A Few Words About A few words about...™ Public Enemies -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Bobby Henderson]

Zack, if that's really the case then why don't the fans of video allow the video to stay looking like video? If video is so great, why are they trying to make it look like film? Why not leave the video footage in its native wide-gamma RGB form? Even Public Enemies was post processed to some degree to mimic the film look -even though it fails to do so worse than many other digitally-originated movies.

 

[Douglas Monce]

Mann's interest in using digital seems to be less about a particular look, but rather the ability to crank up the gain, and shoot in low light conditions with little or no augmentation by the DP. A perfect example of this style of working is the parking garage roof scene in Miami Vice. I haven't yet seen Public Enemies, but I suspect he is doing the same thing here. Personally I wouldn't shoot that way, but its not my film. As to movies being shot on HD not looking like traditional films, I've seen many that I didn't know were shot digitally until after the fact. Get Smart is a perfect example, Zodiac would be another. Zodiac in particular with its emulation of 1970s film stock, in my opinion proves the old notion, it’s not the equipment you have, it’s how you use it.

Doug

 

[Bobby Henderson]

Get Smart is a "digital" movie that didn't work as well as others on mimicking the film look. I didn't know anything about its production work flow, but the first time I saw the movie I knew it had been shot electronically rather than exposed on film. Zodiac is a much better example of digital photography pulling off the film look convincingly.

Miami Vice isn't a good example of digital done well. Many have complained about all the "grain" prevalent throughout much of the movie. I think some of that extra artificial grain was added to make the various noisy high ISO, low light shots look more consistent with each other. Overall, the image quality was pretty terrible, a noticeable step down from Collateral.

Film has a disadvantage of not having a sexy buzzword like "digital" to attach to it. Nevertheless at this point motion picture film camera systems still do a better job of capturing imagery than video cameras. I think the video cameras would have a better edge on the competition if the footage was allowed to retain its full RGB gamut range.

 

[Brian Borst]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

Zack, if that's really the case then why don't the fans of video allow the video to stay looking like video? If video is so great, why are they trying to make it look like film? Why not leave the video footage in its native wide-gamma RGB form? Even Public Enemies was post processed to some degree to mimic the film look -even though it fails to do so worse than many other digitally-originated movies.

Because there are people that don't like the look of video, and want it to resemble film more. So you get a spiral going on. People want it to look like film, the filmmakers change it to look like film, and so people are wondering why the filmmakers change it to look like film.

As is the case with the latest Harry Potter movie, people want the filmmaker's version of the movie, as long as they like it.

 

[urbo73]

I think you are not understanding the point. You don't like the film. That means nothing really. Eli said it best in post #9 above. I completely agree. Either you get it or you don't. Fine either way, but no need to talk about how you prefer film over video, how video "doesn't work" (when it clearly does for many), etc. I happen to think it works brilliantly and the movie is one of the top 5 I've seen this year. If it doesn't work for you, that's fine. But don't draw conclusions about what works and doesn't in general. IMHO, you didn't get the film and focused on the visual elements. I suggest you read the ASC cover on this film. Digital also allowed, among other things, for the DP to use slower zoom lenses for that "personal"/up-close/etc. style which is one of the reasons I like the movie.

I suppose you don't care for Fincher's digtial video films either then - Zodiac, Benjamin Button? Or is it that you just don't like Mann's style? You said video doesn't work, so I'll assume the former. And in that case, you are missing out on some very good films IMO. Mann could have done many things. However, he does what he likes, not what you like. And it works. Miami Vice was not bad because of the way it was shot, but because the film was bad IMO. Stop focusing so much on the medium, understand the medium, and enjoy the film.

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

You and Brian are missing the point, or perhaps ignoring the point deliberately.

The appearance of video, as opposed to film, is unmistakable. It has a certain look that calls attention to itself when it is used in mediums outside of broadcast television. People associate the video look with daytime TV soap operas, the 6 o'clock news, talk shows, live TV sports broadcasts, variety shows and sit-coms taped in front of studio audiences. That is the conventional view of where the video look fits. Video has a live, present day, immediate feel to it. It does not have any sort of historical vision of the past vibe to it at all. Film does.

The video look doesn't work well in feature films. And every "digital" movie being released tries through post processing in some way to mimic the film look as much as possible. Some electronically shot movies succeed pretty well in imitating the film look. None of Michael Mann's "digital" movies have accomplished that, although they have had the original wide RGB gamma range crushed down to a muddier level in a vain attempt to do the film look thing. It takes more than shooting in 24p and throwing a stock color curve at the video footage to achieve the film look.

