The Holdovers, the 'Film Look', and Why it Matters
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- Опубліковано 20 вер 2024
- Alexander Payne, cinematographer Eigil Bryld, and colourist Joe Gawler took unusual steps to make THE HOLDOVERS look like a film shot in the 1970s and subsequently left in a garage to rot. What does it all mean?
Based off of my article in Filmmaker Magazine - read it here:
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Find my work here:
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NOTES:
• Typo 00:02:50 "LTR" = "LCR"
I’m obsessed with this movie because it’s so different from the war/biopic/self-serious Oscar bait movie. It’s the kind of movie that’s actually entertaining and that you can watch with your whole family.
Oscar bait movie of a different kind. film nerds who can obsess over film stock and mono sound, which the average filmgoer cares nothing about. Holdovers my guess the Breakfast Club but set in the 70s, with all the modern messaging. slop
I love that this dives so much deeper (and really blows past) the "film look" as traditionally referenced in the common discourse.
Some director should shoot a movie on 35mm, tell everyone it was shot digitally and “film-emulated” then watch social media lose its sh*t about how fake it looks, and how obvious it is that it started as a digital source. Then do the reveal. Jeez. Can’t some of you just enjoy a movie any more?
huh?
A wonderful overview, thanks! Must say I'm a big fan of early dissolves overlapping dialogue - it strongly pushes whatever's said in the dissolve into echoing at the start of the next scene. Sadly, as you say, not very popular these days.
makes me almost wonder if the modern cars, centre frame in the driving montage to boston, were a purposeful blunder? in such an anachronistic film hanging on a recreation of the past it seems still unusual that these cars weren't removed. It would be quite easy nowadays even for a layman with any effects program.
Anyway great video!
So that's why I could see the actors and hear what they are saying!
Nice breakdown, Devan! I must admit when I first watched The Holdovers (one of my favs this year) I just assumed it was shot on film... and was surprised when I found out different. I gotta say this is first time I've seen it pulled off without noticing or questioning. It was subtle, but had much more to do with just the "film emulation" people are obsessed with. It's rare to see breakdown that gives insight into it being more about "the effect". Solid content! Subbed
Hey Devan! Long-time subscriber to Film Formally here, and I always love reading your analysis of films on Letterboxd as well. Happy to see this video pop up on my algorithm! Really enjoy listening to your expertise.
Awesome composition and editing. Always love to see you back mate
Great video that deserves more views.
This is great! Always love reading your thoughts on Letterboxd. You should definitely do more video essays on film theory.
your microphone is really boomy. There's some muffled and low tones added to your voice.
Great work! Enjoyable breakdown and musings.
I’m super late to this, but appreciate the work you put in this deep dive. New sub….about to binge everything else here!
Loved the article. Love the video. More of this please :D
Great stuff
You did a great job with this video buddy. New subscriber here ❤
Thanks for this. Definitely check out your article, too. I used to buy Filmmaker as a physical magazine. (Do they still print it?)
so true, watch any film shot by Rodger Deakins in the mid 2000's that was shot on celluloid and you'll see how sharp everything is with basically no grain at all. TO me honestly the Holdovers had more of a super 16mm look although the Arri Camera they used was basically super 35. Super35 does not usually look as grainy as that film did.
Film stocks are not all created equally. 1970’s 35mm film stocks were grainier than film stocks of the 2000’s. Also, film stocks from the 2000’s onwards were designed to be scanned digitally. On The Holdovers, as I’m sure you’re aware, the grain was added in post.
idk if you mentioned steve yedlin there in the article but he has done his good contribuiton analyzing this aesthetic meticulously.
Devan,
I watched your video since it was in my recommended feed and _The Holdovers_ was one of my favorite films in 2023. I went in without knowing anything about the medium it was shot on to learning the hows and whys in a few minutes. Thank you! 🙏 I will check out your article in _Filmmaker_ magazine next.
Thank you! Obviously trends are trends and some techniques will come and go, but it feels like since digital, a whole bunch of techniques have been straight up abandoned.
