MikeKardec
One Too Many
- Messages
- 1,157
- Location
- Los Angeles
Wow! What an amazing, complicated, ambitious, film. Not for everyone and containing some problems but very, very, impressive.
The story is intercut between moments covering Pvt. Bill Lynn's tour of duty in Iraq and the final day of what is essentially an Army propaganda tour celebrating his heroic actions on behalf of a wounded fellow soldier. He hand his squad are scheduled to appear as part of an over the top halftime show at a Texas (his home state) football game.
It's familiar format, a catastrophic event is explored by contrasting it with the public or institutional reaction to it ... like Clint Eastwood's recent movie Sully. But far more than that Billy Lynn dives deep into the creepy phenomenon of people's attempts to try and possess one another's stories. The brief heroism of Billy Lynn's attempts to save one of his platoon's sergeants is a story that is leveraged by nearly everyone and every institution in the movie (Billy Lynn' Long Halftime Walk was also an extraordinary novel).
The Army tries to use it as a way of spinning an already unpopular war, the football team tries to use it to add some shine to their reputations which will help them in the building of a new stadium, an agent tries to sell "their story" (the story of Billy's Squad) to the movie studios ... and it's really not a story, this brave kid ran into a hail of bullets to save a man who dies anyway, the "story" lacks the sort of additional twist (which this film has in spades) that makes it saleable. The movie requires all these people's reactions, their attempts to colonize his bravery, to turn it into an actual story worth telling by commenting on humanity, the media and our own egos.
In my opinion it reaches it's most horrific and most subtle expression, late in the movie, when a young drama vampire pulls away from Billy in momentary revulsion when he doesn't act perfectly according to the script she has consciously or unconsciously written for herself (with him as it's primary prop). Even his beloved sister, the person you discover has the most right to feel that she is a part of his story, has got an agenda for this young man ... though in her case she has a legitimate excuse. People use the soldiers of Billy's squad to oppose the war, to support the troops, to make money, impress their friends, feel good about themselves and to test their masculinity or femininity. Finally, the squad itself must take a stand to control their own story, and regain their identities. Their reality is threatened to its core and as the film ends they feel that while their bodies may be safer at home their souls may well have been safer in Iraq.
The most controversial aspect of the movie, and the one unfortunately least likely to be appreciated for good or ill, has been the way it was shot. Billy Lynn was produced in ground breaking 4000 line resolution, 120 frame per second, 3-D. It's a format that few theaters can present and one that is not yet perfected. Unlike many recent 3-D movies this one was not timidly shot by a director who would rather be working in a traditional format (many directors HATE 3-D with a passion), Ang Lee was going for the gold ring here and it shows ... it's a odd looking film in regular 2-D. Early showings were supposedly so "hyper real" and in your face that it was jarring and, though it made you appreciate the soldiers combat fueling reactions to the hyper stimulating environment of the football game, it was also just a bit too much for comfort. Possibly this is how audiences felt in the very first movies, when a close up could make people flee the theater because of its overwhelming intimacy.
In addition it supposedly had an impact on people's interpretation of the performances. Ever see a behind the scenes video included in DVD "bonus features" where a movie scene is shown in its raw form, brightly lit, no editing, no sound effects? Ever notice that often the performances are not nearly as convincing as they were in the finished movie? Some of this is because we mentally adjust our experience based on whether it looks like a polished movie or not and whether it looks like rough and raw life. In the rough and raw version acting looks like "acting." Supposedly a similar effect undermined the 3-D version of Billy Lynn. Regardless, the film is still highly effecting and emotional.
I did not get to see it in 3-D but, once upon a time, I worked in film and am somewhat familiar with 3-D, high resolution formats like 4000 line and high frame rates like 120 fps. Having had that experience it was pretty easy to understand some of what the final product might have looked like and what the problems would have been. It was a ballsy attempt, perfectly in tune with the subject matter of the movie. Issues like those mentioned above which were reported in advance screenings may have been mitigated a bit through additional processing in post. I know that they were in consultation with Douglass Trumbull (a man who's special effects career goes back to 2001: A Space Odyssey and a pioneer of high rez/high speed film formats) about finding a way to keep the original 3-D version's intensity while also making it easier to watch.
All in all Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is probably one of the most important events in traditional cinema (as opposed to VR or things of that sort) since the turn of the 21st century, it's only too bad that it is so far ahead of its time that we may not get to see it in all it's intended glory.
