I’d consider myself to be a movie fan, not so much the cinema but I’ll watch at least a few movies at home each week. I usually find it hard to just sit and watch anything by switching off and watching, I have to dissect and work out the how’s and why’s. Not the plot, but the technicalities of a movie as a creative work… The locations, effects, cinematography, how well a soundtrack is used, choice of location, camera angles etc etc. Movie making genuinely interests me as an art form because it takes an incredible amount of work and talent to bring so many ingredients together successfully to create something watchable, let alone something great. In fact, just getting a team of people together who are all creatively compatible must be an achievement in its own right! 
     The way writers, art directors, set designers, costume and prop makers etc manage to create a complete physical world with every minor, intricate detail is nothing short of amazing. I’m in awe of any truly talented film maker.
   
I have never written about a movie but after just catching it on TV and watching it for the third time, I felt I should finally write a few thoughts on 'Tron Legacy'. You might think that seems an odd choice… Not the greatest movie of its genre ever made, maybe not an iconic classic but stylistically, it’s an absolute triumph and never fails to impress me as a designer. The first couple of Alien movies were artistically incredible and possibly the best thanks to the work of Geiger but Tron impresses on a different, more ‘realistic’ level.

I’m definitely no fanatical geek or nerd when it comes to sci-fi movies. They’re often great movies, classics and a real visual spectacle but I don’t really get involved in the whole fantasy of it all. I like a movie to be rooted in some realism somewhere for me to relate to.
Tron Legacy however, appeals to me on a different level to any other science fiction movie I’ve ever seen. Maybe any movie, full stop. The superb Daft Punk soundtrack aside (a modern day kraftwerk-esque journey which frames the visuals perfectly), the way the sets are designed to offer reference to their mirror image on Earth yet be completely futuristic in their construction and design is both subtle and brilliant. Every artistic and creative angle in the movie just works together perfectly, for me. It’s complete computer fantasy, rooted in reality.

This isn’t a movie review, though. The reason I decided to write this little piece is because of one particular scene and location in the film, when the son of Flynn is rescued and taken to the off-grid ‘hideout’. If you haven’t seen it, bear with me (I’ll add a gallery of images at the bottom)

A glowing, glossy, geometric white ‘apartment’, on a ledge, carved into a mountain of slate grey rock is just a visual and stylistic masterpiece with the whole thing illuminated via under floor lighting through six foot square pieces of opaque glass. It also pays reference to young Flynn's riverside apartment on Earth, which is irrelevant but worth a mention as again, it roots the fantasy in reality which I like.

The design anoraks among you will have quickly picked up on the iconic, timeless pieces of product/furniture design scattered around the space…  The Barcelona chair by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, the 670 lounge chair and ottoman by Charles and Ray Eames, and the Arco lamp by Achille Castiglioni.
    The reinvented crystal and synthetic material versions of 18th century French antiques and chandeliers retro-fitted with LED-type lights. There’s even a retro-futuristic (no, that's not a real term) sunken lounge area straight from the late 60’s.
All of this laid on top of a minimal, ‘perfect’, glowing white canvas, which in itself is contrasted against angular, jagged crystalline rock formation. Forgive me for the endless superlatives and adjectives but it’s a real feast for the eyes, a great marriage of texture, style and a nice juxtaposition of classic furniture within a futuristic space.
     Raw, unfinished materials versus geometric, perfectly finished surfaces and shapes. It just really speaks to me on every level, visually as a designer it achieves many principles I, ideally, like to achieve and practice myself.
I always cringe when I hear phrases like ‘design porn’ but in this case I would not only allow it, I’d use it myself.

In my own work, I am genuinely passionate about mixing classic and contemporary influences, using one to contrast and draw attention to the other. I’m openly skeptical about minimalism though (in its most commonly used sense), as too often it’s a less than creative way of simply doing nothing with an empty space to little effect, however I am a fan of allowing a space to speak for itself if it’s creatively relevant and adds impact to other areas. Less is more but only when done with purpose and emphasis.

So for me, this scene in Tron Legacy isn't a nerdy fantasy or a poster on a teenage geek’s bedroom wall, it’s fully achievable. It pays tribute and references reality and a design solution which I would happily explore and implement myself as a real world concept.

To use opaque materials to emphasise and spread a light source evenly across an area is both energy efficient and visually impressive. Lighting an entire area via only the floor is a superb concept in itself (if the room allows it, architecturally) and creating partitions within a space without physical barriers is also a valuable design exercise.
Textured walls can always be used to great effect and I'm also a great believer in using the lines of a space to frame key elements within it, providing a base to allow the form of an object to take centre stage without becoming lost in translation. I have, do and undoubtedly will use these design cues on future projects. 

So, I’m sure you can see why as a designer, this movie really catches my imagination and inspires me. The set, in my opinion, is a real future classic of ‘fantasy’ interior design. If you haven’t already checked it out, please do, even just to see what I’m rambling on about and haven't just wasted several minutes of your life reading this!

Paul Hancock
(Founder & Director)