If you aren't familiar with the debate of film versus digital when it comes to shooting movies, then this little documentary, Side by Side, is a great place to start. It's a documentary that chronicles the rise of digital video and how the technology started as something raw, dirty, and very poor quality, but quickly became a true contender against film, and is now beginning to surpass film as the gold standard medium to shoot movies on. The film details the workflow of movie making from getting the shot on set, to processing, to editing, to color correcting, and finally to distribution to theaters, most of which now project digitally as opposed to film projectors which dominated the industry until about ten years ago. This is a fantastic little doc, and it's even executive produced and narrated by the great enigma that is Keanu Reeves. Seriously, it's the most compelling you'll ever see Neo.
Keanu jokes aside, this really is a fascinating documentary that gives us candid discussions and genuine insight from some of the greatest minds working in the industry today. Reeves interviews everyone from Martin Scorsese, to Lena Dunham, with Christopher Nolan, David Fincher, Danny Boyle, Wally Pfister, and Lars von Trier in between. Plus a swathe of other big names that it would be absurd of me to list completely here. The bottom line is, Side by Side has some of the most significant and valued opinions of the film industry within its runtime.
Side by Side tells a story of digital's rise and film's descent that is a fascinating one if you aren't already familiar with it. Living in Los Angeles and working within this field this whole conflict is nothing new to me so I'm not necessarily getting any new information by watching Side by Side but with so many great interviews that's not what I enjoy this movie for. I watch it for the insight of listening to an admirable director talk so openly and candidly about their work.
I've gained new perspective on some of my favorite filmmakers from this doc, and I walked away being able to fill an entire trivia book with things divulged in these interviews. Things I never knew before, like how Danny Boyle's masterpieces 28 Days Later and Slumdog Millionaire were shot by Anthony Dod Mantle, the cinematographer who shot the very first Dogma '95 film, an incredibly experimental film movement that I now want to spend some time familiarizing myself with.
The great thing about this doc is that it never picks a side. Rather it just puts the two alternatives... side by side (aha!) and lets the audience draw conclusions. The film certainly has more digital advocates than film ones, but when the figurehead of the film camp is Christopher Nolan you've already got a hell of an argument. I do think that the death of film is inevitable and imminent, and I think most of the industry, including the makers of this documentary, know that as well. Thus there was never a better time to make this film, now that both mediums can be compared side by side and we can have a serious discussion about the pros and cons of each. In ten or fifteen years when celluloid is a thing of the past we will always have this fantastic documentary to remind us of the immaculate run that film had, and the beginnings of a digital technology that would fully surpass the medium of film.
Keanu jokes aside, this really is a fascinating documentary that gives us candid discussions and genuine insight from some of the greatest minds working in the industry today. Reeves interviews everyone from Martin Scorsese, to Lena Dunham, with Christopher Nolan, David Fincher, Danny Boyle, Wally Pfister, and Lars von Trier in between. Plus a swathe of other big names that it would be absurd of me to list completely here. The bottom line is, Side by Side has some of the most significant and valued opinions of the film industry within its runtime.
Side by Side tells a story of digital's rise and film's descent that is a fascinating one if you aren't already familiar with it. Living in Los Angeles and working within this field this whole conflict is nothing new to me so I'm not necessarily getting any new information by watching Side by Side but with so many great interviews that's not what I enjoy this movie for. I watch it for the insight of listening to an admirable director talk so openly and candidly about their work.
I've gained new perspective on some of my favorite filmmakers from this doc, and I walked away being able to fill an entire trivia book with things divulged in these interviews. Things I never knew before, like how Danny Boyle's masterpieces 28 Days Later and Slumdog Millionaire were shot by Anthony Dod Mantle, the cinematographer who shot the very first Dogma '95 film, an incredibly experimental film movement that I now want to spend some time familiarizing myself with.
The great thing about this doc is that it never picks a side. Rather it just puts the two alternatives... side by side (aha!) and lets the audience draw conclusions. The film certainly has more digital advocates than film ones, but when the figurehead of the film camp is Christopher Nolan you've already got a hell of an argument. I do think that the death of film is inevitable and imminent, and I think most of the industry, including the makers of this documentary, know that as well. Thus there was never a better time to make this film, now that both mediums can be compared side by side and we can have a serious discussion about the pros and cons of each. In ten or fifteen years when celluloid is a thing of the past we will always have this fantastic documentary to remind us of the immaculate run that film had, and the beginnings of a digital technology that would fully surpass the medium of film.