This is a booklet covering some of the key debates around the effect of digitisation in the film industry.

1. Film Studies
Background Notes
Paper 2: Section A
Critical Approaches to Film:
Contemporary US and British Film
The Significance of Digital in Film and the
New Possibilities for Cinema

2. 1
The Film Industry in the Digital Age
The film industry has always used new technologies relating to the making and
showing of films (although crucially, this has not always occurred as soonas the
technologies have become available).
A brief list of crucial technological moments in the history of cinema might include:
1. The mechanical projection of moving images to create the original silent movies in
makeshift cinemas in the late 1890s;
2. The financially successful introduction of sound (the 'talkies') in the late 1920s/early 1930s
which led to massive changes in the industry;
3. The widespread adoption of colour and widescreen
in the 1950s in an effort to combat the competition
from television caused by the mass production of
TV sets, changing leisure patterns, and the
movement of much of the population out to newly
built suburbs following the Second World War;
4. The gimmicky, ultimately unsuccessful first efforts
to offer the public three-dimensional film in the
same period, again in an effort to offer the public
something different from television;
5. The increasing use of television from the 1960s as a
medium for showing films with the accompanying
realization that in this way old films could
effectively be recycled or resold;
6. The advent of VHS rental and recording from the
1970s opening up the possibility of again reselling
old films but also effectively re-releasing relatively
new films to a new 'window' after a period at the
cinema;
7. The introduction of satellite and cable channels
from the 1980s which again offered a further
'window' for both old and relatively recent films (main package channels, premium
subscription channels and pay-to-view channels of course effectively further subdivided this
'window');
8. The increased marketing of the 'home cinema concept' from the 1990s so that with
technology allowing larger screens and surround sound something approaching an analogous
cinema experience becomes possible;
9. The move to DVD technology from the late 1990s which with the use of 'extras' and an
enhanced experience encourages consumers to replace their old video film library with the
latest disc format;
10. The increasing use of the Internet from the late 1990s, for marketing initially but also more
recently for downloading films (VOD);
11. The advent from around 2000 of digital projection facilities in cinemas;
12. The recent 'format war' between HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc to become the successor
generation format to DVD.
13. The revitalisation of blockbuster films through the use of improved CGI….

3. 2
Each of these moments of technological change for the industry are essentially concerned with the
viewing experience, but it is also true that there has been a parallel series of technological changes in
the production of films.
For example, when sound is successfully
integrated into film then the cameras have to
become silent in order that their mechanical
noises are not picked up and obviously
sound technology has to develop quickly in
order to enable voices to be picked up
clearly; in fact a whole new field of
production and creativity opens up.
Perhaps we have currently reached a similar
turning point because the big question now
is what impact new digital possibilities for
filmmaking and exhibition are going to have
on the industry.
Digital technologies and the Spectator
New technologies might be said to offer spectators:
1. An improved overall qualitative experience as a result of better sound and/or image
reproduction;
2. Enhanced spectacle perhaps through the sheer overpowering size of the screen or the impact
on the senses of a surrounding wall of sound;
3. Improved ease of access, or ease of use, for instance, through enabling people to curate their
own film collections in various formats;
4. New, easier, and intensified ways of using film for pleasure, for example, IMAX would seem
to offer an intense 'fairground ride' for the senses;
5. An enhanced intellectual experience through the provision of increased knowledge or
understanding, for instance through the use of commentaries by directors on DVDs;
6. The chance to use new, ever cheaper and more compact devices to make films for
themselves…

4. 3
Digital technologies and the Film Industry
New technologies offer the industry:
1. The possibility of an improved opportunity to create profits (the costs or required expenditure
involved in bringing in the new technology will be carefully balanced against the projected
additional income before any new technology is
introduced);
2. The chance to repackage and resell old products,
especially cult and 'classic' movies, thereby
establishing a new audience base, or even fan
base, for an old product;
3. An opportunity to place products for sale in new
'windows', thereby lengthening the commercial
life of each film (a film may now be sold to
consumers via the cinema, satellite and cable TV,
DVD, Blu-Ray, VOD, and terrestrial TV);
4. The chance to encourage multiple purchases of
essentially the same product (so any one
consumer might pay to see a film in the cinema,
then later pay to watch the same film on pay-to-
view, before later still buying his or her own copy
on DVD);
5. Overall, enhanced production, distribution and
exhibition possibilities.
Digital Technologies and the Cinema Experience
It could be argued that new technologies have always added to, rather than detracted from, the
cinema experience. The size and/or quality of the spectacle have been enhanced by each new
development adding to the unique nature of the cinematic 'event' (even the advent of television in a
sense only highlights the difference and in particular the spectacle of the cinema experience).
The experience of the cinema itself cannot be easily replicated or replaced but the alternative
experiences of pay-TV, or home cinema, have their own attractions particularly in terms of flexibility
of viewing. The advent of TV and changed leisure patterns (binge-watching box sets anyone?) ended
the social dominance of the cinema as a source of entertainment and information (remember this was
once the only place you could see visual images of news events).
The cinema experience has made something of a comeback, although attendance is never going to
match the heights attained in 1946 in both the USA and Britain.
As with studying the content of the films themselves, what we find is that the industry and its
technological base always have to be seen within social, economic, political and historical
contexts.
Towards the end of the Second World War and immediately after, cinema attendance peaked, as
without the presence of television sets in the home people sought news images and perhaps some sort
of collective, community-enhancing escape. The nature of cinema attendance at this moment was

5. 4
determined by the nature of the historical moment, and this is always the case. Our job is to try to
understand how changes and developments within the film industry might be connected to the
contexts of the period in which they take place.
FOR: Supporters of the Internet suggest that this marks a new era of democratization and freedom of
choice empowering ordinary people to produce and receive information and entertainment from all
over the world.
AGAINST: Others suggest that this development, isolating consumers from face-to-face human
interaction, enables them to be more tightly controlled and manipulated. Other critics note the
increased access to pornography, echo chamber ‘fake’ news, extreme right-wing, or terrorist,
propaganda available on the Internet, or point to an increasing gap between information-rich and
information-poor populations.

6. 5
‘Cinema is gone. The cinema I grew up with and that I’m making, it’s
gone.’ Martin Scorsese
‘I love film, but it's a nineteenth century invention. The century of film
has passed.’ George Lucas
How has Digital Changed Cinema?
With the development of digital technologies, the
production, distribution, exhibition and reception
of film have been – and continue to be – radically
transformed.
If one were to take a selective 'snap-shot' of the
filmmaking process you might find the following
digital interventions at work.
1. First is the use of electronic, 'moving
image' storyboards in both the pre-production
and production stages of film-making first
pioneered by Francis Ford Coppola during the
making of Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992).
So, instead of hand-drawn, inanimate storyboards
being used to 'pitch' a film, or organise and
dynamise a shooting schedule, the director and
cinematographer on a film utilise an electronic
simulation of the story/scene that is to be made – a
simulation which more accurately visualises what
is to be shot.
2. Second is the increasing use of Digital
Video (DV) cameras to shoot both documentary
and full length feature films. DV has a number of
advantages over celluloid film.
Cameras are more mobile, and generally lighter to
use; they are easier to operate; and reduce the
costs of shooting and editing, particularly because
they do not use the comparatively more expensive
film stock, neither do they need their video formats processing in the same way.
Shooting 'complex' scenes is easier to organise, especially in relation to the relative ease with which
light source can be monitored (unlike the arduous lighting systems needed for shooting on celluloid).

