Rows of Desks
Some of the most evocative imagery in the film includes the shots of the rows and rows of desks at the office building. Baxter's desk at the beginning sits in the middle of a sea of desks exactly like it, with identical typewriters on top. The uniformity of the office space is striking and reflects the alienated atmosphere of the corporate world, the haunting specter of replaceability. The seeming endlessness of the rows of desks was achieved through forced perspective. Alexandre Trauner, the art director, put smaller desks in the very back of the room and seated smaller people—including children—at them, to achieve the effect that rows seemed to continue almost indefinitely.
Spaghetti in the Tennis Racket
When Fran questions why Baxter has a tennis racket in his kitchen, he tells her that he uses it as a strainer for pasta. This shows Fran that Baxter has a rather underdeveloped domestic life, but it also belies his playfulness and ingenuity. When he cooks dinner for them later, he sings a made-up Italian song and strains spaghetti through the tennis racket. It is a thoroughly charming image, that of a man cooking for a woman he loves and using whatever he has to make the dinner work. The juxtaposition between food and sporting equipment is at once ridiculous and lovable. Then later, after Baxter has quit his job at the office and is packing up his apartment, he locates the tennis racket and finds a lone strand of spaghetti still stuck to it. He looks at it wistfully, remembering the romantic and enjoyable night he spent with Fran, and remembering that he's lost her. The tennis racket and spaghetti are a charmingly mismatched pair, just as he and Fran might have been.
The Cracked Mirror
The cracked compact mirror that Fran leaves in Baxter's apartment is an important prop, both symbolically and in terms of the plot. It represents the way that Fran's relationship with Sheldrake makes her feel broken or damaged in some ways. The camera sits atop her shoulder as she looks at her reflection in the mirror, split down the middle by the crack, and she says, "I like it that way. Makes me look the way I feel." It also is an important image, because it signals to Baxter that Fran is Sheldrake's mistress, which complicates his feelings about her considerably.
Fran's Flower
When we first meet Fran Kubelik, she is a perky and likable elevator girl, with a new short haircut and a flower pinned to her collar. While everyone else in the office building is dressed in conservative office clothes, Fran stands out because of her almost childlike innocence and positive spirit. This spirit is represented by the flower pinned to her collar. The flower sets her apart from the other people in the drab world of the office and shows that she has a more romantic and playful spirit than the other people who work there.
