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.
