First five seconds I called this as a Deviln/Emmerich movie... I was half wrong. Looks like it's a Dean Devlin solo project. With as far out there in hokey-town that Emmerich has been travelling the past decade, it's probably good that he took the helm himself.
So this can go one of two ways. A miraculously entertaining and well made movie by a first time director that is well established in Hollywood's big budget cinema world, resulting in a blockbuster windfall for WB. Or a complete failure that no one goes to see and loses WB hundreds of millions.
Based on Devlin's history with disaster films that are now dated. And the fact he's writing, producing and directing (a deadly zero oversight combo that only Orson Welles could pull off for decades). AND the fact that the trailer looks completely dysfunctional and hokey beyond an Emmerich level. I predict the latter.
This is a still from Alfred Hitchcock's North By Northwest (1959)
A car has just dropped off the Man on the right. Cary Grant's character Roger Thornhill has been waiting on the left side of the road to meet a secret agent named George Kaplan for the first time. Thornhill has been waiting on the road for some time, leaning with anticipation as previous vehicles came and went wondering if this car would be the one carrying his covert contact. The man on the right is looking at Thornhill after being dropped off. But will then look down the road most of the time, as if waiting for someone. Glancing back at Thornhill again as if he might or might not be the agent in question. Thornhill prepares to approach the man to determine if he is the man he has come to see.
There is no soundtrack throughout. Only ambient sounds.
Note the shot. The landscape is barren and clean, lightly colored in earth tones. The two men are dressed in dark suits, starkly contrasting with their surroundings. This forces the viewer to focus intently on the two figures.
The road is shot at an angled perspective, the lines drawing our eye towards Thornhill, our protagonist who is the primary focus of our film.
The road is a split with a median line, indicating a barrier between the two men that must be crossed for a secret conversation to occur.
The road is a broad, bare, open gulf that would be a long challenge to cross making Thornhill vulnerable and exposed.
The camera is on Thornhill's side of the barrier, because as the protagonist we the audience are on his side, wanting him to succeed.
The barbwire fence behind him and the telephone line down the road, visually prevent escape. Thornhill has nowhere to go but towards the Man.
The Man on the right is slightly closer to the camera causing him larger and more intimidating than Thornhill. This makes him a more menacing prospect to walk towards.
The man on the right is wearing a hat to shade his eyes from the late morning sun. Thornhill is not wearing a hat making him unprepared and even more vulnerable.
The man on the right stands alone in the open space with no fence around, his arms braced behind him all indicating a stronger more powerful presence than the slightly slouching Thornhill.
Thornhill is on the left side of the shot, wanting to move to the right. As an American film directed towards an audience that reads English from left to right, our eyes instinctively want to push Thornhill across the frame from left to right.
All of these items are subtle artistic cues that drive into our subconscious and cause us to side with Grant's character and anticipate his task at hand more intensely than we normally would otherwise. Forcing our attention, and bringing us suspensefully to the edge of our seat. This seemingly simple shot is only on screen for a couple of seconds. But a detail oriented master planner like Hitchock worked on it for far longer than that.
Felt like seeing a Braveheart clip this morning for some reason. Landed on the speech at the Battle of Stirling. And you know, it's a remarkably short speech, but it turns the mood of the scene and the whole movie around 180 degrees.
If you read the speech in your head, and try and do it without hearing any music or pauses, it seems like an extremely short, effectless 7 sentences.
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Wallace: I see a whole army of my countrymen here in defiance of tyranny. You have come to fight as free men, and free men you are. What would you do with that freedom? Will you fight?
Veteran soldier: Fight? Against that? No, we will run; and we will live.
Wallace: Aye, fight and you may die. Run and you'll live -- at least a while. And dying in your beds many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that for one chance, just one chance to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they'll never take our freedom!!!
Wallace and Soldiers: Alba gu bra! (Scotland forever!)
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So why does it work so well?
One, story buildup. Randall Wallace did a great job of making this speech a turning point by building up the scenes of scottish resistance to this point. If William can't turn the army around, then their cause will end there. So our minds give the speech gravity, because we know it's an important moment.
Two, direction. Gibson is many things including a master filmmaker. He knows just where to put beats in a scene to make it effective. Just how to cut it. And since he was doing the acting himself, he knew just how to play the scene.
Three, and this is the most important, music. Steven Spielberg has said that music is 50% of the movie. And it's true. And there has not been a contemporary film composer that could top James Horner for emotional impact. Glory, Avatar, Field of Dreams, Legends of the Fall, Titanic. The man was a master at enhancing the feelings of screen story. His passing is a great loss to cinema. But at least we can enjoy his masterworks such as this for years to come.
And these three aspects really encapsulate the essence of film craft.
