LOCATION: Youth recreation center
NOTES: While yesterday's post dealt with the presence of pinball machines in celluloid taverns, today's post concerns the relationship between pinball and youth. Post-war French youth culture and the champions of the nouvelle vague are due a great deal of credit for concretizing the pinball/youth relationship as an immediately readable filmic prop (though, US and Italian filmmakers were known to deploy this pairing as well).
Modern cinema finds this pairing to be no less useful when rendering a space as being devoid of adult authority (such as this youth-center scene in 25 Watts).
FILM: The Hunter
YEAR: 1980
DIRECTOR: Buzz Kulik
PINBALL MODEL(S): 1st pic: Strange World (Gottlieb, 1978), 2nd pic:Toledo (Williams, 1975) & Royal Flush (Gottlieb, 1976)
GAME LOCATION: Tavern/bar
NOTES: It's no secret that pinball machines are often the denizens of marginally reputable locales; especially when the game is represented in cinema. The inclusion of a pin in a film can immediately attune our sense of the scene with the tonal intentions of the filmmaker. In other words, including pinball as an element of mise-en-scene is an efficient visual strategy by which certain locations are characterized as shady, or downright dangerous.
Despite the fact that this scene is set in a tavern—thus aligning pinball with gambling and somewhat offsetting the levity of the sequence—the ability of Tommy (always a significant pinball name!) to confidently troubleshoot the machine's enigmatic inner-workings characterizes him as likable and intelligent. This characterization serves to further resist the notion of pinball as a solely illegitimate activity.
FILM: Dying Room Only
YEAR: 1973
DIRECTOR: Philip Leacock
PINBALL MODEL(S): Queen of Diamonds (1959, Gottlieb)
GAME LOCATION: Roadside diner
NOTES: The setting for this (sadly) overlooked, made-for-TV feature is a roadside diner located on a desolate stretch of American highway. Most of the film's action takes place in a single room, in which this pin-table is the least visually banal aspect of the space's mise-en-scene. The pin can be seen in dozens of shots throughout the film.
In what begins as a fairly run-of-the-mill "vulnerable strangers in an unfamiliar location" setup, the story becomes quite terrifying when the locals begin to overtly hinder the attempts of the outsiders to leave. The spatial promise represented by the American road is inverted by the film and reduced to a claustrophobic and inescapable stage of terror. The closed-boundary space of the pinball playfield serves as a pertinent metaphor for the plight of the woman and her husband, and as the film progresses, we get the sense that they are being "played," much in the way that a player manipulates the action of a pinball table.
FILM: Hotel du Nord
YEAR: 1938
DIRECTOR: Marcel Carne
PINBALL MODEL(S): unknown (possibly a 1938 Genco "Junior" model)
GAME LOCATION: Hotel parlor/common-area
NOTES: The pin we see in the common area of the hotel is a flipperless pre-war machine. We can see bumpers on the playfield, indicating that this pin was likely manufactured in the late 1930s, when auto-scoring bumper features were becoming commonplace.
While pinball machines would have been a regular facet of French eating/drinking establishments of the era, the specific presence of the pin in this film serves to resonate the themes of hazard and chance that govern the events of the story.
FILM: Dangerous Dan McFoo
YEAR: 1939
DIRECTOR: Tex Avery
PINBALL MODEL(S): N/A
GAME LOCATION: Tavern/Lodge
NOTES: Cartoons have been having fun with the possibilities of the pin-table since the early days of the art-form. As with most animation, comedy is achieved by exaggerating and distorting the realism of the objects depicted. The "marble game" that Dan is playing is a bizarre incarnation of a modern pin and a European table-top target game. Of course, the physics of this animated universe precludes the game from responding in a predictable way, and hilarity ensues.
FILM: Walkabout
YEAR: 1971
DIRECTOR: Nicolas Roeg
PINBALL MODEL(S): Sluggin' Champ (1955, Gottlieb)
GAME LOCATION: Private home
NOTES: In a film largely concerned with the practical and ideological frictions that arise from the cultivation of modernity in Australia, this scene exists as an effective visual evocation of that theme.
