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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

The Public Enemies Look

Aside from the very nice framing choices, this movie is a disaster visually. Mann should have used the F950 or F23 and stuck to it. The constant changing of cameras and formats was incredibly distracting for me. It pulled me out of the story. The handheld prosumer cam shots were a complete disgrace to such a fine motion picture.
 
mike ogden said:
As another poster said, If I'd have turned in something looking that bad, I wouldn't expect to get paid...
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Unless it was precisely the look your client wanted. In which case, if you turned in something that looked like it was shot on pristine 65mm, you might run into some trouble with your client too.

So the questions that need to be asked are this: first, is Michael Mann inept, weak-willed, or lazy? As David Mullen astutely pointed out above, clearly, the answer is no. He made HEAT with the same DP as Public Enemies, and that's a stunning film in every respect. And he has a reputation for being a very hard-driving near-insane perfectionist. The pressure's not coming from anyone else on this one.

So given the above, I think the more important question to ask is: what does Mann gain in shooting like this? Not having seen Public Enemies yet, but having seen (and quite liked) both Collateral and Miami Vice, it's clear that Mann likes the video texture, and not just 'open shutter'. There's tons of noise, extremely deep DOF, oversharpening galore, and the image clips all over the place. It's also a look that is impossible to get with film. I think Scott Foundas' piece in the LA Weekly is actually a pretty good place to start the discussion about what Mann gains, artistically or otherwise, by shooting in this style. Much better than simply saying "OMG IT LOOKS LIKE CRAP" and ending the discussion there.

The point is, cinema is much more than simply polished cinematography, and there are many great films that many would probably classify as ugly in a traditional Hollywood cinematography sense, and if people aren't willing to interact with films like that because of the technical flaws in the cinematography (or editing, or sound, or whatever), it will end up being an extreme limiting factor for them in the long run.

To keep things in perspective, remember this: at one time (not THAT long ago), lens flares were seen as major cinematographic mistakes. Also, when working on the Godfather, I'm sure there were more than a few people who thought Gordon Willis was either out of his mind or inept; labs would try to compensate for the 'mistake' of his underexposed negatives, ignoring his printing instructions, etc. Flashing the negative to change the exposure characteristics of the film stock (as Vilmos Zsigmond did with a number of Altman's films in the 70's, and many more have done since) was seen to be a fireable offense by some people.

And if you're just concerned that Michael Mann's giving digital a bad name, perhaps to the detriment of your business, just remind people of Slumdog Millionaire or either of David Fincher's recent films, which were mainly shot digitally, and have stunning cinematography.

EDIT: I'm pretty sure the revolution isn't an artistic one, David. That said, at least it will be televised.
 
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I don't think it's so much about convention vs revolution, David. It's about making the look of a picture work for the story. And for me, the crappy prosumer and consumer cam shots badly distracted me from a pretty great movie. When that happens, the cameras have become the enemy of the production, rather than tools contributing to its success.

Of course, that's just one person's opinion. Honestly, I don't think average joe six pack audience members will be distracted trying to figure out which camera was producing banding and fringing on blown-out windows, but many of us here come from video backgrounds where we have been plagued by this kind of crap for a long time. I do think joe six packs will subliminally notice that some shots are "off" and look crummy.

I just think Mann let his obsession with mixing cameras distract from the movie he was making, which is a pretty damn good movie.

BTW, I was one of the few supporters of the look Mann got with the Miami Vice movie. I am in no way bashing digital looks just to bash them.
 
I was going to say the same thing -- if you turned in something that looked like the way that the director and producer wanted, then you would not get fired, you'd get fired if you didn't turn in something that they wanted. Dante Spinotti's obligation as a DP was not to please his peers or the members of RedUser, it was to please Michael Mann, which I assume he did because he wasn't fired.

This discussion is similar to the one about "The Informant" and people getting their panties into a twist because Soderbergh decided he wanted a double-fog filter on the camera and blown-out windows and lamps.

It's like we're still living in the time when you were supposed to follow "Kodak's Guide to Getting Good Pictures" or something banal like that. Loosen up.
 
I have a copy of "Kodak's Guide to Making Good Pictures." (it may actually be from the 50's; it's certainly not much younger than that.) It's hilarious. More often than not, the "what not to do" examples are far better and more interesting photos than the "right" ones. I highly recommend as an object lesson it to anyone who takes photography seriously.
 
I noticed every digital artifact in there, but honestly, my overall reaction was that I thought the movie was striking-looking, not crummy-looking. It was distinctive and a fresh way to approach this material. Sure, it would have made a nice-looking period movie if shot in 35mm, definitely more aesthetically pleasing. But even at its worst, when it started looking like "Blair Witch Project" out in the woods, I thought it was an interesting approach that actually kept me more involved in what was happening.