The wide adoption of Photoshop didn't mean nobody wanted to create and look at oil paintings, and microwave ovens didn't kill the concept of grilling. Why remove tools from your arsenal?
looks great - what camera and lens are you using for your talking head stuff - tasty :))
Sony A7IV, and a pretty wide mix of lenses - Mir 24m, Helios 44-2, and Sigma 24-70mm in this one, all with various filters (Classic Soft, HBM, Promist, Glimmerglass) and tilt-shift adapters at various points.
@@DevanAGScott Thanks - looks really good :)) well done
I dont think any digital camera and modern lenses can create anything that holds a candle to the film feeling. I think we should embrace noise instead and cultivate a new feeling.
Agreed on the second part, but we need to define the "film feeling" here.
5:10 can someone please give me a quick sentence-long explanation to what "proscenium-aware blocking" means? Thanks!
Great video! Thank you!
And did you shoot this video on film or are you just amazing at grading?
I love this movie
It's funny; it generally bothers me when "period" films look too modern (ZODIAC not withstanding) so I appreciate that this film is meant to look "contemporary" to the era it's set. However there was something about it that felt... off to me. Like the seams were too obvious. Like they were trying *too hard* to look like a 70s film.
Honestly I think it was the titles - they just were so clearly digitally produced and then run through some quick "film look" filters that it drew my attention to the "effect" and I couldn't shake it.
But maybe as Spinal Tap says, that's just nit-picking innit?
Great essay Devan!
verygood. keep it up.
Devan, wonderful video. May I ask which camera do you use? Thank you Devan.
Love this!
Bravo!
camera shot across the hallway peeking through the door of you on the toilet.
Interesting video. It would be better, though, if you spoke more slowly. It would make the video easier to follow.
The movie is fantastic but any time a movie shot is digitally and fake film-look aesthetics are added in post, it seems disingenuous. It would have looked so much better shooting on 16mm instead. They had the budget. 16mm film stocks haven't changed that much over the last 50 years and it would have been more authentic.
You beginner filmmakers have to stop thinking that film look means movie look
The bass on your voice recording is too muddy.
The cost of accidentally leaving my NAS, which sits on my desk, activated. Hopefully fixed in the subsequent ones.
Very interesting. I admit that when I saw the film I did not pick up on as many "filmmaking techniques" employed by the crew. I was definitely focused on the digitally-shot to look like film thing. In that regard, I thought it did a relatively good job. But as someone who watches a lot of movies from many different eras going back to the silent era, and who occasionally gets to see an actual film print projected, it still resembled a digitally shot film. To achieve the film look in a digital era, I still prefer high resolution DIs of 35 mm film negative. But I understand that costs factor in to all of this too.
Why are we watching this guy through a door?
Exactly ;)
Arty innit
IT'S GARTH NOT GARATH . great video tho. subbed
fair
Idealistic Crusader sent me.
This was by far the least bad of all the Oscar season films, especially because it's honest in spirit. The rest are just a bunch of pretentious crap movies without any philosophical value whatsoever. Kudos to Giamatti and Sessa.
hollywood is absurd. If they just used the budget for real film stock and made do with less, no one would have to research and fake 'mistakes.' those filmmaking hiccups in 70s cinema were beautiful because they showed the film to be an organic, breathing thing that came from a real crew of creators. Payne opted for a sanitized set and decorated his neutered film with fetishized symbols of authenticity.
He really did, I really hate this trend of "emulation" instead of actually going for the real thing. Fincher did it with Mank and almost anyone can tell you that movie does not look like some lost classic from the 40s found in a vault, and if Fincher can't do it I doubt anyone else can
@@DavidK-wg8wzFilm is expensive, you know? That's the reason why people are trying to so hard to emulate the film look with digital.
@@matheus5230 but when it comes to these hollywood films they absolutely have a choice
Not only is film more expensive, it is also a much harder workflow in all parts of production. The problem is not budget, most of the times it's the amount of days of shooting. I agree it is fascinating to breathe the organic nature of film and '70s filmmaking, but often times if the audience can't tell the difference it's okay. I don't think Payne's set is that sanitized, his work still comes from a place of love (otherwise the meta aspect would be awful) and he still wants creative freedom from his shots. Also, I don't know any filmmaker that fetishizes old lo-fi audio recording techniques.