BACK THE FUCKING CAMERA OUT!!

[Shockwave]

This is a rant with action movies of late and how they like to put the damn camera so fucking close to the action u cant see what the fuck is going on!

The most recent example would be Transformers. I overall like the movie, and while the effects were top notch, id really have to say most of the action was only so-so. In most cases the camera got so close to the damn robots i found myself squirming in my seat, as if to get a better sight of what was going on, or who was shooting who.

Transormers isnt the only offender, as many movies are doing this of late. Does anyone get sick of this? I feel like im watching a full screen movie on a wide screen and only getting half the action!:mad:

..anyone else have any movies that spring to mind that have done this to u? Feel free to rant away!

[vesaker]

it was probably some sort of money saving technique or something, like if you only have half the robot in the shot perhaps it only costs half to animate it or something.

Oh and about the whole turning in your seat trying to get a better look at something on a screen, i do that all the time lol. Especially in video games, i'll find i'll be up against a wall and will lean to the side to try and look around the wal...... but it never works :mad: lol

[Cronos]

depending on the scene i sometimes like it since it can be like you're right in the middle of the action but when it's used constantly it annoys the hell out of me

[Otis Driftwood]

The Bourne Supremecy
Batman Begins

These are two that come to mind that put the camera too close in the action sequences.

I hate it.

[LordSimen]

The only time this happend and I COULDN'T tell what was going on was Batman Begins, and even then there was a reason for that. Otherwise, every Michael Bay movie and the Bourne movies I've been able to tell exactly what's going on in every shot without a problem...

[ilovemovies]

Originally posted by Otis Driftwood
The Bourne Supremecy
Batman Begins

These are two that come to mind that put the camera too close in the action sequences.

I hate it.


Those movies are NOTHING compared to how annoying the action scenes are in Transformers.

[Quigles]

Originally posted by ilovemovies
Those movies are NOTHING compared to how annoying the action scenes are in Transformers.
That is not true at all, and I think people will stop saying this once the film hits DVD. On a smaller screen, I think they will be easier to comprehend.

I still have no idea what's happening during the action scenes when I watch BATMAN BEGINS, but could completely tell what was going on in TRANSFORMERS (even up close to the huge screen).

[arto_j]

Originally posted by Quigles
That is not true at all, and I think people will stop saying this once the film hits DVD. On a smaller screen, I think they will be easier to comprehend.



I totally agree. I just got back from the film and I thought the action scenes were mostly excellent. Bay actually has relatively long takes (for him) where you certainly can see what's going on. The only trouble I had was in the end, as I didn't really know which robot was good and which was bad. But all in all I found the action sequences very well shot.

[Shockwave]

I actualy agree about being on a smaller screen helping Transformers, but i stil cant help but feel like i only saw half the action.:mad:

[therealjohng]

Go see Live Free or Die Hard and you will see how action movies should be shot. I want to say the majority of the action scenes were shot from long distances and it was really refreshing to see that in a modern day action movie.

[ilovemovies]

Originally posted by Shockwave
I actualy agree about being on a smaller screen helping Transformers, but i stil cant help but feel like i only saw half the action.:mad:

Perhaps. That is what happened with me in Bad Boys 2. The action was too chaotic and the camera was constantly shaking too much on the big screen but it did play better on the small screen.

I'm hoping that will be the same way with Transformers.

[bigred760]

I have no problem with it as long as I can still tell what's going on. My only issue with Transformers was not that I couldn't tell what was going on, but I got confused as to which robot was fighting. And that was just my ignorance to the autobots and decepticons. That'll probably change with future viewings (and there will be those :D). I think the closeups are only an issue when there's quick-cuts going on as well.

But I agree with the Batman Begins issue, hard to tell what was going on in some of the fight scenes.

[Shockwave]

Originally posted by therealjohng
Go see Live Free or Die Hard and you will see how action movies should be shot. I want to say the majority of the action scenes were shot from long distances and it was really refreshing to see that in a modern day action movie.

Die Hard and 300 have had some of the best shot action ive seen in quite awhile.

[poopontheshoes7]

I really, honestly dont see what everyone is complaining about. I saw everything just fine:confused: The action in Transformers is actually pretty restrained for a Bay film. The crazy editing and shit was cut way down imo.


I have to agree, Die Hard was a huge suprise for me. Great action.

300, on the other hand, sucked. Just a bunch of shitty slow-mo's in front of a green screen. True, there was slow- mo in Transformers, but pretty much all the action in 300 was slow motion. Fucking waste imo.

[vesaker]

Originally posted by poopontheshoes7
300, on the other hand, sucked. Just a bunch of shitty slow-mo's in front of a green screen. True, there was slow- mo in Transformers, but pretty much all the action in 300 was slow motion. Fucking waste imo.

Not all the action was in slomo, it was sped up then slowed down repeadidly which gave it its own unique (although not sure if its ever been done elsewhere) look and style and it made certain parts of the action that much more trilling like when it slows just before Leonidas smashes that one Persian with his sheild in the first fight.

