The scene then cuts to a close up shot of Jack’s face, this shot is also a match on action as the light from the photocopying machine he’s using can be seen scanning across his face. We are then given an establishing shot of Jack’s office where there are four other workers just like himself all standing at photocopying machines drinking their star bucks coffees and struggling to stay awake, this coupled with the blue filter which has been used through the shot emphasises the monotony of Jack’s work and lack of humanity present in the world around him.
The next scene begins with a tracking shot from within Jack’s waste paper basket; this shot is achieved through CGI and as the camera tracks its way out of the basket in slow motion, the camera closes in on the brand names of all the items that Jack has used and thrown away, Pepsi cans, Krispey Kremes boxes and of course the ever present Starbucks coffee cup. This scene is almost like a deep space exploration as the slow movement of the camera makes the discarded items in Jack’s basket seem like celestial bodies that gravitate in his universe, this ties in with Jack’s narrative as he says – “When deep space exploration ramps up, it'll be the corporations that name everything, the IBM Stellar Sphere, the Microsoft Galaxy, Planet Starbucks.” – This is Jack describing his world to us.
The use of sound here is also notable as the monotonous ringing of the telephones and tapping of computer keys throughout the waste paper basket scene adds extra resonance not only to the theme of a corporate lifestyle driven by consumerism but its contrapuntal nature contrasts with the theme of space exploration and high lights the difference between the two themes being brought up by Jack’s ongoing narrative.
The constant reappearance of the Starbucks brand in the sequence up until and including this point in the film is used to emphasise the theme of consumerism and how the brand names Jack and by proxy the rest of us rely on to get through the day are seemingly inescapable; we’re only minutes into the film and already we have seen the same logo in several of the shots.
As we cut to an over the shoulder shot of Jack’s desk as he and his boss exchange office related jargon, we are shown Jack’s work space which we can infer is essentially his world. In this shot the props are key and give us further insight into his nature and personality; the ever present cup of Starbucks coffee on his desk, the meticulously organised wall of folders and post it notes and the three files on the desk behind him organised in an almost symmetrical pattern allow us the audience to infer that perhaps Jack is an obsessive compulsive and in fact we are given further evidence of this in the next scene as we enter Jack’s home.
Jack is sat on his toilet reading an Ikea catalogue as though it were a pornographic magazine, the shot starts off as a medium long shot taking from a low height showing us Jack with his trousers around his ankles as he sits on the toilet, with his phone between his ear and his shoulders, waiting on hold. The camera zooms in slowly on him until we get a medium close up taken from a low angle peering upwards at him and we can see his facial expression as he examines the catalogue, turning it upside down and back round again like a child reading a dirty magazine, eying up the images inside with an almost carnal desire to purchase them. From this angle we can see Jack’s lime green and crème shower curtains, his matching lime green wallpaper and his matching ornamental framed photograph of what appears to be a flower, allowing us to infer that he often buys items from this catalogue.
As Jack is taken off hold, he drops the catalogue onto the floor and we cut to a close up of the image on the front of it which is a living room, we then cut to an establishing shot of Jack’s own living room which is exactly identical, again emphasizing the fact that such a slave to consumerism that he lets the Ikea catalogue dictate exactly how his environment should be. From this point the camera begins to pan across Jack’s bare living room in slow motion and as the camera pans to the right, items of furniture begin to appear complete with brand names and prices as if they were pulled directly from the catalogue. This scene tells us almost directly that Jack’s life is the Ikea catalogue.
As Jack describes the items his finds himself compulsively purchasing from the Ikea catalogue, the audience is given a view of the full extent of his apparent obsessive compulsive disorder; Jack opens a cupboard and we’re given a match on action cut to a shot from within the cupboard. There are several blue bowls with “the little imperfections” or bubbles in them, Jack closes the cupboard, his figure expression showing that he’s impressed with the contents. Cut to a shot of Jack opening his fridge, we are given another match on action cut to a shot from within the fridge; there are two potatoes, a few jars of mustard and one vegetable. The props in this shot are key because of how starkly they contrast with the contents of his cupboard in which he had several bowls, presumably for eating food with yet the contents of his fridge show that he has no use for the bowls, once again hammering in the fact that, to Jack nothing is more important that the superfluously purchasing things he doesn’t need – not even eating.