This topic reminds me of one of the bigger laugh out loud anachronisms I saw in a movie. In John Woo's awful WWII Iwo Jima epic Windtalkers he needed footage of battleships firing off shore for a naval shelling sequence. What did he use? Stock NTSC SD color video footage of battleships firing. It looked like footage of battleships from the 1980s firing on Shite positions in the mountains outside Beirut. Blown up to 'scope, you could see the video scan lines unmistakably clear. Really bad choice there.

 

[Rachael B]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

I watched Public Enemies again last night and tolerated it's look much better seeing it at a larger size. I cannot recall playing a DVD or BD on my 32" bedroom set that came off worse. Just the same, it's a homely movie. It even looks ugly when they're out at the racetrack on a sunny day.

 

[esl88]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson ">[/url]

I disagree. The customer/viewer does not have any obligation to re-condition. They enter the theater in whatever mindset they choose. The filmmaker (or in this case "videographer") must communicate with the audience better. If he takes unusual chances and the gamble blows up in his face it is the "videographer's" fault, not the fault of the audience. The audience should not have any sort of pre-requisite to be conditioned into a collective video camera fanboy in order to understand the show.[/QUOTE]
Your mistake is that you're taking it for granted that people walk into the theater with an open mind, and need to condition themselves to see things differently. Most of our ideology, expectations, and outlooks come from the culture we live in and the stories we're used to seeing. It's the same thing with using film on a period piece; we've come to expect it, but that doesn't necessarily make film more "realistic". Both digital and film achieve the illusion of reality by capturing light on a digital chip or film stock. Even our eyes create an illusion of reality. What we see is really just light captured from our eyes, converted to neural impulses. Reality actually looks quite different from how we see it. My point is that almost [i]everything[/i] we we've come to expect is a matter of conditioning in some way or another.

Having said this, I'm not really a fan of digital. Film looks better to me because it has a certain organic quality that I like. It feels more emotional and artistic than HD, which is more a cold imitation of reality. If I directed [i]Public Enemies[/i] I probably would have opted for film, just because I like it more. But this is a personal preference and I'm not the director. Michael Mann is a professional, and if he feels that HD is more compatible with his approach, I say he should go for it. It's certainly ballsy and different.

Quote:[QUOTE]Originally Posted by [b]Bobby Henderson[/b] [url=/forum/thread/295742/a-few-words-about-public-enemies-in-blu-ray#post_3637520]

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

Get Smart is a "digital" movie that didn't work as well as others on mimicking the film look. I didn't know anything about its production work flow, but the first time I saw the movie I knew it had been shot electronically rather than exposed on film. Zodiac is a much better example of digital photography pulling off the film look convincingly.

Miami Vice isn't a good example of digital done well. Many have complained about all the "grain" prevalent throughout much of the movie. I think some of that extra artificial grain was added to make the various noisy high ISO, low light shots look more consistent with each other. Overall, the image quality was pretty terrible, a noticeable step down from Collateral.

Film has a disadvantage of not having a sexy buzzword like "digital" to attach to it. Nevertheless at this point motion picture film camera systems still do a better job of capturing imagery than video cameras. I think the video cameras would have a better edge on the competition if the footage was allowed to retain its full RGB gamut range.

Does Get Smart really look all that different from say, Enchanted which was shot on film? Not really. At this point the "Digital" look has much more to do with the way the color timing on the DI is done than how the images were captured originally.

Doug

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Brian Borst




Because there are people that don't like the look of video, and want it to resemble film more. So you get a spiral going on. People want it to look like film, the filmmakers change it to look like film, and so people are wondering why the filmmakers change it to look like film.

As is the case with the latest Harry Potter movie, people want the filmmaker's version of the movie, as long as they like it.

But his is the strange part, because film is looking less and less like film. The Pirates movies for example. Shot on film, but after all the processing, doesn't look much like film to me. Again I think much of this has more to do with the over use of color correction tools in the DI process than anything else.

Doug

 

[Zack Gibbs]

Originally Posted by Douglas Monce




But his is the strange part, because film is looking less and less like film. The Pirates movies for example. Shot on film, but after all the processing, doesn't look much like film to me. Again I think much of this has more to do with the over use of color correction tools in the DI process than anything else.

Doug

Agreed, and I hate it. I used to blame the advent of digital grading (and still do ultimately), but it's also just the style of the times. "The Dark Knight," which was at least partially processed photochemically (for the IMAX footage), looks fantastic in "The Dark Knight Prologue." The finished film didn't look bad to be sure, but they certainly washed away some of it's raw beauty IMO.

When I think of Mann's current use of HD cameras, I always think of a Miami Vice shot with the two mains on a rooftop, a storm covered Miami skyline in the background bursting with lighting. It embraces video 100% and it looks fantastic.