Here, progress is shaded as being regressive, and modernity (and its participants) are marginalized in its wake. Roeg privileges this pin by allowing it to occupy half of the frame; a monolith alluding to the European detachment from the natural space.
FILM: Expresso Bongo
YEAR: 1959
DIRECTOR: Val Guest
PINBALL MODEL(S): the pin bearing the choreography credit is 'Hi-Diver' (1959, Gottlieb). The pin on the right (center photo) is marked with the words, 'Moon Rocket,' though I can find no record of any such machine being manufactured. It is likely that the pins on the right and left of the female player are adorned by "fake" artwork.
GAME LOCATION: Amusement arcade
NOTES: Rather than simply let pinball machines sit in the background as passive artifacts of the mise en scene, they are used in this film as textual space for sections of the title sequence.
Clever, if not particularly meaningful, this visual strategy does call to attention the nature of both cinema and pinball as commodities whose forms share a design component (literally, in this case). Also, by originating the action of the film within the youthful environment of an arcade (located in London's Soho district), a context is immediately established for the narrative that is about to unfold.
FILM: Caught
YEAR: 1949
DIRECTOR: Max Ophuls
PINBALL MODEL(S): Carnival (1948, Bally)
GAME LOCATION: Mansion
NOTES: A narcissistic, power-abusing millionaire (played by Robert Ryan and based upon real-life tycoon Howard Hughes) is shown to own this pin as part of his ostentatious home. Thus, this is one of the rare pinball scenes not set within a cafe or bar, and the machine is instead framed by the film as an asset of the wealthy.
Ryan's character—a hypochondriac and emotionally-manipulative tyrant—topples the machine while having a heart-attack (either imagined or fake) and clings to it as he begs his persecuted wife for help. The crash of the upended pin (which occurs off-camera) is what alerts her of the event.
It is difficult to see in my low-resolution screen-capture, but the glass for the pin-table is broken. Because we don't actually see the table fall, it is likely that the broken glass is a carefully arranged artifact of the set design, rather than the result of actually destroying the table.
FILM: Deep Red
YEAR: 1975
DIRECTOR: Dario Argento
PINBALL MODEL(S): Jungle Life (Gottlieb, 1973)
GAME LOCATION: Cafe
NOTES: This pin is located in a cafe in which Daly (David Hemmings) is attempting to regroup his investigative efforts. The atmosphere in the cafe is noisy, and Daly verbally expresses his frustrations about the din after twice being burned by the espresso machine behind the phone and (via a brief reverse shot) toward the blue-collar pinball players.
FILM: Marathon Man
YEAR: 1976
DIRECTOR: John Schlesinger
PINBALL MODEL(S): Polo (Gottleib, 1970)
GAME LOCATION: Cafe/Bar
NOTES: In this scene, we see one of Dr. Szell's assassins playing a pin while spying on a meeting between Doc and Agent Janeway.
Through a series of successive cuts, we are shown that the pin-table provides a direct line-of-sight across the busy Manhattan street to the French cafe in which the meeting occurs.
FILM: They Drive by Night
YEAR: 1940
DIRECTOR: Raoul Walsh
PINBALL MODEL(S): The center photo is a modified 'Ricochet' machine (1937, Stoner Mfg.), with point values painted directly on the playfield. I am not able to determine the models of the pins being played in the other shots.
GAME LOCATION: Roadside diner
NOTES: These screencaps come from two different scenes in film—both set in a restaurant—but each scene features the same player. We know that the pin-table in each scene is different because the support legs for the two machines are different (as opposed to the same machine being painted with different cabinet art on both sides in the interest of set-design efficiency).
Pinball is used comedically in this story (a perpetually behind-schedule truck driver keeps winning play-credits and becomes further delayed), but the film alludes to the gambling dimension of the game as well.
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