[LordSimen]

Originally posted by vesaker
Not all the action was in slomo, it was sped up then slowed down repeadidly which gave it its own unique (although not sure if its ever been done elsewhere) look and style and it made certain parts of the action that much more trilling like when it slows just before Leonidas smashes that one Persian with his sheild in the first fight.

Yeah. The time relapsing in 300 was freakin' amazing and beatiful. One of the best movies of this year.

[Digifruitella]

Originally posted by Shockwave
This is a rant with action movies of late and how they like to put the damn camera so fucking close to the action u cant see what the fuck is going on!

The most recent example would be Transformers. I overall like the movie, and while the effects were top notch, id really have to say most of the action was only so-so. In most cases the camera got so close to the damn robots i found myself squirming in my seat, as if to get a better sight of what was going on, or who was shooting who.

Transormers isnt the only offender, as many movies are doing this of late. Does anyone get sick of this? I feel like im watching a full screen movie on a wide screen and only getting half the action!:mad:

..anyone else have any movies that spring to mind that have done this to u? Feel free to rant away!

that was one of the many things I didn't like about Transformers. Not only was the first hour so long and took so much freakin time to get to Transformers, but it was ridiculous and stupid, and when it got to the finale it just became so blurry at times. I dislike it when directors do that, what are they trying to tell me? that by shaking the cam, or unfocusing the lens they're trying to carry over the feeling of how HECTIC it is? I know Nolan did that with Batman Begins, but I didn't really have a problem with that since it was well executed (I think), but in T'formers it just went on for too long with that, show me what's going on.

[Monotreme]

It's the difference between this:

http://www.dailyinfo.co.uk/images/cinema/MI3.jpg

And THIS:

http://www.filmwise.com/visual/explosions_01/image_04.jpg
(bad and small image of the bridge explosion in True Lies)

[LordSimen]

I sat in the 3rd row of a large theater and I had no problem telling what was going on, where a character was, who a character/robot was, or what the characters were doing. Everything seemed clear and nothing seemed to be too close or cut too fast... So I have no clue what the complaint is about... Because everything seems VERY clear and staged well to me.

[Tuukka]

Warning: This post is pretty fucking long.

There are different ways to execute good action scenes.

Let's take thh first example: Matrix is heavily stylished, operatic ballet. It celebrates the "beauty" of action. Most action movies don't go for the same visual aesthetic as Matrix. But if you watch movies from great action directors like Spielberg, Cameron, etc, there is always the visceral thrill you get from the beauty of mayhem, destruction and violence.

Filming an action sequence is like filming a dance sequence. Sure, you can film it in telescopic close-ups, so that the dance performance amounts to a collection of close-ups of different body parts, only occasionally cutting into wide shots which allow us to see the beauty of performance. But to me this approach kills the whole point of watching the dance performance in the first place.

Sure, I get the idea of what is supposed to be happening in the dance, just like I always got the idea what was happening in the action scenes of Transformers. But I don't get to ENJOY the performance. I'm not allowed to enjoy the beauty of the performance.

This is a major handicap. When I went to see Transformers, the main attraction for me was to see giant robots kicking ass. But for the most part, I didn't see that. All I saw was a close-up of a random metallic object colliding with another random metallic object. The primal thrill of seeing that is considerably smller than actually seeing a giant robot in full view colliding with another giant robot.

Maybe it might make no difference to you. But it makes a big difference to me.

Sure, there are wide shots in the action scenes of Transformers. But they are rare. Very rare. 95% of the action scenes are chaotic, shaky medium shots and close-ups, with plenty of motion blur. When you add the fact that the robots can often easily be mistaken for each other, and for the majority of time there is no clear overall coreography and strategy to the scenes, it all ends up in an incoherent, uninvolving mess.

This is the same thing as getting the greatest dancer in the world to perform. And then having him do a completely random coreography which is filmed in shaky, blurry close-ups.

I would prefer to see coreopgrahy which is full of invention and imagination, shot and edited with great clarity and wide dynamic range.

Now let's ignore the dance comparison for a while, and check out the OTHER effective way of filming action. The shaky-cam approach, which aims to deliver the rawness, grittiness of the action. There is no beauty here, only visceral "ugliness". The action is shots and edited in a frenetic style, which aims to put the audience in the action. Saving Private Ryan is a great example of this.

Transformers aims to do much of the same as Saving Private Ryan. The philopsophy of Bay is to put the audience into the action, to have the action happen as close to the audience as possible.

It's a nice idea, but it didn't work form. The reasons:

His Point Of View is all over the place. If you look at Saving Private Ryan (or almost any Spielberg film for that matter), it uses restricted POV very effectively. The camera sees what the characters see. The camera is with them, in the same space. But in Transformers the camera is constantly changin POV, at extremely rapid pace. It flies around like a mad parrot, preventing me from putting myself into the situation of the characters.