7. 6
Mike Figgis utilised the flexibility of the digital format for the groundbreaking Time Code (2000).
The film was shot in 'real-time', with four interconnecting stories being played out on a split screen at
the same time (see left). The length of the film is the length of the tape that Figgis had to shoot with.
Events, actions, dramas, therefore, unfold on
the screen as they (arguably) did during the
shoot.
3. Third is the use of digital special
effects or Computer Generated
Imagery(CGI) in the filmmaking
processes.
Increasingly almost all fiction films have one
or two different types of digital special
effect: invisible special effects, which
Buckland (1999) suggests ‘constitute up to
90 per cent of the work of the special effects
industry [and] are not meant to be noticed by film spectators’; and visible special effects, or those
special effects which produce some wondrous, fantastic, out-of-this-world creation that produces the
Wow! That can't be real reaction from spectators and audiences.
The digitally created dinosaurs in Jurassic Park (1993) or the stop-motion action/spectacle sequences
in The Matrix (1999) are two early examples of this. However, Titanic (1997) is an example of a film
that is most remembered for its visible digital special effects, namely in the form of the good ship
itself, but which is actually saturated in moments of invisible special effects, whether it be the
seamless simulation of Southampton Docks, the waves the audience see crashing against the vessel,
or computerised passengers walking on the decks as the ship sails away into the distance.
Such is the growth in CGI that it constitutes a major division of the film-making industry, initially
headed by George Lucas' Industrial
Light and Magic company but
increasingly being dominated by the
VFX industry in the UK. It is also
now of course, thanks to
Disney/Pixar, a developed animated
film form. The ground-breaking Toy
Story (1995) was the first ever,
complete CGI movie and one that
established the trend for films to be
generated solely from digital
hardware and software. However,
CGI is also a technology which has
`trickled down' into domestic use:
digital effect software packages are
sold in electrical retailers and used to
enhance everything from home videos to A Level Film Studies coursework in schools!

8. 7
Since his first Star Wars film, George Lucas has been a leader in applying technology to the cinema. His
movie, Episode I: The Phantom Menace, contained almost 2,000 digital-effects shots.Yet Lucas took the
digitization ofThe Phantom Menace a step further. During its premiere in the summer of1999,
showings were digitally projected. Audiences were amazed at the outstanding audio and the clarity and
brightness ofthe pictures.The D-projectors performed well, but the technology must come down in
price before its improved audio and visual presentation reaches a mainstream audience.
(Scientific American November 2000)
4. Fourth are the developing use of direct-to-theatre satellite and/or the Internet to
distribute – or rather transmit – and exhibit new film releases.
The cost of making prints, coordinating exhibition schedules and distributing them to individual
theatres (across the globe) is extremely expensive. Copyright is also a problem with piracy a
common feature of print distribution as it is, so the major studios are looking at ways to utilise
telecommunications to reduce costs, negate piracy, but also, arguably, to increase the audio-visual
experience for audiences – film prints can get heavily scratched in transit and during projection while
the digital image remains picture perfect:
Digital distribution would shave over US $10 million dollars in domestic post-production
print manufacturing costs for a Hollywood budget for a tent-pole production. If the
39,000 screens in North America were to switch to digital projection today, film studios
would save $800 million they spend annually on making, insuring and shipping film
prints. (Miller 2001)
However, it is the Internet where the most radical transformations are beginning to take place.
Independent, Internet-based film studios (such as Amazon and Netflix) use the Internet to by-pass
the major studios' monopoly of distribution and exhibition, to stream film/video straight into the
home. With broadband technology, and with enhanced home cinema options, increasingly reception
'at home' becomes as good as watching a movie at the cinema.
5. Finally, digital technologyis transforming the audio-visual experience at
cinemas. On the most basic of levels, with digital Surround Sound, improved projection and
screening facilities, or with the digital image itself being relayed from a mainframe computer

9. 8
terminal elsewhere, film watching becomes ever more virtual. However, it is with the development
of very large screen systems, of which IMAX is the market leader, that film viewing becomes an
ever more sensory dependent experience. Cinema becomes spectacle and display.
IMAX combines a horizontally run 70mm film with screen size as large as 100ft x 75ft. The screen
itself is slightly curved and with seating arranged in closer proximity, the screen image washes over
the audience. This sensory experience is extended through the development of hemispherical screens,
3D IMAX, where the ‘3D’ glasses that are worn render the film three-dimensional, and Showscan,
which combines the large-screen format with synchronised, moving and tilting seats in the
auditorium. Spectators no longer just watch a film; they live it, more able than ever before to 'enter'
its imaginings.
In short, film in the digital age has metamorphosed into something touched by spectacle, by ease of
use and ease of access. Digital film revolutionises the production, distribution and exhibition
processes. Satellite and the Internet revolutionise not only the `public' distribution and exhibition of
film but the 'private' sphere, as film/video increasingly starts or ends up on the Web and downloaded
from or into the home.

10. 9

11. 10
The Impact of Film Piracy
Headline Figures in 2016:
1. The UK’s film, TV and video industries lose £500 million a year due to copyright theft. This
equates to a total economic loss to the UK economy of £1.2 billion. (2011)
2. Almost 30% of the UK population is active in some form of piracy (2014)
3. In 2014, the UK film distribution sector generated £1.6 million in revenue; and an estimated
£262 million in export revenue for the UK economy.
4. The sector’s economic activity, through its direct and indirect effects combined, yielded an
estimated £410 million in tax revenue for the UK government.
5. In 2014 the Creative Industries accounted for 5.2% of the UK economy, sustaining and
supporting 1.8 million jobs.
6. Deadpool was the most pirated film of 2016 ahead of Batman v Superman, Captain America:
Civil War, Star Wars The Force Awakens, & X-Men Apocalypse.
Any attempt to ignore the fast approaching
world of legal film downloading is seen as
'swimming against the tide'. Piracy is a
major concern of all film distributors and
has been since the widespread arrival of
internet broadband in the early noughties. In
the UK, the Film Council's report Film
Theft in the UK from 2004 claimed that
only Austria and Germany have a higher
degree of DVD piracy in Europe.
Levels of piracy are relatively stable in the
UK. Although over the longer term there was a continued decline in physical piracy, digital piracy
levels increased year-on-year to compensate and overall piracy levels are now at around 29-32% of
the population.
A report published in 2009 found that some straightforward steps to tackle film piracy would
increase UK economic output by £614 million and protect the jobs of many thousands of people
employed in the film industry, as well as creating some 7,900 jobs in the wider economy.
The audio-visual sector currently loses about £500m in the UK each year (up from £459m in 2006)
from the direct impact of copyright theft, equating to a total economic loss to the economy of £1.2
billion. This is felt right through the industry, from cinema, video, and television – including cable
and satellite – and legal Internet services.
At a time when the Government is working towards universal access to broadband services and is
looking to the audio-visual sector to invest in the production of new and original content, Britain's
creative community are seeking reassurance that their copyright will be properly protected, so that
they can play their part in promoting demand for broadband through compelling content.

12. 11
Digital Projection & Distribution
Another aspect of technological change that might concern us is digital projection.
The Digital Screen Network (DSN) project was the UK Film Council's attempt to provide cinemas
with digital projection facilities that began in 2005. It was hoped (but by no means guaranteed) that
more small-scale independent films would get seen this way. Digital technology has the potential to
make life a lot better for low budget filmmakers and distributors.
In the case of short films, it is now possible for these to reach a potentially wide audience via a range
of hosts, from the BFI, to The BBC Film Network and Big Film Shorts, and a host of short film
festivals, all of whom have online submission.
So, can one detect a legacy ten years later the birth of the DSN? Without doubt, the UK now releases
more films today than ever, with foreign language and more ‘specialised films’ receiving wider
distribution than ever before. More people chose to see these films, a fact reflected in the box office.
Positing a causal link might be dangerous, although it perhaps churlish to suggest that the DSN, had
no effect at all. What is clear, however, is that the DSN prepared the way in terms of understanding
and acceptance that digital cinema would be the future, whether wanted or not, and that UK
conversion was faster and less complex than it might otherwise have been.
As far as the major studios and distributors are concerned, digital technology offers great potential to
increase profits and dangers in equal measure. Digital distribution has certainly transformed the
film industry more than any previous technological change since sound. Once it became the norm to
download film via broadband, the potential for a new form of 'blanket distribution' was obvious—not
only do you no longer need multiple prints; you can also bypass the cinemas (although the big screen
offers a separate experience that is likely to remain attractive).

