found some time to watch Fifth Element last night. the film has a certain preoccupation with characters being bound or immobilised by the futuristic technology around them, with Leeloo the resident Born Sexy Yesterday obviously copping the majority of it; and thinking about this it occurred to me that the first example of Leeloo being “bound in technology” is actually this very first scene of the film:

this sarcophagus, which the characters all explicitly expect to be a male character, seems at first glance to be faceless, only to reveal this face at the top. the placement is unexpected, but not particularly strange, if we think of it as stargazing, or perhaps as some sort of aircraft? but then when we find out this thing does have the capability to fly, it doesn’t do so in the expected, superman-like fashion, but instead in this weird upside-down way…

which makes the placement of the face seem weird again. it’s such an unnatural pose that we’re forced to wonder if there’s some specific reason it was designed this way. and it wasn’t until I was thinking back on the film this morning that I realised we’re clued in to why this is:

because the nature of the ultimate weapon is, ultimately, the orgasm, the weapon’s casing of course has her sealed in the state of orgasm, gaping mouth positioned ready to fire into the sky!