DVDvision
Screenwriter
And more from David Simon, all interesting points regarding this thread subject.
I am completely aware that HD and 16:9 are different technological enhancements. And I am neither defending nor attacking HBO here, save for acknowledging — because it is the absolute truth — that they own The Wire, having paid more than $100 million to complete the project when ratings were so insubstantial that its completion was improbable. It is their product to display. You would do well to give yourself less credit for reading between the lines and instead assume that I have taken pains to say exactly what I intend.If you are a filmmaker, then you cannot overlook the empty hole at the center of your argument — the fact that you refuse to acknowledge that choices are made at the point of composing every shot and filming every shot that do not merely involve the width and length of the frame, but the depth and definition of the image. You are oblivious to the thousands of times in the actual filming of The Wire that the crew stood around the monitors, watching playback, and trying to assess whether something in background that we didn’t want to “read” would in fact “read” upon broadcast. Decisions were then made that the SD presentation would ensure that we would never pick up, say, the black ink over Andre Royo’s teeth, or a street sign that actually doesn’t comport to dialogue about the claimed location, or the fact that Stringer Bell is breathing in frame after being shot to death.
Film is artifice. We are lying at every ****ing moment, trying to conjure fictional imagery and suspend disbelief, and we are doing so with finite time and resources. Choices must be made about how much daylight and money can be spent protecting in background and deep background against dozens of falsities in every single shot. We must, as filmmakers, prioritize, moving on to fresh work when we feel we have covered a scene sufficiently without so great a fraud embedded in the frame that the film is undercut. And we make every one of those calculations knowing the format in which the film is to be broadcast and released.Now, years later, technology advances and what was once “safe” in small details and background material becomes more visible to the eye. Now one of the film’s most important assets as a means of storytelling — its ability to suspend the viewer’s disbelief — is made vulnerable in many, many different ways. Not merely by the change in aspect-ratio, but by the introduction of HD display on television. Is there a gain for the viewer in seeing things more clearly defined? Of course. But there is also corresponding cost in credibility elsewhere. And I can tell you, being internal to the HD transfer process, that decisions were made in every episode about how much time and money we had to fix all of the myriad “flaws” that were exposed in that transfer. We did the best we could. We focused on the more egregious exposures. But make no mistake, the transfer of the film to HD revealed unintended problems that would not have been problems otherwise, in the same way that a change in aspect-ratio does.Is it worth upgrading the film? Maybe so. Certainly as a financial question, it is worth it to HBO. But the hypocrisy of people now claiming HD as the “truest” form of the film, merely because it can be achieved using the original film and present technology, while wailing jeremiads about a change in aspect-ratio, which in the case of The Wire can also be achieved using the original film without pan-and-scan, is profound. The filmmakers’ intention was to tell a story that would be acquired in 4:3 with standard definition. Those were our givens. We executed every decision with complete awareness of those givens. We protected our imagery with those specifications guiding us. And indeed, when on occasions such as premiere showings, we displayed episodes of the drama in a film theater rather than on television — a scenario that you use to premise your argument above — we did indeed have to sit and wince to see some of our artifice exposed. But of course, we were not making the film for theater distribution and display, so these rare occasions were hardly disconcerting. We knew that we had protected for the actual medium in which our work was to be acquired by its audience.Now you want to talk about the “true” form of our film and make after-the-fact declarations about what the new givens should be? And you don’t see that you’re simply valuing the “enhancements” that you do, and not valuing those that you don’t? You don’t see that you are no more a film purist than any hack who wants the black bars off his widescreen? Sorry, no. We made the film when we made it and every single decision was made with the specifications of 4:3 and SD in mind. You want to stay pure, you watch the DVDs. You want to play around with the film beyond that, then be honest about your role. And maybe think twice before you lecture someone else about what they should and shouldn’t do on behalf of your personal values and priorities.HBO is choosing to apply today’s standard technologies to a film made to different specifications with regard to not only width or length, but to depth as well. Having paid to complete that 60-hour film when it had little audience, they are now attempting to enhance their revenue stream. They have that absolute right. As one of the filmmakers, I believe my role is to do my best to protect the integrity of the film within that process and to influence the process for the better. If HBO decides to offer the film in other formats or other venues, it will remain my role. There is nothing written between those lines, much as you might think yourself possessed of such insight that you imagine some additional words there.
