Thanks for the info - and very observant of you, TBF! I totally missed that. I imagine it is just the passing of time during the shoot but you never know. It is kind of funny they would put a working clock on the wall... But if they wanted to deliberately indicate the passage of time between the two photos... hmm! Interesting!
So, when we're trying to figure it out, some more observations (admittedly most of these are pretty obvious but I'm trying to collect 'em):
The bare, bleakness of the kitchen.
The stove seems a bit odd to me - maybe it's just because it's older but it doesn't make sense to me to put a burner over nothing but a drawer.
It also seems odd to put a toaster on the kitchen table.
Everything's black, white, and gray except for the clock, which is red (this lends credence to the idea that the different times are deliberate since your eyes are drawn to the clock - although I didn't notice it! lol). Even Don's pants, which are light brown, look a bit off-white. His clothing certainly doesn't stand out. Same for the matches. Gray tones vary from the paint on the wall to the steel toaster, table, and chair.
The box of matches looks like it could easily be knocked off - part of it's hanging off of the table.
Don's sleeves are rolled up.
The line of matches we've already mentioned... they indicate that he's just spending time watching the matches burn down, placing the burnt ones in a row, then getting another one out of the box to watch it burn down... doing it again and again... it's the most obvious oddity of the photo.
I think he looks hypnotized by the flame in the first photo, and caught by surprise in the second. (Subjective, I know).
The black, white, and gray tones surrounding him kind of makes it look like he and the clock are the only color elements in an forties/fifties-era black-and-white photograph. (Another subjective thought),
Any other observations? Even obvious ones?