13. 12
Digital film has the advantage of offering identical versions of the film to each viewer, and this will
without doubt save billions of pounds at the distribution phase. Despite the 'hype' over piracy (see
earlier) and the digital enabling of this illegal activity, industry commentators believe that one
advantage of digital distribution will be control and security, as most piracy is the result of a cinema-
goer with a hidden camcorder distributing a poor quality version of a film to parts of the world
where it has not yet been released (because the prints are currently somewhere else). Simultaneous
global distribution via the Internet will put an end to this 'time gap' and thus its exploitation by
pirates.
One issue for debate is about the quality of digital movies. Whereas some filmmakers and critics
argue that the 'binary reduction' of images in the digital compression process reduces the complexity
of image and light, it appears that just as music in .mp3 format comes without the parts that the
human ear cannot hear, so digital films remove the degrees of texture that most viewers wouldn't
notice anyway.
In the old days the ‘film’ we sawat our local multiplex may have been shown many times over and the
wear and tear on it will be considerable:scratches, dust and fading all reduce the quality ofthe
presentation. Even before wear and tear kicks in, what we are watching may well be a third generation
copy - a photocopy ofa photocopy - where the original definition is inevitably lost.Some experts believe
that Digital cinema will overtake the quality ofthe best conventional cinema within the next year or
two, and at the same time address age-old industry problems. Prints are bulky and their manufacture,
distribution and exhibition are labour intensive and therefore expensive. What's more,in a world
increasingly concerned with the impact industry has on the environment; it is hard to justify the use of
a technology (film manufacturing), which involves a highly toxic process,when a cleaner alternative is
available.
Nigel Randle & Keith Culkin, Digital Cinema: Opportunities and Challenges, 2004
Another interesting prediction that Randle
and Culkin make is to speculate that digitally
generated ‘synthetic actors’ may soon
replace film extras - more on that later…
The digitalisation of film offers a range of
new institutional practices. There are greater
possibilities for the manipulation of the
image itself, the editing process becoming
more creative and composite images can be
produced to incorporate digital animation.
The current 'one way’ process of film
making and consuming is threatened by the
interactive 'zeitgeist’ so that the generation
of audience, you, who are immersed in online media and videogames are likely to require new forms
of interactivity in the film medium.
Digital technology has reduced the costs of film making so much that DV can be seen as widening
access to the 'means of production' for new creative talent. And the convergence of media through
digital technology creates new opportunities for distributing and exhibiting.

14. 13
The digital rejuvenation offilm is not limited to the grand-scale strategies ofa large industry. The
digital has created newcultural economies. There is clearly a place for short film via the internet.
Through different websites,the digital version of film breaks down the limitations ofexhibition that
have controlled what it is possible for audiences to see. Digital cameras have made it possible to have
filmic qualities in the smallest ofproductions. Although this expansive development offilm is still quite
circumscribed, it demonstrates how'film' has been more accessible and is connected to the wider new
media and cultural phenomenon ofthe will-to-produce.
(Marshall 2004)
Will cinema survive?
Cinema as an institution has survived several threats to its life. Most notably, it was predicted in the
1950s that television would make it extinct, but cinema survived by securing cinema releases prior to
TV broadcast and because of its social, 'night out' context.
In the 1970s, the VCR seemed
to have put a bigger nail in the
coffin, but this time cinemas
redefined themselves as
multiplexes, offering a broader
'leisure experience' on an
American model, together with
the emergence of the
'blockbuster' and its associated
expensive marketing.
Despite multi-channel
television and Netflix/Amazon
Prime offering viewers the
opportunity to download films
to watch at their convenience,
hard drive recording of on-air free films, specialist film channels that are now relatively cheap to
subscribe, cinema still survives.
So the question is—will cinema always survive technological change, or is the latest technology a
bigger threat because it is at the exhibition end of the chain?
Whereas the changes in accessibility given above are to do with distribution, the pleasure of the
cinematic experience is determined greatly by the size and quality of the image.
Hollywood films in particular are still largely driven by spectacle, noise, and plot (perhaps with an
eye to the preservation of the cinema box office) rather than character, and people still want to see
these films on the biggest screen with the loudest sound.

15. 14
The question then arises: what are the consequences or implications for cinema now and in the future
from such radical transformations?
Three potential scenarios emerge, each outlined below.
1. The End of Narrative Cinema?
It can be argued that the
increasing use of digital
special effects, across all
generic types of film,
establishes the dominance
of spectacle and the
spectacular as the 'new'
structuring or linguistic
device in the way 'film' tells
its stories. In particular,
VFX can be seen to come to
displace narrative or three-
dimensional
characterisation, dramatic
(human) encounter and plot development.
In this scenario, contemporary cinema is reduced to a purely – albeit spectacular – visual experience.
In fact, it can be argued that visual effects cinema revisits early cinema's 'cinema of attractions',
where what is shown (the ‘WOW’ moment) is the 'main story', and the technology behind this vision
the 'back story'.
Ridley Scott's Gladiator (2000) is an early example of this: it is the digital reconstruction of Rome,
the Coliseum, the roaring crowds, the spectacular fight sequences, and ultimately the digital
'reincarnation' of Oliver Reed (who died while making the film) that makes the film a visual rather
than a narrative experience. Ridley Scott is often criticised for being just a 'visual' filmmaker, as a
director who relies on the image to tell a story.
If one links this to the developments in screen projection then vision or the visual-spectacular seems
to be the tour de force of modem cinema.
However, it is with the sci-fi/fantasy genre where the argument seems to have most weight.
Not only is it with sci-fi/fantasy that state-of-the-art special effects are often first developed and
used, but the genre provides the textual context for their use. These films demand that everything
from alien beings to future societies be visually, believably created.
Given that science fiction/fantasy films have now dominated box office takings for over 30 years
(unlike, for example, in the 1950s, where science fiction movies were low budget 'B' movies), it is
clear that for audiences’ VFX cinema reigns supreme:
From The Godfather to Jaws to Star Wars, we see films that are increasingly plot-driven,
increasingly visceral, kinetic, and fast-paced, increasingly reliant on special effects,
increasingly 'fantastic' (and thus apolitical), and increasingly targeted at younger
audiences. Thomas Schatz (1993)