For example, that shot of Depp in the woods trying to reload as the G-man approaches in the background, both more or less almost in focus -- I found that shot to be both dramatically interesting and yet disturbing for its visual flaws. It conjured up an odd mood, like those shutterless shots of Bale firing his machine gun as his car sped through the woods at night. Again, not conventionally pretty or technically "correct" but visually striking and atmospheric for me.

I found myself liking the look of this movie quite a bit because of all of its flaws, not in spite of it. But that's just my reaction.

But hey, I went to a hippy-dippy art school so I was exposed to an awful lot of video art when I was there, smeary, clippy VHS stuff...
 
For all the talk of revolution here on this site, a lot of people seem to have very conservative, conventional ideas of what a movie should look like.

It's like we're still living in the time when you were supposed to follow "Kodak's Guide to Getting Good Pictures" or something banal like that. Loosen up.
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David Mullen, ASC
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Amen
 
David Mullen ASC said:
I noticed every digital artifact in there, but honestly, my overall reaction was that I thought the movie was striking-looking, not crummy-looking. It was distinctive and a fresh way to approach this material. Sure, it would have made a nice-looking period movie if shot in 35mm, definitely more aesthetically pleasing.
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I'm definitely not saying it should have been shot on 35. I understand what Mann wanted to do. But I'm just saying he could have stuck with the F23 or F950, for example, and cranked up the sharpening, etc, to achieve a hyper-realistic look.

I think the whole "Filmed as if people with cell cameras were shooting it and uploading it to youtube" is way too much of a gimmick, and made the picture look bad in many places, needlessly.

For example, that shot of Depp in the woods trying to reload as the G-man approaches in the background, both more or less almost in focus -- I found that shot to be both dramatically interesting and yet disturbing for its visual flaws. It conjured up an odd mood, like those shutterless shots of Bale firing his machine gun as his car sped through the woods at night. Again, not conventionally pretty or technically "correct" but visually striking and atmospheric for me.
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Those two shots I liked. Bale firing the gun was fantastic. But again, this could have been done with the F23 or F950.
 
Um, so we throw out 100 years of cinema language and start talking crap just because we got a new toy? What Mann and Spinotti are doing is NOTHING like flashing film etc. It's LAZY story telling.

Where I come from, we call a spade a spade, and 'Public Enemies' looks like crap. The 'look' of PE gets in the way of telling the story, rather than adding or enhancing it.

I haven't seen Slumdog or Finchers last film - not my cup of tea - but I bet they don't look like a half assed news crew time traveled back to 1933 and hosepiped a camera about. I'm sorry, but this is what PE looks like.

EPIC FAIL, guys. Well done.
 
I went to CalArts.

Tom, I understand what you are saying about consistency that would come from sticking to one camera type, but it seems clear to all of us that it was not the highest priority for the filmmakers here, so you have to ask yourself why they wanted the tonal shifts. Was it simply to allow them to slip in the technically inferior cameras only when they were the only way to get the shot? Or did they also feel that the resulting quality shifts were part of the rough documentary style where you became aware of the filmmaking process rather than have it become invisible?

I suppose it would have been even ballsier to shoot the whole thing on the EX camera, but then you would have lost a lot of the fine detail in the locations and costumes that the F23 captured.

It probably would have been a bit more conventional -- but more consistent -- had it all been shot on the F23, especially if they had used S-Log instead of Rec 709.
 
Just saw it this afternoon....:banghead: What was the budget on this?

Great story telling and direction, good acting.... visually FOR ME it ranged from "meh, I've seen better prosumer shot stuff at bumb-f-egypt filmfestivals" to "WTF? Somone seriously got paid for that?"

I respect Mann as an artist but wholeheartedly believe techinically it was :nonod: I havn't seen such easily blown highlights and low dynamic range on some shots since miniDV. But it was an enjoyable movie and I like it for it's content. The visuals did pull me out a lot but I thought the scoring was effecitve in keeping me half in most of the time. Oddly enough I did enjoy the shootouts in this style. It felt very immediate and visceral.
 
If the story is good then it makes no difference if it was shot on 70mm, Red, or VHS. I remember when Miami Vice came out, I tried getting a general critical reaction from rottentomatoes. I don't remember many comments talking about the narrative but I remember a lot talking about the way the film looked. By the time I was done reading I was convinced that Michael Mann took every frame of the film and scanned it into a computer, printed it out on xerox paper, and exhibited a video of paper being flipped at 24 fps.