The story is intercut between moments covering Pvt. Bill Lynn's tour of duty in Iraq and the final day of what is essentially an Army propaganda tour celebrating his heroic actions on behalf of a wounded fellow soldier. He hand his squad are scheduled to appear as part of an over the top halftime show at a Texas (his home state) football game.
It's familiar format, a catastrophic event is explored by contrasting it with the public or institutional reaction to it ... like Clint Eastwood's recent movie Sully. But far more than that Billy Lynn dives deep into the creepy phenomenon of people's attempts to try and possess one another's stories. The brief heroism of Billy Lynn's attempts to save one of his platoon's sergeants is a story that is leveraged by nearly everyone and every institution in the movie (Billy Lynn' Long Halftime Walk was also an extraordinary novel).
The Army tries to use it as a way of spinning an already unpopular war, the football team tries to use it to add some shine to their reputations which will help them in the building of a new stadium, an agent tries to sell "their story" (the story of Billy's Squad) to the movie studios ... and it's really not a story, this brave kid ran into a hail of bullets to save a man who dies anyway, the "story" lacks the sort of additional twist (which this film has in spades) that makes it saleable. The movie requires all these people's reactions, their attempts to colonize his bravery, to turn it into an actual story worth telling by commenting on humanity, the media and our own egos.
In my opinion it reaches it's most horrific and most subtle expression, late in the movie, when a young drama vampire pulls away from Billy in momentary revulsion when he doesn't act perfectly according to the script she has consciously or unconsciously written for herself (with him as it's primary prop). Even his beloved sister, the person you discover has the most right to feel that she is a part of his story, has got an agenda for this young man ... though in her case she has a legitimate excuse. People use the soldiers of Billy's squad to oppose the war, to support the troops, to make money, impress their friends, feel good about themselves and to test their masculinity or femininity. Finally, the squad itself must take a stand to control their own story, and regain their identities. Their reality is threatened to its core and as the film ends they feel that while their bodies may be safer at home their souls may well have been safer in Iraq.
The most controversial aspect of the movie, and the one unfortunately least likely to be appreciated for good or ill, has been the way it was shot. Billy Lynn was produced in ground breaking 4000 line resolution, 120 frame per second, 3-D. It's a format that few theaters can present and one that is not yet perfected. Unlike many recent 3-D movies this one was not timidly shot by a director who would rather be working in a traditional format (many directors HATE 3-D with a passion), Ang Lee was going for the gold ring here and it shows ... it's a odd looking film in regular 2-D. Early showings were supposedly so "hyper real" and in your face that it was jarring and, though it made you appreciate the soldiers combat fueling reactions to the hyper stimulating environment of the football game, it was also just a bit too much for comfort. Possibly this is how audiences felt in the very first movies, when a close up could make people flee the theater because of its overwhelming intimacy.
In addition it supposedly had an impact on people's interpretation of the performances. Ever see a behind the scenes video included in DVD "bonus features" where a movie scene is shown in its raw form, brightly lit, no editing, no sound effects? Ever notice that often the performances are not nearly as convincing as they were in the finished movie? Some of this is because we mentally adjust our experience based on whether it looks like a polished movie or not and whether it looks like rough and raw life. In the rough and raw version acting looks like "acting." Supposedly a similar effect undermined the 3-D version of Billy Lynn. Regardless, the film is still highly effecting and emotional.
I did not get to see it in 3-D but, once upon a time, I worked in film and am somewhat familiar with 3-D, high resolution formats like 4000 line and high frame rates like 120 fps. Having had that experience it was pretty easy to understand some of what the final product might have looked like and what the problems would have been. It was a ballsy attempt, perfectly in tune with the subject matter of the movie. Issues like those mentioned above which were reported in advance screenings may have been mitigated a bit through additional processing in post. I know that they were in consultation with Douglass Trumbull (a man who's special effects career goes back to 2001: A Space Odyssey and a pioneer of high rez/high speed film formats) about finding a way to keep the original 3-D version's intensity while also making it easier to watch.
All in all Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is probably one of the most important events in traditional cinema (as opposed to VR or things of that sort) since the turn of the 21st century, it's only too bad that it is so far ahead of its time that we may not get to see it in all it's intended glory.