16. 15
There is one further inflection to the argument:
digital effects-based cinema connects film to
the theme park environment. It is argued that
the digitally created special effect often
simulates the theme park ride. In this
conception, narrative is totally effaced as the
cinema experience mutates into the theme park
ride. The connection, of course, is maintained
because many theme parks - Universal and
Disney in particular - movie-theme their rides.
In summary, digital effects-based cinema
supposedly sounds the death knell for
narrative cinema, producing an aesthetic that
relies on the visual, the spectacular and the
theme park ride. Its visual aesthetic, then, ultimately ties it to the philosophical idea that the modern
world is lived and experienced in a culture of sight.
2. The End of American Studio Domination?
It can be reasoned that digital and computer mediated communication technologies have the
capability to democratise the processes of film-making and to challenge/change the way films are
produced, distributed and exhibited, undermining American studio domination of the film-making
processes. The argument runs as follows:
First, digital film-making technology enables a new generation of first-time film-makers to explore
the potentialities of film without the need for (very) expensive equipment, or for highly specialised
skills that take years of training to master. For example, the British director Shane Meadows' first
two films (Where's the Money, Ronnie? and Smalltime, both 1996) came out of his exploration of
the video/digital version of the medium, independent of film school training.
The spectrum ofbudgets for digital movies is very wide. The Star Wars prequels were shot with high-
definition cameras and cost more than $100 million. Lars von Trier's latest digital feature, Dancer in
the Dark, cost about $13 million. Other established directors have made digital features in the $2- to $8-
million range, including Mike Figgis (Time Code), Spike Lee (Bamboozled). Many novice filmmakers
have directed first features for less than $10,000. Some have even been made for under $1,000. Shot
with a consumer digital video camera on a $900 budget, the thriller The Last Broadcast is in home
video and television distribution in the U.S. and abroad.
Scientific American, November 2000
Second, computer mediated communication technologies such as the Internet have provided these
new independent digital film-makers with a distribution/transmission space that requires little
investment to use, and which circumvent the normal (public' distribution and exhibition sites for film
(which are dominated by the American studios). A film made on a DV camera can then be edited at
home, on a sophisticated domestic software package, and then sold, rented or given free to Internet
distribution companies to stream on-line.
Third, digital technology opens up the way film texts are viewed and interacted with, since the digital
image can be played around with again once it has left the 'author'. With digital technology, film
endings can be re-written, agreed on 'communally', have multiple storylines, or simply appropriated

17. 16
by viewers who can reconfigure their structure and look. For example, the $6m interactive feature
The Darkening (1997) was released on CD-ROM, enabling audiences to navigate their own way
through a multi-layered and open-ended narrative:
...digital images are manipulatable, not only by the artists but also by the viewer. Digital
image and sounds can be altered. sounds and images can be added to a recording, digital
images can be broken up, colorised, morphised. Paul Schrader (1996)
In short, digital and telecommunications technology have the potential to pluralise and decentralise
the way films transmitted, and are produced and financed, distributed/transmitted by interactive
audiences.
3. The Death of Cinema?
The most apocalyptic answer to the question of the effect of digitalisation and computer mediated
communication technologies on film has been to suggest that reel (celluloid) film is in a state of
terminal decline and will in effect very quickly become an antiquated way to make films.
The argument runs that
because digital is cheaper, the
image that it produces is
more robust and yet more
manipulative/flexible, and it
is easier to use, film-makers
will abandon celluloid
altogether in the digital age.
The sense of a potential loss
here is great. It is argued that
celluloid produces a
particular type of moving
image that represents action,
drama, landscapes, etc. in
particularly charged ways. With the death of celluloid comes the de-skilling of the industry as a
range of professional roles are taken up by those who barely know (or need to know) how to hold a
camera or measure light or frame a scene 'properly'. The very nature of the democracy implied by
digital film-making is that anybody, no matter how inexperienced, can make a film.
Further, with the potential digitalisation of cinemas, and the increasing use of the Internet to stream
videos, the cinemas where film can be shown are likely to diminish in numbers until they become
mere museum pieces. Just as today preservation groups place into heritage old 'Picture Palaces',
tomorrow they will put preservation orders on projection rooms where celluloid was once put on
flatbed 'platters'. This is potentially then a double death: the death of film stock and the death of the
cameras and the projection equipment used to showcase it.
Filmmakers such as Paul Schrader celebrate this terminal decline, and wish for its death to come
quickly:
Technologically, film - at least as exhibited in cinemas - is very antiquated. We still show
moving pictures the way the Lumieres did, pumping electric light through semi-

18. 17
transparent cells, projecting shadows on a white screen. These techniques belong in a
museum. A change is overdue. (1996)
Others, such as Quentin Tarantino, JJ Abrams and Christopher Nolan, argue the opposite. They
would rather a future where old and new technologies existed side-by-side, pluralising the form of
the moving image in ways that a mono-technology could not achieve.
However, there is one further turn to make in the argument about digital effects. If digital becomes
the preferred film-making technology, if CGI becomes the dominant mode of representation - so
much so that, for example, CGI replace human actors, such as Peter Cushing’s character in Rogue
One (2016), and if exhibition sites become more virtual as physical celluloid is replaced by the
digital image, then the total cinematic experience becomes one based on simulation and artifice.
On a film set, the camera is rolling only a small percentage ofthe time because ofthe expense ofstock
and processing and the amount oftime required lighting and setting up each shot.On a digital set, the
camera is recording a much greater percentage ofthe time. Directors often use two cameras, something
that is unaffordable on most conventional film sets. And because digital video production often
necessitates a streamlined approach to crewand equipment, the resulting aesthetic choices frequently
make lighting simpler and less time consuming.This lets filmmakers work with actors in ways that
would be impossible on film. Directors can shoot rehearsals, capturing inspired moments that would
otherwise have been lost.
Scientific American November 2000

19. 18
Avatar: changing the face of film for ever
The Daily Telegraph, December 2009.
Q. Read the following article and make notes on to what extent Avatar has proven to
be a ‘game-changer’ for the movie industry.
The 3D movie, Avatar, is the 'game-changer'that insiders have been waiting for.
Forget the dialogue. Don't get too worked up
about the plot. Caught in 3D at London's bfi
IMAX – the largest cinema screen in the UK
– James Cameron's Avatar is a gob-smacking
sensory wow, setting an immediate new
benchmark for the blockbuster. Cameron's
aim with this long-in-gestation sci-fi epic is
to show off what digital 3D can do. And
anyone with half an interest in what the
future of film might look like is going to
want to see it.
This certainly explains why the IMAX at
Waterloo – perhaps the only known answer
to the question "When is a cinema also a roundabout? – is swamped with as much human traffic right
now as Harrods on Christmas Eve. Advance bookings have broken global records for a single screen:
at the IMAX alone, Avatar already had 47,487 ticket sales (a gross of more than £600,000) a day
before it opened.
Demand for the film is such that this cinematic Mecca hardly shuts up shop. Even the screenings at
3.40am are proving to be a sell-out.
"It's mind-blowing," says Dennis Laws, the cinema's affable general manager, who has worked in the
field of 3D projection for over 30 years. "I dress like a punter and listen to the comments as people
come out. We've got five flights of stairs on the way down so I hear lots, and do it with several
showings of each film.
"To date, I've not heard anyone who hasn't said, 'I want to see it again'. There's so much to look at,
they want to rewind and enjoy that moment three or four more times. That's the secret – that's why
Star Wars was so phenomenally successful."
It's no surprise that Cameron has the geek vote sewn up. His dedication to whizz-bang technical
showmanship puts even Peter Jackson and George Lucas in the shade. Hardcore fans know what
extra amplification IMAX can offer Avatar: there's no better place to gawp than on a screen the
height of five double-decker buses.
The question is: how is it going to play everywhere else? Since it first entered production, the $300
million Avatar has been subject to the most intense industry scrutiny of any blockbuster in memory,
or at least since The Phantom Menace and The Fellowship of the Ring. What had Cameron been

