Daniel Kleinman's main titles for 'Skyfall'. My review [SPOILER]:

Daniel Kleinman is at his best with 'Skyfall'

In all honesty, main titles for a James Bond-film are not just a bunch of beautifully designed visuals. On the contrary. They are a movie on itself. They should give you thrills and shivers and prepare you for what still has to come. The last time I had that feeling in cinema was during the premiere of 'GoldenEye' in 1995. 'Licence To Kill' (1989) was my first Bond flick in cinema, but I thought Maurice Binder was not at his best with his last project. Moreover, I still find Gladys Knight's title theme rather dreadful, taking away suspense. By: Gert Waterink (alias: Gustav_Graves)


No, it was a breath of fresh air when Daniel Kleinman came onboard, following the -very difficult to follow- footsteps of his predecessors Robert Brownjohn and Maurice Binder. But he did so flawlessly. His designs for 'GoldenEye' merge perfectly with Tina Turner's hypnotizing Bond theme. The entire results feels like a 'total package'. Moreover, Daniel managed to blend in Binder's classic approach -the use of real girls- with his own strongholds, his use of CGI animations. CGI isn't always bad. They lend themself perfectly for main title designs, IF you do it sparingly and sophistically off course.


Like David Arnold, he never fully managed to get the thrilling well-known Bond feeling back in his following designs for 'Tomorrow Never Dies', 'The World Is Not Enough' and 'Die Another Day'. They either suffered from too busy visuals, accompanied with eerie, sometimes too fast moving elements. Also, Daniel Kleinman wasn't that lucky with the songs he got on his plate. And let's face it, it's not only Kleinman's design, but the entire presentation, music included, that needs to work.

For 'Casino Royale' Daniel Kleinman started working together with British visual effects company Framestore CFC -which he also used for 'Skyfall'-. The titles for 'Casino Royale' are very much stand-alone titles, as they don't look back on previous Bond films. And that seems logical, as 'Casino Royale' was to become a reboot. Just like Binder's simple dots in his first Bond film 'Dr. No', Kleinman uses simple graphic motifs as well. Playing card motifs in Kleinman's case. It was one of the old 1950's frontcover prints of Fleming's novel that gave Kleinman his inspiration. The entire result looks breathtakingly creative and unique.



In my opinion, the entire 'main titles ride' suffered a bit from Chris Cornell's theme song. It is certainly not the best of the David Arnold-era theme songs (Garbage's 'The World Is Not Enough' and especially KD Lang's 'Surrender' still work better if you ask me) and one can ask why for the groundbreaking 'Casino Royale' an equally groundbreaking instrumental track wasn't used. Obviously, marketing and commercialism starts influencing the creative process here, but still 'You Know My Name' wasn't as well-thought as Kleinman's fantastic design. Thus, making the overall feeling a bit lacklustre for me.

For 'Quantum Of Solace' MK12 came onboard, but as their design gave me an instant headache I want to move forward to 'Skyfall's main title design. 'Skyfall' is the 50th anniversary Bond film. In its own way this Bond film is as big as the 1960's productions 'Thunderball' and 'Goldfinger'. Does Kleinman succeed in giving us majestic main titles, that brings you one hell of a 4min thrilling, escapist, visual ride? Yes. Definately.


For this anniversary Bond, Binder obviously made a well-thought decision. Off course Kleinman did not just literally copy previous Binder-designs, but he did know certain elements need to come back for the sake of recognition. He does so in such a skillful way, that the overall result is an effective coherentness. Colour-wise, he sticks to blood-red, many green's and blacks and whites. Combined with slow-moving CGI-visuals and the use of very Binder-ish standstills of James Bond's body, his eyes and, indeed, a couple of females, and their eyes (This is a big SPOILER, as it shows you the entire main titles from 'Skyfall'. Watch the Moonraker-ish female at 02min04sec here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lq8ZeNdT_Mo), this feels much more like the little drama movie I want to be sucked into.


It's not only that. Daniel Kleinman perfectly rolls from the apparent death of agent 007 into his titles. Something that Maurice Binder has done before in 'You Only Live Twice' and re-used even better in his design for 'Live And Let Die'. Obviously, the theme of funerals and death was not new for Bond-creator Ian Fleming.....and Maurice Binder, but Kleinman masterfully gives his own take on the death themeology in his design. And it perfectly blends with the overall theme of the movie: Are secret agents still useful in today's world? Why do these government workers, both soldiers and secret agents, have to die so senselessly?

But I am not finished yet. Adele makes the entire main titles thrill ride complete. Her rather sad title theme (Apparently, it gave Daniel Craig tears when he heard it for the first time) blends wunderfully with the equally sad, dramatic and gripping Kleinman-titles. The whole picture feels much more like Binder's early work on 'Thunderball', 'You Only Live Twice' and 'Live And Let Die', in the sense that Kleinman doesn't overuse certain visuals. Together, Adele biggest hit since 'A View To A Kill' and Daniel Kleinman's title design manage to give me real goosebumps on this one. And that's exactly what we Bond fans really need for her majesty's secret agent's 50th birthday.