A Thread to help Future Directors and Writers

[Kavinsky]

Now in the past couple of months in turning on the Tube' and going to the movies I've seen and heard some pretty shotty dialog and camera work, along with reactions and acting in general actually.

 

and writing, the whole spectrum really, and this is supposed to be a golden age where anything can be made nowadays, while I'm seeing the exact opposite.

 

anyways The latest being NCIS LA, with a very poorly shot car chase, the worst I've ever seen in my life. and I mean it.

 

and I want to air my grevances as a movie and tv lover

 

Now Litterally they went a block and a half, and flipped a car and they didnt even capture it right, like how do you screw that up, the episode with Director Vance and Heady getting tied up in some russian plot that recently aired.

 

Setup? a black challenger shoots out after a Crown vic out of an alleyway the camera is moving with the cars the entire time, no sense of speed, no sense of scale, and no steadycam, its bouncing up and down, up and down following the car with a green filter over the thing, with no shots from the sidewalk or anything to give it a sense of scope

 

and the reaction shot of the actors is of Dull Suprise, MST3K levels of Dull surprise!

 

 

they hop a cross walk at low speed, not even any sparks then the crown vic, a polished up perfectly good looking black one that would probably make a fine car is flipped via a pipe ramp over two parked cars

 

not to mention there was no speed in this case, it looked like a 30 to 35 mph car chase.

 

and where do they place the camera? right next to one of the cars that it gets flipped over, pointing at the parked car with it taking up 75%    75%! of the camera

 

and you dont even really see the flip, just something go over and then it jumps to it on the ground with them pulling up next to it.

 

cars flipped! Reaction shot? Dull Surprise! I mean I couldnt make this up if I tried, I mean I'm there laughing my ass off at how bad it was, I mean it was so terrible I dont even wanna look it up!

 

 

 

Now for the directors out there, the whole point of a car chase is to have a sense of speed, a sense of danger, and a sense of claritiy that this is some dangerious stuff going down right here, its kind of like shooting a gun fight in that sense

 

as you want to do it like chinatown 1974, the orange grove scene

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYAUoVJDgRg

 

or a dirty harry film, as actually knowing what firing a gun is like really helps for the director and the actor, even if in a way the scenes full of it

 

 

one handed, 300 grains my ass lol although god I need to get one of those someday, its on the bucket list, even if it didnt work half the time lol

 

but also this shows why sound design is also quite key too.

 

 

so you dont want blue bloods where they're shooting airguns at each other.

 

 

as the audience is a spectator, like a guy on the sidewalk, the guy who walks out in the road and suddenly has two cars go between him at warp 11, or the woman who walks in the road and has her skirt blown up like she's Marlyn Monoroe

 

you want them to go Oh ****!  take cover

 

you never ever EVER want to keep up with the action and have have the cam be unsteadly like that, as it gives a sense of speed sickness, not speed

 

 

and even then it makes the audience sick or think that the camera man isnt doing a good job, as I remember years ago when the third borne film came out in theaters, The Bourne Ultimatum I wasnt the only one who was going what is going on here with the camera man here

 

 

spoilers for the above one FYI, couldnt find quite the scene but you can see the camera work here, and this is paul greengrass, a man I know WHO can direct a good movie, yet he did this?

 

 

or for another example in star trek into darkness, the whole I am Khan scene

 

 

this seriously took me out of the movie, like hold the f'ning camera steady god damn! is what I was thinking when I saw this in the thearter. as the human body does not work like that, plus remember this was on the big screen, so its amplified like a scope amplifies your movement when your aiming down it.

 

so your first thought is somethings wrong with the projector, like the base has come undone somehow.

 

now for those not in the know the human body autobalances itself, its what the lymphete notes in the ear are for, along with probabaly a good amount of lquid in there

 

and this kind of thing pulls the audience out of the action and more into a boat than anything else

 

I mean your telling me in 43 years of movie development they still havent developed a good tripod and technique to keep the camera moving smoothly without taking up too much room in an on location setup?

 

 

and even then they steady it for the rest of the scenes

 

 

I mean this is how you shoot a car chase, aptly called, FEAR is the key, and have movement with the camera

 

 

as there it makes sense, rough terrain, and the camera work is a little rough, it does not make sense on paved road or in a room with a smooth floor

 

granted its not the best shot in the world, and someone cut down the chase scene here for some reason to get it uploaded to youtube

 

but when a 45 year old film has better film work than most films and tv nowadays, something is wrong.

 

 

 

and this is how you a scene in general, STEADY, with a sense of scope and distance, and its focused right, with the background out of focus so the human eye can focus on what's nearest to you, like they did in the older films like this

 

 

and I literally just watched this the other night, the film that got me into the black and whites.

 

 

 

 

as modern digital film and film makers using it have yet to learn how to get the focus right in addition to this steadyness problem with this high def technology, and its partly ruining films by accident if the director does not know this or adjust for it.

 

as everything is on high display now, and its making films worse, not better, not to mention driving the cost up as now the set dressers have to work twice as hard, its kind of the same situation happening in games now

 

the graphics and physics are costing so much that its driving the industry bankrupt, so literally unless its a surefire hit, no one is going to fund it, and thus it gets stale, and dies, or they try and make it up some other way.

 

hence throwbacks like Hotline Miami

 

 

and why you have day one DLC, or someone taking down movie clips or tv show clips thinking its taking away their precious money instead of promoting the work and making people think I oughta buy a copy

 

like I'm thinking I really need to do with Fear is the key right now, or atleast the soundtrack as I'm really a fan of Roy Budd's work, as I have get carter in my video library

 

 

and that's the problem with getting serious money involved, it becomes too expensive to be creative, as downgrading down to the second to greatest thing is often the far wiser choice than doing a specter, the most expensive picture Sony Pictures has ever made

 

as you know they've hit the gold plated lexan bulletproof plastic ceeling just by that, hell I personally think Specter is the next moonraker because of that, plus Craig, I dont want him as bond anymore, bond enjoyed his work, his bond doesnt.

 

and thus the audience cant help but think why dont you go out and do something else if your hearts not in it, and I think that's why people damn Quantom so much, its a miserable film, literally the atmosphere is about misery and how it loves company mixed with a bond film.

 

that and blue bloods, seriously, cops have a sense of humor, if they didnt well the average turn around would be a week with the stuff they deal with, and I mean real humor, the kind you dont see coming half a mile away, like in the bogart scene there with him laughing at the end.

 

 

 

anyways I think I've set the baseline here, feel free to air your grevances with modern tv and movies as I just really, really needed to get that off my chest

Edited May 4, 2015 by Kavinsky