 

[Vincent_P]

The 35mm prints of THE DARK KNIGHT were timed photo-chemically. The film didn't undergo a DI (aside from the IMAX version, were the 35mm material was scanned and converted to IMAX), although the IMAX footage was scanned and then recomposed for 35mm anamorphic framing.

Vincent

 

[esl88]

Yeah, the IMAX/Blu-ray version looks very different from what was shown in theaters. IMAX tends to overdo it a bit with their DMR work.

 

[skyscraperfarms]

"To me the use of HD took the film out of its time era and gave it a look that just didn't sync with the subject matter"


Are you high? If this movie was true to the time period it would be in black and white and most likely with no sound. People in the past didn't veiw the world through blurred lenses. Their vision of the world through their eyes looked exactly the same as you and me see things(if you have 20/20 vision) and HD makes things very close to reality.

This movie was very hard to watch, I could not get past the inconsistencies of the films used. It made it impossible for me to keep my attention. If it was all grainy it would've been better or all HD clear it would've been fantastic. Another extremely bad judgement to top of the horrible career of Michael Mann.

 

[cafink]

You registered on the forum to ask Robert Harris whether he's high?

 

[Robert Harris]

I'm confused by this comment. If the "movie was true to the time period" it could well have been in three-strip Technicolor
and certainly would have been sound. Directional audio was only two years away.

RAH

Originally Posted by skyscraperfarms

Are you high? If this movie was true to the time period it would be in black and white and most likely with no sound.

 

[Richard--W]

As a dedicated fan of Michael Mann's work, I'm disappointed in PUBLIC ENEMIES. Shooting on digital media undermines the story he is telling. His aesthetic choices undermine the story he is telling. The steps he takes to tweak the digital media are tantamount to placing an artifact between the viewers' eyes and the movie. If Mann wants to take nostalgia out of the story, there's other ways of doing it with 35mm film. It looked like a flared and muddy mess on the big screen, and it looks like a flared and muddy mess on the rental. I like to play with new toys, too, but Mann is taking this digital obsession too far. I wonder if he has not lost his mind.

My disappointment in PUBLIC ENEMIES extends to the casting. I know something about these people, but even if I didn't, it is painfully obvious that Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, among others, are utterly miscast. Sure they are good actors and deliver at the very least highly professional performances, but they are dramatically, emotionally, physically, and personality-wrong for the parts. I know this will be misunderstood by some of you, but I think Mann needs to start casting American actors in American roles. All Warren Oates and Ben Johnson had to do to play the same characters in the 1973 film was to show up for work. They were authentically cast and they delivered natural, easy authentic performances. Depp (an American / European) and Bale (a Brit) have to work at it, yet their performances are as inauthentic as the digital media in use.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Watched this on rental a week or so ago, and it gave me the impression that I was watching some sort of experiemental Dogme 95 "film".

It just did not work for me -- and I'm glad I didn't do the blindbuy on this one.

_Man_

 

[Yumbo]

Just finished watching this for New Year's Day.

Sound seems unbalanced, but I noticed that it was more 'realistic'. eg. when they're escaping the jail, voices from inside the car, and heard from outside the car. Gunfire was fine. Deliberate perhaps.

Picture was fine, watching at 185" - no EE, murkiness etc.
Seems people need more calibration or different equipment.

I LOVED THE SCORE...seemingly out of place. Interesting how Zimmer was involved.
Kudos to Mann.

 

[Bryan^H]

Originally Posted by Yumbo

Sound seems unbalanced, but I noticed that it was more 'realistic'. eg. when they're escaping the jail, voices from inside the car, and heard from outside the car. Gunfire was fine. Deliberate perhaps.

I thought the same thing watching it in the theater. I'm sure it was deliberate.

 

[EricW]

finally got to watch this movie. i liked it.

the digital parts were so smooth, it made it look like i had Frame Interpolation switched on, which i hate... i actually had to switch off the 24 hz on my PS3 to compensate.
with regards to shooting a period piece with moderns techniques, doesn't that actually do more to draw you INTO the period? i mean, if they'd shot a 70's movie with added grain like Planet Terror / Death Proof, all that does is constantly remind me that i'm in 2009 (or 2010) watching an experience that took place along time ago. if they shoot a period movie with modern ultra detailed cameras, that would do more to bring me into the period. like Benjamin Button. in my opinion anyways.
still, i'd prefer the movie to be completely digital over back and forth, which i think was just as much for effect than lighting. i remember a restaurant scene which had 2 cameras, one on Depp and one on the Red Hamilton character. one was extra grainy and one was totally clear. back and forth. now THAT takes my out of the scene. it's like those acid shots in Tony Scott's Domino which i hated.

also i'm surprised that totally-fake over-the-counter scene was left in, where Depp's face seemed super-imposed over someone else jumping over the desk in the bank robbery sequence.