There is no coreography. In case people confuse this with ballet-like action, I'll be more precise: There are no tactics, no strategy. 95% of the action has characters, both good and bad, just randomly shooting and punching around. The action scenes don't establish clearly what the characters are trying to do. A good guy faces a bad guy. What he will do? How will he win? Does he have a plan? What is the plan? How will he execute the plan? Will he succeed in his plan? Those are questions that are extremely important for a compelling action scenes, yet Transformers largely ignores them. Those questions are also crucial for creating suspense. Without anticipation, there is no suspense. Without estalibhed strategy, there is no anticipation. The audience can't ask themselves whether the hero will succeed in his mission, if the mission isn't established in the first place. This holds true both of the longer plotlines, and of minor story beats within the action scenes.

A good action scene has purpose, a goal, and a clear antagonistic force preventing that goal from happening. A good action scene is a game of chess: The villain makes his move. The hero has to do a counter-move to survive. The villain answers with another counter-move. The hero as to answer with yet another counter-move. Storybeat by storybeat, with both opposing forces upping the ante with their every move. These things were largely missing in Transformers, instead the action scenes were just collections of random shoot-shoot-punch-punch-shoot-shoot-punch-punch scenes.

Look at Saving Private Ryan. The film is full of shaky, handheld camera work. It shows large establishing shots only when the character in question is able to see the bigger picture. Yet... There is great clarity in the action scenes. It's always clear what the heroes are trying to do, and what the enemy is doing to prevent the heroes from succeeding. There is always a clear goal. And I don't mean just in terms of overall plot. I mean in terms of minor story beats within the larger action segments. There are a dozen smaller beats like this both in all the major action scenes of the film. We always know exactly what the hero has to do to survive the current action moment, what the antagonist are doing to stop him, and then we just wait in anticipation whether he succeeds.

An important element in a good action scene is the use of location. Location establishes stategy and tactics. Both the protagonists and antagonits should use the location to their advantage. After all, this IS what happens in every real world "action" scenario. Characters pulling out random weaponry and just randomly shooting around is bad action writing. Characters using location and all the separate elements in the location is good action writing, because it requires inventiveness, imagination and smarts. It also has the benefit of making the characters seem smart. It's worth noticing that the characters in Transformers very rarely use the location to their advantage at all. When it is used, it happens in the most boring and pedestrian way possible (The army guys hide behind the walls of the desert village when Scorpinok attacks).

The stategies in Transformers were just plain boring and unimaginative. For example on the freeway Barricade (?) attacks Prime and they fall down. Just when you expect a kickass battle, Prime just draws a deus-ex-machina sword and kills his enemy in one strike. When Bumblebee and the cop-decepticon start their fight at the industry complex, it happens completely offscreen. When Sam fights the tiny decepticon in the same area, it's just random rolling and hitting without any coreography. When the copter-decepticon attacks the military base in the beginning, he just shoots around in a completely random order. In the city it's all just random punching and shooting, with only a couple of action beats where some minor script inventiveness is at play (Two robots use a truck to protect themselves from aerial attack, Bumblebee is attached to a car so that he cam move around, the army guy uses a motorcycle to take a shot at the vulnerable spot of the evil robot). But a handful of action beats with some imagination is way too little in a scene which takes over 30 minutes.

This is important, because for me the anticipation, suspense and emotional engagement in an action scene comes from the two questions: How are the protagonists going to survive? How are they going to beat the bad guys?

The answer Transformers constantly gave me was this: The good guys will win by ramdomly shooting and punching around. And it's not a fulfilling answer. Once I realized that was gonna be the answer to all the action scenes, I stopped caring.

And on a final note, the motivations in the action scenes made no sense. Why exactly doesn't Prime have the cube, since it would be safer with him than with Sam? And why are they trying to take the cube to an army base, when decepticons are perfectly capable of taking down entire army bases? And why does Prime send Sam to the top of the building, to be carried away by a military helicopter, since decepticons are much stronger in the air. Three of them can fly, while none of the Autobots can fly. Sending Sam to a helicopter is retarded, and a suicide mission.

Nitpicing about plotholes might seem pointless in a film like this, but I'm talking about extremely basic story motivation. The actions of the good guys made no fucking sense whatsoever. How am I gonna be able to identify and understand them if their actions are completely illogical? And yes - this is an action scene related argument. A good action scene has logic, motivation and understandable causality. Because the entire 3rd act action segment didn't have those elements, it was very hard to care. It was hard to feel any suspense and excitement.

[Shockwave]

Originally posted by LordSimen
I sat in the 3rd row of a large theater and I had no problem telling what was going on, where a character was, who a character/robot was, or what the characters were doing. Everything seemed clear and nothing seemed to be too close or cut too fast... So I have no clue what the complaint is about... Because everything seems VERY clear and staged well to me.

To be fair, i think a large part of the problem was the robots themselves. In motion, many of them just looked like a gaint ball of scrap.