When I finally convinced myself to watch the film later on I noticed things like open shutters, high gain, blown highlights and maybe a lack of conventional lighting schemes. To be honest it couldn't have bothered me less. I like that film and I love Collateral. I haven't seen Public Enemies yet but the complaints I'm seeing here are pretty much the same complaints echoed with the trailer which I don't mind. I know that the idea of this forum is to discuss cinematography and the merits of some techniques but if you go to a film and you walk out for some of the reasons that appear in this forum then I'm of the opinion that you're way too picky about aesthetics.
:nonod:
 
Patrick Wynne said:
I know that the idea of this forum is to discuss cinematography and the merits of some techniques but if you go to a film and you walk out for some of the reasons that appear in this forum then I'm of the opinion that you're way too picky about aesthetics.
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Agreed with most of what you wrote there, Patrick, but I'd say that oftentimes, it's actually less about being picky in the sense of only being able to view "the best" of a certain craft, and more about being more narrow-minded and limited in one's thinking about aesthetics, or assuming that aesthetics are only relatable in a certain way to a specific style of lighting or camerawork, as opposed to the overall whole of a film/work of art/whatever. It strikes me as an unwillingness (whether from laziness, stubbornness, fear, or otherwise) to interact and grapple with what's actually on screen, rather than simply saying something along the lines of "It looks awful; He did it wrong; it should have been done this way or that way, so it would look better." Or something.

(And before someone jumps on me for this, no, I don't actually think that any specific person on this board is a lazy, stubborn aesthetic bigot). Just sayin' in case someone is insulted; was not my intention. Been having this conversation elsewhere, too, and I'm speaking to a few of those interactions as well.
 
I just saw a 4k projection of this baby. I have to say I wasn't turned on by the video-ish aspects to the look of this film. I understand the choices to want and push the look of a film. Every great advancement comes from someone making an artistic choice that pushes the boundaries of "acceptability". I think composition was interesting. I liked the design and lighting quite a bit. The sets were really great and put me in this timeframe better than other gangster pics I've seen. I think some of the handheld work and other shots were a tool to enhance the mood and emotion. There was nothing in there shot wise that really strayed too far off the path for me. I generally really like MM's work.

That being said... the quality of the hyper-realism choices were distracting. I was often pulled out of the story because of instantly becoming aware of the HD video look which at the time of viewing seemed like a contradiction to the time period. Even if that was the intent of the director I am no longer caring about the characters but sitting in a theater watching a digitally projected movie. So the story failed me a bit. I wasn't as involved as I wanted to be. I appreciate the risk though.

It makes me wonder that if I had seen more big films with this type of treatment if I would be more accepting and less distracted. Time will tell. I appreciate the risk though. And I applaud the artistic choices. I would love to read MM's viewpoint on the final.
 
Jason Murphy said:
it's actually less about being picky in the sense of only being able to view "the best" of a certain craft, and more about being more narrow-minded and limited in one's thinking about aesthetics, or assuming that aesthetics are only relatable in a certain way to a specific style of lighting or camerawork, as opposed to the overall whole of a film/work of art/whatever. It strikes me as an unwillingness (whether from laziness, stubbornness, fear, or otherwise) to interact and grapple with what's actually on screen, rather than simply saying something along the lines of "It looks awful; He did it wrong; it should have been done this way or that way, so it would look better." Or something.
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HOLY F-ING SH!T you are right, I NEVER looked at it like that. I totaly missed that aspect, GOD I'm so stupid.....ugh and lazy

Hey I found this awesome site it's called youtube... AMAZING!!!!
Unbelievable work with the latest cutting edge film production techniques of smartphone cameras and brilliant... BRILLIANT bumb fighting. The coreography alone much less the camcorder work... WHAT?!!!!!

Once again Thnx for pointing that out, I never realized what I thought was bad looking video was f--king badass ART!

(at least you expected that response, just thought I'd oblige)
 
To me the most valid criticisms here are personal, not technical. If something in the film distances you from it then it has failed in some way. If Mann decided that distancing some of the audience in a particular way was important and had a solid reason that enhanced what you feel then he has succeeded. It is a risky strategy though, because as in comedy, the line between funny and not funny is one atom. The line here seems to be real/not real? A film/not a film? What?

But after all this discussion, which I've really enjoyed reading, I really want to see it.
 
Also it's a pity that MM was "trapped and surrounded" with "Sony Boys" agents (informants) who recommend him "Sony Bloody Digital HD Technology" that can't compare with RED1 at ALL !!!

Who knows maybe HE (MM) in his next feature will do (finally) his own digital research... choose RED1 ... or he is (dead) as a good movie director anyway...
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Sanjin Jukic
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Nice to see such well thought out opinions from Sanjin.

:mad2:
 
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