Lost Art of Filmmaking represents my attempt to highlight examples of film language that no longer seems to appear on the radar of a majority of working filmmakers.
Each column, I’ll choose a clip from a movie that demonstrates a ‘lost art’ of some sort, ask you to watch it, and then go into detail about why this particular slice of movie is worth bringing back into focus…
SHAUN OF THE DEAD
SHAUN OF THE DEAD is that rare gem of a movie. A movie shot in Britain by Brits that doesn’t suck.
I’m kidding, Edgar Wright. Great Britain gets it right a lot more than we Americans seem to do. In fact, Edgar, is that I’m in love with you as a filmmaker. I’m putting on the prom dress as I write this.
You see, I’ve seen SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD. And now I have no clue as to what I to expect from you next.
I was in awe during that film. It’s the attention to every little detail, you see. It’s how each shot – each edit – each transition – was not left up to chance. It’s the immense amount of craft that went into the designing and production of this film. Truly mind-blowing. Most of my friends were staggered by it as well.
As film fans, we’re often let down by a filmmaker who hasn’t matched or kept the promise of their potential (cough cough, M. Night, cough cough, got pretentious, cough cough). It happens way too often, if you ask me. So it’s extremely joyful to watch a filmmaker keep that promise and reveal that there’s much more potential in his/her bag of tricks that we realized.
Back when SPACED came out, you made a splash on the geek world. Of course, I only recently saw it when it was available on DVD. But I devoured it with my roommate (wish i could say I was the Simon Pegg of us two, but he’d probably say I’m more the Nick Frost). In fact, I even devoted a post to a clip from the series that I felt was the funniest, truest example of how guys are with each other. You can check out that post HERE. Everyone who’d seen it knew it was special, but I think I could bet safely on the fact that no one knew – back when SPACED was first airing and in reruns – that you had a SCOTT PILGRIM in you. Hell, maybe no one out there knew you had a SHAUN OF THE DEAD in you either.
But SHAUN OF THE DEAD is where it started for me. As it started for legions of fans out there. It really is a rare gem of a movie. It’s a horror-comedy for sure… but it’s one that’s built from characters. From story. But SHAUN OF THE DEAD is especially rare for the emotions that it brings up in the final act. There were tears for sure. Why? Because this was a creative team that had something to prove and never said “that’s good enough.” You know who DOES say that? George Lucas. Does that surprise anyone? Me neither. But I got all emotional over a zombie film. When does THAT happen?
Now, to be up front, I’m not a fan of Steadicam usage for fluid masters… I think it has merits for certain reasons, such as time or budget issues, or for adding energy to a scene (as they did often on ER – groundbreaking television work there) but I do think that’s it’s used more often than necessary. I don’t even mind Steadicam usage for epic battle scenes like SAVING PRIVATE RYAN or in CHILDREN OF MEN (covered in an an earlier LAOF post HERE.)
But for the most part, I think directors who don’t really know how to stage a scene or understand the mechanics of the scene will often turn to a Steadicam because it does a lot of the director’s work for them, and then they don’t have to really plan anything out – the Steadicam guy will frame and fix it for them and then the actors don’t have to manage their blocking as well and…. blah, blah, blah. Kind of like how they’ll say “oh we’ll fix it in post with some CGI or something.” Also – the Steadicam tends to have a ‘floating’ feel to it that I don’t always prefer.
So here… with these two Steadicam shots… I feel Edgar Wright had a lot on his plate, didn’t have a large budget, and had to shoot fast. Hence… the Steadicam.
Here’s a twin pair of fluid master shots that Edgar and his team use to convey information in a different way than we’ve talked about in this column. Here’s the first:
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Pretty straightforward. Just setting up the beginning of Shaun’s daily routine. The people he sees, the neighborhood he’s in… it’s a nice little throwaway shot. But it’s really all just a setup for the second fluid master shot.* The one that takes place the morning after zombies have overcome England. Here’s the second:
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Same daily routine. Same fluid master shot. But everything’s different. As an audience member, we’re told – THROUGH VISUALS DAMMIT!!! VISUALS!!! — that the world around Shaun has gone to pot (possible pun there). 
The genius of the shot comes from how deftly the exposition is handled. The comedy of the shot comes (obviously) from Shaun’s obliviousness to all that’s changed around him.
These twin fluid masters work in conjunction to tell the story visually in an interesting way. They just wouldn’t work as well without the other – and that’s kind of the point. The team didn’t make this up on the fly. This was planned way in advance – as was every aspect of SHAUN OF THE DEAD, HOT FUZZ, and the brilliant-why-haven’t-you-already-seen-it SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD.
For them, it was never ‘good enough.’ For them, it was to be done right or not at all.
Thank goodness for that.
*on the commentary track for SHAUN OF THE DEAD, it was said that these two shots weren’t shot sequentially. Meaning the second fluid master shot with the zombies and the aftermath was actually set up and filmed first. From a production standpoint, this makes sense. It’s easier to have their zombies ready for camera before call time rather than have a crew wait around for the zombies to get made up. I mean, no one in their right mind would wait around for zombies, right?
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: OK Go – End Love
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: SERENITY
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: CHILDREN OF MEN
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: TOUCH OF EVIL
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: BASIC INSTINCT
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: OK Go – This Too Shall Pass
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: SNEAKERS
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: THE SUGARLAND EXPRESS
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: HARD BOILED
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: 48 HRS
LOST ART OF FILMMAKING: JAWS
FILMMAKING IS FADING