20. 19
keeping up his sleeve since Titanic? Was this really the "game-changer" we kept being told it was,
and what might that even mean?
Advances in digital 3D had been a step-by-step business since Robert Zemeckis's The Polar Express
in 2004, which still does healthy business at IMAXs each festive season. But Cameron was
promising a huge leap forward: crystal-clear images without that halfway-to-a-cartoon look, and a
new level of depth, detail and perspective. It's not just a movie the entire industry is eagerly
anticipating, but one it has had to adapt to accommodate.
"The most important thing that Avatar has done," explains Laws, "is to force the exhibition industry
to get off the fence and make a decision as to whether to install digital projection, and more
importantly digital 3D. Over the past four or five months, all the companies that install these
projectors have been going absolutely crazy."
At the end of 2008, only 69 screens in Britain could handle digital 3D. Now there are 375. This is in
part thanks to help from the UK Film Council, which is continuing its drive to help both multiplexes
and smaller cinemas switch to digital.
In turn, distributors have more than doubled the number of 3D releases on their calendar – 13 this
year compared with six the year before. Next year, it will double again. One of these films, the
forthcoming StreetDance 3D, will be the first made in the UK by a British production company.
Cameron's original hope for Avatar was that it could be a 3D-only proposition, but however quickly
cinemas scurried to update their capabilities, it wasn't quite quickly enough. The film is being shown
in several formats, including conventional 2D. Whether audiences favour the 3D (and IMAX 3D)
versions is a significant factor in how far Avatar will spearhead the 3D-ification of effects
blockbusters to come.
Avatar feels like an experience designed to convert the sceptics, because Cameron isn't just parading
his third dimension as window-dressing but exploring it to the full, pushing the recesses of the screen
back further than anyone has attempted before. The 3D application isn't just a gimmick here – the
gimcrack, poke-you-in-the-face provocation beloved of 1950s creature-features – but a gateway to
immersion in a strange new world.
Disney and Pixar have also pledged that all their animated features from now on will be in 3D. Still,
Pixar's Up attempted it with a softly-softly approach: there was nothing coming out at us frontally,
leading doubters to question whether it needed to be in 3D at all.
"It's about educating the audience," thinks Laws. "You know you can do it, but the question needs to
be asked: should you do it? Will the enjoyment be enhanced by 3D, or is it simply there to add a
couple more pounds to the ticket price?"
What does seem clear at this stage, and Avatar makes even clearer, is that 3D is no longer a passing
whim. "Digital has made the change," says Laws. "Way back in the 1970s, I ran polarised 3D on
35mm. It was never any good. You had to go in person to every cinema that showed it. The
projectionists weren't trained on how to set the lenses up, and it was crucial that it was set up
correctly, otherwise it just didn't work. With digital, as long as no one fiddles with anything, it
works."

21. 20
What's particularly impressive about the Avatar experience at London's IMAX is how perfectly
Cameron's showmanship marries with the venue. While I talk to Laws over the phone, there's a
muffled roar, and he breaks off in mid-sentence. There's been a front-of-house announcement; a
screening is about to start, and thunderous applause can be heard as he pushes his door ajar.
Laws and his staff love to cultivate this air of expectation – it's what really makes the fans feel
they're getting a different experience from what they watch at home, however elaborate their living-
room set-up.
This takes us right back to the 1950s, when 3D came in, along with CinemaScope and such instantly
obsolete fads as Smell-O-Vision, to tempt viewers away from their tellies and back to the silver
screen. Its souped-up re-emergence, in an age of Blu-ray and 100-inch plasma screens, is serving a
similar purpose.
As the roar subsides, Law sounds like a satisfied ringmaster. "Those people now have adrenalin
running through them like you can't believe. Half of the people in there will have never been in a
cinema where everybody has clapped and cheered."
As it starts, they wind up the sound on that 20th Century Fox drumroll – "to really make it smack
them in the stomach". Revolution may be too early to call, but the ticket barriers can consider
themselves stormed.

22. 21
George Lucas & Steven Spielberg on the
Future of Cinema
Variety, 12th June, 2013
Q. What do George Lucas & Steven Spielberg predict in this article from Variety in
2013? To what extent do you agree?
Looking into their crystal ball, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg predicted the imminent arrival of
a radically different entertainment landscape, including pricey movie tickets, a vast migration of
content to video-on-demand and even programmable dreams.
Speaking on a panel at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, Spielberg and Lucas took a grim view of
the future of the majors and predicted theatrical motion pictures will become a niche market.
“They’re going for the gold,” said Lucas of the studios. “But that isn’t going to work forever. And as
a result they’re getting narrower and narrower in their focus. People are going to get tired of it.
They’re not going to know how to do anything else.”
Spielberg noted that because so many forms of entertainment are competing for attention, they would
rather spend $250 million on a single film than make several personal, quirky projects.
“There’s eventually going to be a big meltdown,” Spielberg said. “There’s going to be an implosion
where three or four or maybe even a half-dozen of these mega-budgeted movies go crashing into the
ground and that’s going to change the paradigm again.”

23. 22
Lucas predicted that after that meltdown, “You’re going to end up with fewer theaters, bigger
theaters with a lot of nice things. Going to the movies will cost 50 bucks or 100 or 150 bucks, like
what Broadway costs today, or a football game. It’ll be an expensive thing. … (The movies) will sit
in the theaters for a year, like a Broadway show does. That will be called the ‘movie’ business.”
“There’ll be big movies on a big screen, and it’ll cost them a lot of money. Everything else will be on
a small screen. It’s almost that way now. ‘Lincoln’ and ‘Red Tails’ barely got into theaters. You’re
talking about Steven Spielberg and George Lucas can’t get their movies into theaters.”
Both see “quirky” or more personal content migrating to streaming video-on-demand, where niche
audiences can be aggregated. “What used to be the movie business, in which I include television and
movies … will be Internet television,” said Lucas.
“The question will be: Do you want people to see it, or do you want people to see it on a big screen?”
he added.
The longtime friends appeared on a panel on the future of entertainment at the grand opening of the
Interactive Media building at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, along with Don Mattrick of
Microsoft. Julia Boorstin of CNBC moderated.
But Mattrick took a back seat as the two old movie pros dominated the hour-long talk, teasing each
other at times and agreeing at others. When Lucas complained about how hard it was to get
“Lincoln” or “Red Tails” into theaters, Spielberg quipped, “I got more people into ‘Lincoln’ than
you got into ‘Red Tails,'” drawing guffaws from the crowd.
Addressing the evolution of vidgames, Spielberg said so far, games have not been able to create the
same empathy with onscreen characters that narrative forms have. Though gamers might empathize
with characters in the cut scenes between game play, he said, “The second you get the controller
something turns off in the heart, and it becomes a sport.” Lucas was more sanguine, saying the game
industry can and will create empathetic characters, but it hasn’t so far because it’s been driven by
hard-core gamers who enjoy onscreen violence.
“The big game of the next five years will be a game where you empathize very strongly with the
characters and it’s aimed at women and girls,” Lucas said. “They like empathetic games. That will be
a huge hit and as a result that will be the ‘Titanic’ of the game industry, where suddenly you’ve done
an actual love story or something and everybody will be like ‘where did that come from?’ Because
you’ve got actual relationships instead of shooting people.”
But Spielberg, looking farther ahead, said he thinks the real shift will come when game controllers
are obsolete and games are controlled by Kinect-like devices that completely immerse the player in
the story. “I believe need to get rid of the proscenium,” Spielberg said. “We’re never going to be
totally immersive as long as we’re looking at a square, whether it’s a movie screen or whether it’s a
computer screen. We’ve got to get rid of that and we’ve got to put the player inside the experience,
where no matter where you look you’re surrounded by a three-dimensional experience. That’s the
future.”
The most out-there suggestion for the future of entertainment came from Lucas, who sees brain
implants within the relatively near future. He noted such implants are already being used to control
artificial limbs; they just haven’t been used for entertainment yet.

