1997 The Saint (Communicator/Knife)

[TheSaint]

Ok, as you all can probably tell by the screen name that I'm a huge fan of the "Saint" franchise. Not just the '97 movie but the original TV series as well as the books as well.

However, the 1997 remake really piqued my interest as to prop making. Some things just "screamed" out at me begging to be made. One was the knife* and the boots used to conceal the knife and another was Val's "spy" getup ranging from his entire ensemble to the neat little watch he uses to detect the rooms temperature.

Finally, I really loved the Nokia 9000 he was using. I bought a Nokia 9000i after the movie in fact and was bummed out that there was no back lighting like in the movie.

Come to find out via this link for Val's communicator as well as the huge replica used for close up's of the communicator's screen, it was all green screen.

In fact, the Nokia 9000 he used was just a dummy phone with a little green insert.

Well, since it's been a while since I've really built anything (other then resin casts) I thought I'd go with two easy little items.

1.) The knife used by Val
and
2.) The Nokia 9000i with screen accurate screenshots for the internal display.

In 2008 I bought four used Nokia 9000's on eBay for like 30 bucks together. All fully functional. I plan on taking one of them and making it into a static replica with a blue/green screen like seen in the movies showing either the "Human Fly" encrypted text OR his bank account details.

I'd like to put a little switch inside the battery compartment which would hold a 9v battery to light up both internal and external displays.

Now, onto the knife. *I know someone else here on the forums looked into making it but nothing came of it. So for my first round, I'll be making a "fully functional" version out of wood. Not sure which wood type yet though. If I get the dimensions down and figure out exactly how I'm going to make it open/close I'll consider making one out of metal. If that fails, resin. (Reason for making it out of wood is so I have something to cast from should all go well.)

I already have most of the screen caps for the Nokia 9000i's display so my next (and first) move would be to replicate them in Photoshop. Once I've got the easy part out of the way, I'll go about deconstructing a Nokia 9000i and figuring out how I'll do all this. Shouldn't be too difficult however I don't want to bork anything and having to 'destroy' another Nokia 9000i...

I'll update this thread with pictures as I get them.

 

[Klwl]

omg 1997...seriously??? I loved that move but wow has it been that long?

ugh i hate getting old.

 

[TheSaint]

ugh i hate getting old.

You and me both! :wacko

Just dug out one of the old Nokia 9000i's now. Not going to do much tonight as it's a quarter til three am here.

 

[TheSaint]

Ok, got some pictures of the 'donor phone' here. Sorry about the quality.

Open:

Closed:

Battery compartment (The battery compartment easily holds a 9v battery, wish I would have done a comparison.) :

I'll have to replicate the screen texture, but I think I found something that'll do the job. I might have to use a couple of layers of it though. What it is is a type of tracing paper. At least it looks like it. I can get these in a variety of sizes. I tried to do a little comparison between the two here (look at the edges where the flash isn't so bright). See image:

In person it has that grainy LCDish look.

I've opened up Photoshop now to replicate the LCD screens. I might be able to just adjust them so I can directly copy the screencaps for use as the display instead of remaking them.

Once I've got all this down, I'll start taking apart the old communicator and see what I have to work with.

I always thought that the first incarnation of the Nokia 9000 didn't have SMS and a backlight whereas the Nokia 9000i had both SMS functions and a backlight for the internal screen seeing that in the movie, it had. Come to find out, the only Nokia 9000 communicator with a backlight was the Nokia 9000il which had a different face plate then the other 9000's. Only reason why the Nokia 9000 had a light in the movie is because of the oversized version... Just thought I'd throw that in there.

 

[TheSaint]

Here's the Nokia 9000i's display from a screencap in the movie. I adjusted it so the edges would be straight and not slanted from the screencap.

Now to print this out in various sizes to see how it'll look. But I'll have to wait til tomorrow. (Empty for ink + high grade copier paper.)

*Edit*
I may very well have to redo the entire screen as it's a little blurry.

 

[thegreatgalling]

Argh, I feel your pain, but welcome to the RPF, home of the neurotic perfectionists of the world!!!

You have selected a worthy cause! The Saint is a great flick with many fans here.

Good luck!

 

[TheSaint]

Thanks TheGreatGalling. I've always loved "The Saint". Something about that movie just makes me want to become an international criminal.

For some reason though, the Nokia 9000i I dug out of the box won't charge. I have two other 9000i's and a 9000il laying here somewhere within my boxes and boxes of stuff. (I move a lot.)

Thankfully, I did find my old Nokia 9110 which uses the same OS as the 9000i and that'll give me a little clearer idea of the icons on the left bar (battery/signal icons).

Once the 9000i's completed I'll move on to the knife. It'll be a static prop mainly, but I'd like it to at least open and show a faux knife... Anyone got any suggestions on materials I could use? I thought about wood as I've done plenty of wooden props before but I've also considered using delrin as the main body and using a dremil tool to sand down an old knife to make it look like the blade from the movie.

 

[CB2001]

Awesome job so far. Honestly, I always wanted to do this prop, but the closest Nokia I could find was a much later model. But still, pretty awesome so far.

 

[TheSaint]

Thanks CB2001 Yeah, I spent about five years looking for a couple of Nokia 9000's myself until I finally hit some up on eBay in 2006. I bit (and won) all three auctions. Spent about 30 bucks which included shipping. Always wanted one again since I gave mine away in 2000 when I moved to Europe.

Wanted to buy a Euro version so I hit up eBay.co.uk here the other day but they wanted like 60 pounds for one! :S Oh well... More opportunities will come along!

 

[CB2001]

Thanks CB2001 Yeah, I spent about five years looking for a couple of Nokia 9000's myself until I finally hit some up on eBay in 2006. I bit (and won) all three auctions. Spent about 30 bucks which included shipping. Always wanted one again since I gave mine away in 2000 when I moved to Europe.

Wanted to buy a Euro version so I hit up eBay.co.uk here the other day but they wanted like 60 pounds for one! :S Oh well... More opportunities will come along!

You're very much welcome, Saint. Normally, I tend to go to thrift stores and flea markets a lot more than risking doing the eBay thing. But like I said, the closest I came across in person, which was at a flea market, was a Nokia 9110 Communicator, which was the one released after the one in the film.

 

[TheSaint]

I hear ya CB. Not only can you find more, it's a bit more cozy as well. Plus you get to interact with people.

I've owned every communicator up til the e90 with the exception of the 9300. They've been some of the best phones I've ever used.

 

[TheSaint]

Sorry for the lack of posts. Been super busy. Will try to have the phone ripped apart tomorrow so I get a better idea of what I have to work with. Should be more then ample room inside the device seeing that's it's pretty fat.