#nokiawave

[starstrider-productions]

Dracula: 2004 will begin crowdfunding on 2nd April 2025! Keep your eyes on our social media for updates.

Care to take a bite?

[punkysdilemma-blog]

Nokiawave™ was a term applied by designer David Rudnick on twitter in 2018 to refer to thriller/action films that incorporated:

“mid-to late 90s fascination with "Budapest" as an impossibly sexy backdrop of spy intrigue”*

He went on to apply the label to several films of the era:

“provisional NOKIAWAVE shit-tech espionage canon (please suggest additions, ambiguous depictions of eastern europe as one enormous physical black market a plus) Mission Impossible (1996) Goldeneye (1995) The Saint (1997) The Bourne Identity (2002) The Jackal (1997) Ronin (1998)”

The ideas behind what connects these films was more seriously written up by Jacob Lindgren at Mubi who suggests a post Cold War malaise where the certainties of good and bad (Communism vs. Capitalism, East vs. West) dissolved in a post-communist, post-modernist swirl of corruption, consumerism and civil conflict** (most notably in the former Yugoslavia) that defined the West up until September 11th attacks. 

*Rudnick’s original thread on twitter here

**Adam Curtis’s provocative documentary essays have explored this period extensively, Hypernormalisation is a good entry point and well worth a watch. 

[orchidblack]

Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano in Abel Ferrara's adaptation of New Rose Hotel.

[punkysdilemma-blog]

NIKITA 1990

[elenadotnet]

The Nokia Design Archive goes live – relive the early years of mobile multimedia

The Nokia Design Archive goes live – relive the early years of mobile multimedia

The archive of Finnish tech pioneers Nokia has been entrusted to Aalto University. Now you can explore the company’s archive of models, conc

[orchidblack]

Recently acquired a 686 thinking machine laptop with an artificial intelligence RISC chip, so I can really churn these out now.

[orchidblack]

When you're deep down the #Nokiawave rabbit hole.

[orchidblack]

Some things you may have forgotten about The Saint.

- He does not use a gun. His weapons are theatricality and deception, which is to say a series of increasingly risible Sacha Baron Cohen-esque disguises.

- The plot is premised on 34-year old Elisabeth Shue being a desperately unfuckable spinster who holds the secret to cold fusion.

- The vaunted electronica soundtrack is deployed only in brief, diegetic snippets, when Russian gangsters pile out of their black SUVs.

- With the slightest nudge, the movie could play as MacGruber-style parody, and is probably the reason Val Kilmer was cast in MacGruber.

This rewatch was occasioned by a deep dive into “Nokiawave”, an a e s t h e t i c first playfully defined by designer David Rudnick. It's best observed in late-90's espionage movies, and is characterized by Eastern European backdrops, chunky, monochrome gadgetry, low-tech spycraft, early online interfaces, and of course: the jacket.

At least a couple people have taken this concept very seriously. Having once owned the jacket, I can only applaud their efforts.