24. 23
“The next step is to be able to control your dreams,” he said. “You’ll just tap into a different part of
your brain. You’re just going to put a hat on or plug into the computer and create your own world. …
We’ll be able to do the dream thing 10, 15 years from now. It’s not some pie-in-the-sky thing.”
Asked by Boorstin what that might mean for the Entertainment Industry, he said: “You still have to
tell stories. Some people will want to be in a game… and some people will want to have a story told
to them. Those are two different things. But the content always stays the same. The content hasn’t
changed in 10,000 years.”

25. 24
The Traditionalist:The directorwho resurrected
Batman, made time go backward in Memento, and
deconstructeddreams in Inception speaks his mind.
The DGA Magazine, Spring 2012
Q. What are Nolan’s views on digital video, CGI and VFX, 3-D, and IMAX? Do you
agree?
The movie-obsessed son of an English ad man and an
American flight attendant, director Christopher Nolan burst
upon the scene in 2000 with the film noir Memento. The $4
million independent film delivered the usual crime thriller
tropes but with a meta twist—the hero’s recurring short-term
memory loss was illustrated by using an intertwined pair of
narratives, one moving forward in time while the other told the
story backward.
With its non-linear narrative, a device Nolan would also use in
later films, Memento introduced a new talent who respected
hard-boiled tradition while breaking cinematic rules. After
capably handling Warner Bros.’ 2002 psychological drama
Insomnia, the studio entrusted him to resurrect its dormant
Batman franchise. Nolan’s 2005 Batman Begins, along with its
even more spectacular 2008 follow-up, The Dark Knight,
brought brooding sophistication and near-Shakespearean
gravitas to the familiar comic book character.
In between visits to Gotham, Nolan scaled down and directed
The Prestige (2006), a period piece about rival magicians in
late 19th-century London. And in 2010, he made the visually
daring, labyrinthine caper film Inception, about a team of
dream invaders. But behind the wild imagination that unleashed the anarchistic Joker, folded the
streets of Paris like so much origami, and played out an entire story line in reverse, is a traditionalist
who eschews special effects and shoots as much as he can with a single camera.
We met up with the 41-year-old Nolan as he was editing his third and final Batman film, The Dark
Knight Rises, working with associates out of a comfortable house a few miles below the Hollywood
sign. Despite an intense deadline to pull all the myriad pieces together and complete his director’s
cut, Nolan was the picture of Zen-like calm, speaking softly and deliberately about his work.
JEFFREY RESSNER: When did you realize that directing was your life’s calling?
CHRISTOPHER NOLAN: To be honest, I’ve always made films and I never really stopped, starting
with little stop-motion experiments using my dad’s Super 8 camera. In my mind, it’s all one big
continuum of filmmaking and I’ve never changed. I used to noodle around with the camera but I
didn’t go to film school. I studied English literature at college and pursued a straight academic
qualification, all the while making my own films and wanting to make more. I paid for my first
feature, Following, myself and made it with friends. We were all working full-time jobs, so we’d get

26. 25
together on weekends for a year, shooting about 15 minutes of raw stock every Saturday, one or two
takes of everything, and getting maybe five minutes of finished film out of that. We went to the San
Francisco Film Festival with it [in 1998] and Zeitgeist Films picked up distribution, which really
helped me get Memento going. I got paid to direct it, I had millions of dollars in trucks and hundreds
of people and everything, and I haven’t looked back since.
Q: What benefits were there in being self-taught rather than going to film school?
A: A very organic approach to understanding all the different bits of the craft. I’m interested in every
different bit of filmmaking because I had to do every bit of it myself—from sound recording and
ADR to editing and music. I feel very lucky to be a member of probably the last generation who cut
film on a Steenbeck flatbed, physically taping it together and dropping out shots. It gave me a really
good grounding in knowing overall what has to go into a film technically that was very valuable.
And it meant that absolutely everything I did was simply because I was passionate and wanted to try
stuff. You’re never going to learn something as profoundly as when it’s purely out of curiosity.
Q: You’re a longtime fan of detective novels, which often employ flashbacks and other time-shifting
devices. Is that where your fascination for non-linear storytelling comes from?
A: Well, I had a couple of big influences. When I was 16 I read a Graham Swift novel, Waterland,
that did incredible things with parallel timelines, and told a story in different dimensions that was
extremely coherent. Around the same time, I remember Alan Parker’s The Wall on television, which
does a very similar thing purely with imagery, using memories and dreams crossing over to other
dreams and so forth. Nicolas Roeg’s The Man Who Fell to Earth and Performance were also
influential. Those stuck in my head, as did a lot of crime fiction—James Ellroy, Jim Thompson—and
film noirs like Jacques Tourneur’s Out of the Past, which was just staggering. Then, somehow, I got
hold of a script to Pulp Fiction before the film came out and was fascinated with what Tarantino had
done.
Q: You’ve often said that your favorite film is Blade Runner. What special significance does it hold
for you?
A: As a kid watching films, you go through a gradual realization of what’s behind them. You start
off like everyone else, thinking that actors make up the words and create the film themselves. So
when I was young and looking at Alien and Blade Runner, I was going, OK, they’re different stories,
different settings, really different actors, everything’s different—but there’s a very strong connection
between those two films, and that is the director, Ridley Scott. I remember being struck by that, and
thinking that’s the job I want.
The atmosphere of Blade Runner was also important, that feeling that there was this whole world
outside the frame of the scene. You really felt there were things going on outside of those rooms
where you’ve seen the film take place. That’s something I’ve always tried to carry with me. Every
film should have its own world, a logic and feel to it that expands beyond the exact image that the
audience is seeing.
Q: In your early films you wrote, shot, edited, even designed sets—the only thing you didn’t do was
act. What process do you use working with actors?
A: What I try to do is give them whatever process they need. It may not be what they think they
need, and indeed it may be counter to that, but I really try to be different [and adapt] for every actor,

27. 26
I try to make them comfortable, I try to get the best out of them. You hear stories of directors
deliberately making actors uncomfortable, but I always make the actor feel that they have what they
need to explore a scene. My uncle [John Nolan] is an actor and he’s been in several of my films.
When I came to make Following, he was teaching acting so I asked him what I would need to know.
He gave me a couple of Stanislavski books—An Actor Prepares was one—and said they would give
me the basics. He also talked me through a few things and gave me an understanding of the craft.
Q: What did you pick up from working with actors on your early films?
A: I learned lots of things on Memento, but
one thing I’ve always adhered to since then is
letting actors perform as many takes as they
want. I’ve come to realize that the lighting and
camera setups, the technical things, take all
the time, but running another take generally
only adds a couple of minutes. I was shooting
a very important scene with Guy Pearce in
which his character is extremely upset, and
it’s the lead-in to where Carrie-Anne Moss’
character takes Pearce’s shirt off and sees all
the tattoos on his chest. That day, the financier
of the film just happened to be visiting the set
and was literally standing right behind me. We did a take that I thought was very good, and I knew
we were out of time. So I asked Guy if he felt he’d gotten it, and he said, ‘No, we should do it again.’
I remember having a ‘What do I do?’ moment. Do I let him do it and risk running over? Or do I
insist that we move on, which Guy would have done, because he’s flexible and professional? But I
let him do another take, and that’s the one used in the film. It was very special, beyond what he had
done previously, and way beyond what I had imagined was even possible for the scene. I’ve carried
that with me ever since: If an actor tells me they can do something more with a scene, I give them the
chance, because it’s not going to cost that much time. It can’t all be about the technical issues.
Q: How do you accommodate actors in the same film who may have different styles of working?
A: With Insomnia, Al Pacino liked to rehearse very, very carefully, block things out, and do a lot of
takes. His first take would be perfect, but he really wanted to talk about things, whereas Hilary
Swank didn't want to rehearse too much. She wanted to save it, then do what she was going to do in
one or two takes and no more. As a director, you have to figure out how to balance those things,
because you want them both to feel that they're being given the floor in the way they need for what
they're doing. What I love about great actors is that you then get them in a two-shot where you think
their differences will be difficult, but it isn't, because they accommodate each other’s process, they
feel each other out and listen to each other.
Q: What was it like moving from the $45 million budget for Insomnia to three times that for Batman
Begins? How daunting was that leap?
A:I don't know if other people’s experiences mirror my own, but for me, the difference between
shooting Following with a group of friends wearing our own clothes and my mum making
sandwiches to spending $4 million of somebody else’s money on Memento and having a crew of a
hundred people is, to this day, by far the biggest leap I've ever made. It was a bit like learning to

