Film vs Digital

Digital is the future of cinema. Or so we're told. It seems that with film studios and production companies wanting to cut costs, especially with the dwindling sales of DVD'S and the increase in film piracy seemingly damaging their deep pockets, films on film is a dying concept. For some, myself included, this is very sad news indeed.

I remember the exact moment which made me decide that I would always be a champion of film over digital. It was during the trailer for the very forgettable Public Enemies (a film so forgettable I had to look the title up on IMDB.) A drama set around criminal activity in 1930's America that starred Johnny Depp and directed by Michael Mann. There was just something not right in the images I was looking at on my laptop. The film its self didn't look bad but the quality of the images just weren't correct. They weren't out of focus or badly framed, they just weren't right. What was wrong with the footage was that it didn't look like a film. It looked like the behind the scenes footage of a film you get in DVD extras. It had no substance to it. In short, it just wasn't film.

After going to see the film in the cinema a few months later, the same problem resurfaced, only this time it was 100 times worse. While the acting, writing, direction and narrative all had problems, the real problem for me was the digital look of the film. I just couldn't engage myself in the action or lose myself in the story. I was very aware that I was watching actors rather than engaging with characters.

Now I must clarify before I go any further, I'm not against the digital format. I believe both digital and film should be available to film makers and depending on the subject and the individual film maker, they should be able to choose the best look for their particulate project. I was just surprised when I first saw the trailer for Public Enemies that Mann had decided to go down the digital route since it was a period piece. I wanted to lose myself in celluloid within a beautifully realised vision of a time I will never experience in any other form other than on the big screen. Instead with digital footage I was left cold and distance from the action on the big screen in front of me. Mann had previously had success with the digital format with Collateral (and also Miami Vice but that's maybe best forgotten).  The clean, crisp look that digital offered Collateral suited the the feel of the film and the mood of its characters within its night time setting. L.A. was the star of that film and the digital photography was one of the reasons for that.

Collateral is by no means alone in being a beautifully shot digital film. Drive for instance looked great. As did Hugo. Both films were shot on the Arri Alexa, a digital camera that aims for the look of film. The Avengers was shot on the same camera, though I was less keen on the look of the images achieved in that film. Though it certainly didn't have the image problems I felt Public Enemies had.

Smaller hand held digital cameras are of course a big part of film making, especially for smaller productions with lower budgets. Danny Boyle has had great success shooting with smaller cameras. For Slumdog Millionaire he used the SI-2K Digital Cinema Camera to shoot around the crowded streets of India. Darren Aronofsky went hand held for The Wrestler with the RED and once again the film was a huge success. It's not that digital can't be great. It's that it shouldn't be the only option for future film makers.

One of the last few champions of celluloid is Dark Knight Rises director Christopher Nolan. 

"I want to work with the best possible image quality, and that's film. Film has the most range, the highest resolution by far. But you won't hear that, because there's no money in sticking with the old format."

Nolan is adamant that film needs to stick around. He is not advocating that film makers shouldn't use digital, only that they should have the choice to use whatever format they feel is best for them.

Nolan is also fighting the good the fight in another format war that is raging right now. Since James Cameron and his hugely successful Avatar redefined the 3D cinema experience, Hollywood has not looked back in embracing this new technology. Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese have both made family films in 3D and said they are open to using the format again on future projects. Though Scorsese has decided to go back to 2D for his next project, The Wolf on Wall Street. It's only a shame it won't be shot on film, with Scorsese opting for digital instead.

3D, even more so than digital, is being presented to audiences not as a money making opportunity for the studios, but as a technical advancement that improves a film by adding new dimensions to a film that can't be achieved with 2D. 

“It’s like a leap from standard definition to high definition,” said Michael Lewis, who co-founded RealD, the makers of the 3D projection system used in most cinemas, as well as stereoscopic cameras.

Once again, Chris Nolan is not convinced. He argues that IMAX and not 3D is the future of cinema. Or at least it should be. Nolan shot parts of the Dark Knight with the 65mm IMAX camera and turned to it once again for The Dark Knight Rises with over an hour of footage shot in the larger format for the final instalment in his Batman trilogy. He argues that film is already 3D and that Stereoscope adds little to the visual dynamic of the film. He feels that 3D technology gives an individual experience that is better suited to computer games and immersive technologies and detracts from the viewing experience of a film.

He is not alone in his reservations with 3D. British film critic Mark Kermode is very vocal in his views against the technology. As he sees it, 3D dims the the image on screen and distances the audience from the film due to the use of 3D glasses.

Many people also believes it is more of a financial decision than an artistic one. The increase price of tickets for 3D films certainly makes a different at the box office but it is the fight against piracy where 3D really comes into play. Simply recording a 3D film and posting it online doesn't work. The studios are turning to 3D as the answer to piracy. Perhaps it is. Perhaps until people have the choice to stream the latest releases on their computers or TV's, piracy won't go away. That's if it ever does.