28. 27
swim once you're out of your depth: It doesn’t make any difference if it’s 2 feet or 100 feet down to
the bottom—you’re either going to drown, or not.
The difference from Insomnia to Batman Begins, I would say, is we had very large-scale sets. But I
had found a production designer on Insomnia, Nathan Crowley, who'd done a lot of art directing on
big, big builds, so he came on board and we figured it out together. Those sorts of logistics are quite
challenging and it was the first time I'd done a major visual effects movie. But for me, the process
itself has always been fundamentally the same: You stand there and look at what the scene is going
to be and then everything else falls away, or it should if you’re concentrating correctly.
Q: Why do you prefer shooting with one camera?
A: I use multi-camera for stunts; for all the dramatic action, I use single-camera. Shooting single-
camera means I've already seen every frame as it’s gone through the gate because my attention isn't
divided to multi-cameras. So I see it all and I watch dailies every night. If you’re always shooting
multi-camera, you shoot an enormous amount of footage, and then you have to go in and start from
scratch, which is tricky time-wise.
Q: You and your cameraman, Wally Pfister, are—along with Steven Spielberg—among the last
holdouts who shoot on film in an industry that’s moved to digital. What’s your attraction to the older
medium?
A: For the last 10 years, I've felt increasing pressure to stop shooting film and start shooting digital
video, but I've never understood why. It's cheaper to work on film, it's far better looking, it’s the
technology that's been known and understood for a hundred years, and it's extremely reliable. I think,
truthfully, it boils down to the economic interest of manufacturers and [a production] industry that
makes more money through change rather than through maintaining the status quo. We save a lot of
money shooting on film and projecting film and not doing digital intermediates. In fact, I've never
done a digital intermediate. Photochemically, you can time film with a good timer in three or four
passes, which takes about 12 to 14 hours as opposed to seven or eight weeks in a DI suite. That’s the
way everyone was doing it 10 years ago, and I've just carried on making films in the way that works
best and waiting until there’s a good reason to change. But I haven't seen that reason yet.
Q: Have you ever thought about communicating your feelings to the industry and other directors?
A: I’ve kept my mouth shut about this for a
long time and it’s fine that everyone has a
choice, but for me the choice is in real
danger of disappearing. So right before
Christmas I brought some filmmakers
together and showed them the prologue for
The Dark Knight Rises that we shot on
IMAX film, then cut from the original
negative and printed. I wanted to give them
a chance to see the potential, because I
think IMAX is the best film format that
was ever invented. It’s the gold standard
and what any other technology has to
match up to, but none have, in my opinion.
The message I wanted to put out there was

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that no one is taking anyone’s digital cameras away. But if we want film to continue as an option,
and someone is working on a big studio movie with the resources and the power to insist [on] film,
they should say so. I felt as if I didn’t say anything, and then we started to lose that option, it would
be a shame. When I look at a digitally acquired and projected image, it looks inferior against an
original negative anamorphic print or an IMAX one.
Q: Have you shot all of your big-budget films on IMAX?
A: We didn’t shoot IMAX for Inception because we were trying to portray the reality of dreams
rather than their extraordinary nature, so we used a handheld camera and shot it in a more
spontaneous way. Whereas the operatic quality of The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises felt
very well suited to IMAX’s larger canvas. So it’s different depending on what film you want to do.
But, in each case, as a filmmaker who’s been given sizable budgets with which to work, I feel a
responsibility to the audience to be shooting with the absolute highest quality technology that I can
and make the film in a way that I want.
Q: Because of the kind of films you make, people might assume you use lots of computer-generated
imagery, but you actually prefer models, mattes, and in-camera effects. When do you like to use
CGI?
A: The thing with computer-generated imagery is that it’s an incredibly powerful tool for making
better visual effects. But I believe in an absolute difference between animation and photography.
However sophisticated your computer-generated imagery is, if it’s been created from no physical
elements and you haven’t shot anything, it’s going to feel like animation. There are usually two
different goals in a visual effects movie. One is to fool the audience into seeing something seamless,
and that’s how I try to use it. The other is to impress the audience with the amount of money spent on
the spectacle of the visual effect, and that, I have no interest in. We try to enhance our stunt work and
floor effects with extraordinary CGI tools like wire and rig removals. If you put a lot of time and
effort into matching your original film elements, the kind of enhancements you can put into the
frames can really trick the eye, offering results far beyond what was possible 20 years ago. The
problem for me is if you don’t first shoot something with the camera on which to base the shot, the
visual effect is going to stick out if the film you’re making has a realistic style or patina. I prefer
films that feel more like real life, so any CGI has to be very carefully handled to fit into that.
Q: Perhaps the most famous effects scene in any of your films is the tumbling hallway sequence in
Inception, which you did without green screens or computers but used an actual tumbling hallway.
Why did you decide to go old school for that?
A: I grew up as a huge fan of Kubrick’s 2001, and was fascinated by the way in which he built that
centrifugal set so that the astronauts could jog all around and upside down. I found his illusions
completely convincing and mind-blowing. It was one of those rare instances that, when you find out
how the trick is done, it’s even more impressive. So I’ve always wanted to do something like that,
and with Inception I had the opportunity and resources to do it within an action context. To take that
trick and push it in a different direction fulfilled one of my childhood ambitions. So many techniques
change in filmmaking over the years, and many of the things you grew up admiring you will never
get the opportunity to do. But that large-scale physical effect was still the best way to do the
sequence, and it was really fun.
Q: Speaking of technical changes, was there any pressure to do The Dark Knight Rises in 3-D?

30. 29
A: Warner Bros. would have been very happy, but I said to the guys there that I wanted it to be
stylistically consistent with the first two films and we were really going to push the IMAX thing to
create a very high-quality image. I find stereoscopic imaging too small scale and intimate in its
effect. 3-D is a misnomer. Films are 3-D. The whole point of photography is that it’s three-
dimensional. The thing with stereoscopic imaging is it gives each audience member an individual
perspective. It’s well suited to video games and other immersive technologies, but if you're looking
for an audience experience, stereoscopic is hard to embrace. I prefer the big canvas, looking up at an
enormous screen and at an image that feels larger than life. When you treat that stereoscopically, and
we've tried a lot of tests, you shrink the size so the image becomes a much smaller window in front
of you. So the effect of it, and the relationship of the image to the audience, has to be very carefully
considered. And I feel that in the initial wave to embrace it, that wasn’t considered in the slightest.
Q: In terms of imagery and style, would you say there are any constants running through all your
films?
A: An absolute concern with point of view. Whether in the pure camera blocking or even the writing,
it’s all about point of view. I can’t cut a scene if I haven’t already figured out whose point of view
I'm looking at, and I can’t shoot the scene in a neutral way. I've tried to use more objective camera
techniques—a longer lens, flattening things out, using multi-camera—but they don’t work. It's
funny, you were asking about 3-D and one of the things that happened when the craze came back
was various aspects of conversion. The way I shoot film is actually very conducive to converting to
3-D because I'm always thinking of the camera as a participant. I don’t use zoom lenses, for
example, so I don't reframe using the zoom. Instead, we always move the camera physically closer
and put a different focal length on. Stylistically, something that runs through my films is the shot that
walks into a room behind a character, because to me, that takes me inside the way that the character
enters. I think those point-of-view issues are very important.
Q: Another thing that’s unique about your style, especially for such big films, is that you choose to
work without a second unit. Why is that?
A: Let me put it this way: If I don’t need to be directing the shots that go in the movie, why do I need
to be there at all? The screen is the same size for every shot. The little shot of, say, a watch on
someone’s wrist, will occupy the same screen size as the shot of a thousand people running down the
street. Everything is equally weighted and needs to be considered with equal care, I really do believe
that. I don’t understand the criteria for parceling things off. Many action films embrace a second unit
taking on all of the action. For me, that’s odd because then why did you want to do an action film?
Having said that, there are fantastic filmmakers who use second and third units successfully. So it all
comes back to the question of defining what a director does. Each of us works in different ways. It’s
really helped me keep more of my personality in these big films. There’s a danger with big-action
fare that the presence of the filmmaker is watered down, it can become very neutral, so I’ve tried to
keep my point of view in every aspect of these films.
Q: You’re known for getting down to business quickly on the set. Roughly how many setups do you
like to do in a day?
A: A very large number, given the single-camera approach. On Memento I remember a day when we
did 53 setups with one camera. That was born out of necessity, but it was also very inspiring, very
invigorating to be able to do a lot of different bits of storytelling in one day. I do like moving fast,
and I can be quite impatient in that way, but I think the energy helps the project. I don’t like days on

31. 30
set where you don’t have enough to do. It happens very rarely. Generally, you never have enough
time.
Q: What are the issues in the industry you’re concerned about?
A: Copyright theft is a very important issue. While studios have been a bit late to realize that, I’m
pleased the Guild has taken a real lead. I think it’s very important that both filmmakers and studios
understand the importance of protecting their copyrights. I’ve worked at both ends of the spectrum
and, yes, you can get a group of friends together and make a movie without spending lots of money.
But if you’re going to be paid and make a living, and if you employ talented craftspeople who need
to make a living, it’s always going to be an expensive form. The only way to ever get paid for it is by
controlling the sale and distribution of the copyrighted material. Anyone who profits through theft,
and certainly anyone getting advertising revenue off of somebody else’s copyrights, should be
prosecuted, shut down, and held accountable. A lot of the laws are already in place, so it’s just a
question of enforcing them. Judges and juries must understand what copyright theft really is.

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Martin Scorsese: ‘Cinema is gone’
Associated Press, 2016
Q. Why do you think Martin Scorseseis so negative about the next century of cinema?
Martin Scorsese’s Manhattan office, in a midtown building a few blocks northwest of the cordoned-
off Trump Tower, may be the most concentrated bastion of reverence for cinema on the face of the
earth.
There’s a small screening room where Scorsese screens early cuts of his films and classic movies for
his daughter and his friends. There’s his personal library of thousands of films, some he taped
himself decades ago. Film posters line the walls. Bookshelves are stuffed with film histories. And
there are editing suites, including the one where Scorsese and his longtime editor Thelma
Schoonmaker regularly toil with a monitor dedicated to the continuous, muted playing of Turner
Classic Movies.
“It’s a temple of worship, really,” says
Schoonmaker.
Scorsese’s latest, “Silence,” may be
the film that most purely fuses the twin
passions of his life: God and cinema.
Scorsese, who briefly pursued
becoming a priest before fervently
dedicating himself to moviemaking,
has sometimes seemed to conflate the
two.
“Silence” is a solemn, religious epic
about Jesuit priests (Andrew Garfield,
Adam Driver) in a violently anti-
Catholic 17th century Japan. Scorsese
has wanted to make it for nearly 30 years. He was given the book it’s based on, Shusaku Endo’s
1966 novel, by a bishop after a screening of his famously controversial “The Last Temptation of
Christ” in 1988.
“Silence” is an examination of belief and doubt and mysterious acts of faith. But making the film
was such an act in itself.
“Acting it out, maybe that’s what existence is all about,” Scorsese says of his faith. “The
documentary on George Harrison I made, ‘Living in the Material World,’ that says it better. He said
if you want an old man in the sky with a beard, fine. I don’t mean to be relativist about it. I happen to
feel more comfortable with Christianity. But what is Christianity? That’s the issue and that’s why I
made this film.”
It wasn’t easy. Scorsese, 74, may be among the most revered directors in Hollywood, but “Silence”
is almost the antithesis of today’s studio film. To make it Scorsese had to drum up foreign money in
Cannes and ultimately made the film for about $46 million. Everyone, including himself, worked for
scale.

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Few today are making movies with the scope and ambition of “Silence” — a fact, he grants, that
makes him feel like one of the last of a dying breed in today’s film industry.
“Cinema is gone,” Scorsese says. “The cinema I grew up with and that I’m making, it’s gone.”
“The theater will always be there for that communal experience, there’s no doubt. But what kind of
experience is it going to be?” he continues. “Is it always going to be a theme-park movie? I sound
like an old man, which I am. The big screen for us in the ’50s, you go from Westerns to ‘Lawrence
of Arabia’ to the special experience of ‘2001’ in 1968. The experience of seeing ‘Vertigo’ and ‘The
Searchers’ in VistaVision.”
Scorsese points to the proliferation of images and the overreliance on superficial techniques as trends
that have diminished the power of cinema to younger audiences. “It should matter to your life,” he
says. “Unfortunately the latest generations don’t know that it mattered so much.”
Scorsese’s comments echo a tender letter he wrote his daughter two years ago . The future of movies,
he believes, is in the freedom that technology has yielded for anyone to make a movie.
“TV, I don’t think has taken that place. Not yet,” adds Scorsese, whose “Boardwalk Empire” was
lauded but whose high-priced “Vinyl” was canceled after one season. “I tried it. I had success to a
certain extent. ‘Vinyl’ we tried but we found that the atmosphere for the type of picture we wanted to
make — the nature of the language, the drugs, the sex, depicting the rock ‘n’ roll world of the ’70s
— we got a lot of resistance. So I don’t know about that freedom.”
Since the election of Donald Trump, some have expressed hope for a return to the kind of ’70s
filmmaking Scorsese is synonymous with.
“If the younger people have something to say and they find a way to say through visual means as
well as literary, there’s the new cinema,” says Scorsese. But the current climate reminds him more of
the ’50s of his youth. “I’m worried about double-think or triple-think, which is make you believe you
have the freedom, but they can make it very difficult to get the picture shown, to get it made, ruin
reputations. It’s happened before.”
“Silence,” which Scorsese screened for Jesuits at the Vatican before meeting with the pope, remains
a powerful exception in a changing Hollywood.
“He wanted to make this film extremely differently from anything out there,” says Schoonmaker,
Scorsese’s editor since “Raging Bull.” ″He’s just tired of slam-bam-crash. Telling the audience what
to think is what he really hates. Trying to do a meditative movie at this point, in this insane world
we’re in now, was incredibly brave. He wanted to stamp the film with that throughout: the pace, the
very subtle use of music.
“How many movies start without music at the very beginning under the logos?” she adds. “He said,
‘Take out all that big Hollywood.’”
Scorsese, apostle of cinema, continues the fight. His Film Foundation has helped restore more than
750 films. And he regularly pens supportive letters to young directors whose films he admires.
Imagine that in your mailbox. Almost like getting a letter from your god.