So with digital and 3D such an established part of Hollywood, just what hope is there for traditional celluloid film making? Well while digital might be becoming industry standard, we should certainly have film around for a few more years yet. Christopher Nolan is now once of cinemas most powerful brands. His reputation with films such as Memento, Inception and the Batman trilogy have given him the kind of power at Warner Brothers that allows him to make the biggest film of the year in 2D IMAX rather than digital 3D. Nolan himself admits the studio bosses would have loved him to go for 3D.

For me, film is still my preferred format. I love the look of it and depth it gives the picture. I don't consider myself sentimental or old fashioned for wanting to keep this format alive and in the mainstream of film making.Yes digital has many positives and is a more flexible format that can offer different possibilities to the men behind the cameras. But that's exactly what it should be. It should be an alternative to film, it should compliment it. It shouldn't be replacing it. I'll leave the last word to Chris Nolan.

"The danger comes from filmmakers not asserting their right to choose that format....If they stop exercising that choice, it will go away. I tell people, 'Look, digital isn't going away."

*next on my blogging to do list, CGI vs in camera effects/stunts*

Blue Valentine - You Always Hurt The One You Love

Some films are easier to sell to a mainstream audience than others. Romantic comedies are generally considered safe ground for a film studio with their warm, light, fluffy story lines and happy endings making them easy to market. Blue Valentine certainly isn’t a romantic comedy. And neither is it an easy watch. It is however a raw, emotionally powerful (and often emotionally draining) dissection of a marriage staring Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling.

The film follows a non linear narrative, jumping in time between the start of their relationship and it’s ultimate demise with brutal honesty and lack of Hollywood gloss. It is a slow burning and unrelenting journey into the world of two people who see their views on love and on one another change as the film progresses.

Blue Valentine - A modern reworking of Scenes From A Marriage (1973)

Blue Valentine owes much in style and content to Ingmar Burgman’s 1973 work Scenes From A Marriage. They share a similar uncompromising look at love. And the intensity that both movies aim for between their main characters lead to some of the most uncomfortable scenes ever captured on film. The scenes are slow burning and unrelenting and remind you of the power that is available from a scene that shows two people falling out of love. Like Burgman at his best Blue Valentine isn’t afraid to risk alienating it’s audience in order to delve deeper into the lives of the two main characters. The film is also reminiscent of the 2006 Australian film Candy which looked at the break up of a relationship but through the eyes of two drug addicts. Though in Blue Valentine there is nothing as remarkable as drug addiction to separate and destroy a young couple in love, instead that is left to unravel by its self.

Blue Valentine’s real trump card is the actors and their ability to convey so much using so little. Throughout the film it is often the moments with little or no dialogue that are the most effecting for the viewer. For added realism and a deeper connection between the two actors Derek Cianfrance, the director of Blue Valentine, rented a house together for them and instructed them to live together as if they were a true couple.

Derek Cianfrance tries to play the film as straight down the middle as possible with both characters shown as flawed individuals who shared a love for each which is now dying. And it’s because that they are both flawed that the film works. Gosling’s character Dean is the romantic of the two but he is someone who lacks ambition and decides to go after a job painting houses as it’s an easy lifestyle that allows him to drink at work and save all his energy for their daughter.
“I didn’t want to be somebody’s husband and I didn’t want to be somebody’s dad, that wasn’t my goal in life. But somehow it was. I work so I can do that.”

William’s character Cindy is the hard working nurse who is the bread winner of the household and also the emotionally colder character of the two. She is fed up with her husband drunken state and having to be the bad guy with their daughter in order to keep some sort of order in the house. It would have been easy for the film to pick sides but it’s to Cianfrance’s credit that he holds it together in an even handed manner so well.

The film has been criticized by some for lacking pace and for not being clear on the pitfalls that ultimately break the couple up. But that is indeed the point of the film. You can’t always pinpoint the moment when a couple starts to drift apart. Blue Valentine is indeed a hard watch, but it’s a good film because of that. By the final scene you might wish you hadn’t just sat through such a heartbreaking examination of a couple and surely that’s the biggest compliment you can pay the film?

*Please note this review is taken from a previous Tumblr account I set up to publish reviews for my university course "Cinema and Society"*

Welcome To My Blog

Eisenstein knew a thing or two about film

Hopefully over the coming weeks and months I will be posting some reviews and thoughts over some films that hold a special place in my heart. Some will be outright classics, others maybe less known or less loved by a wider audience. Every post will be open for discussion and I  hope to link in other sites, reviews,pictures and video to help expand this blog futher.

I have never considered reviews of anything or any kind as art. They're not (though a few reviews are pretty close). I have not seen every film ever made and I don't conisder myself to be the next Roger Ebert. I am just a recent uni graduate with a love of film and a wish to share some thoughts on some of the films that have brought a lot of joy to me over the years.