Directors Fighting Against Motion Picture Film's Retirement Are Winning
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- July 31, 2014
By James DeRuvo (doddleNEWS)
Led by Christopher Nolan, a cadre of filmmakers are pushing back against studios’ plans to retire motion picture film as a recording medium, and they’re winning. Nolan had already managed to get Paramount to agree to an “exception” to its all-digital production plans, less than a month after they established a ‘no-more-film’ policy. And now, other A-list filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino, J.J. Abrams, and more are turning the digital tide, and making a case for film to stay. And the Studios are listening.
“(Both Film and Digital) are valid choices. ?(But) there’s a magic to the grain and the color quality that you get with film … it would be a tragedy if suddenly directors didn’t have the opportunity to shoot on film – Judd Apatow to the Wall Street Journal
Film is alive and well in Hollywood, and don’t let anyone tell you differently. Sure, orders have gone from a record 12.4 billion linear feet in 2006 to only nearly a half a million in 2014, and that has been largely due to studios like Fox and Paramount deciding to go completely digital in the future. But with films like Interstellar, Star Wars Episode VII, and others bucking the tide and choosing the film medium for acqusition, studios have had to keep film as an option for filmmakers like Nolan and Abrams, and as such, studios are once again finalizing a deal with Kodak to exclusively provide film for the next several years.
“It’s a financial commitment, no doubt about it. But I don’t think we could look some of our filmmakers in the eyes if we didn’t do it.”- Bob Weinstein, co-chairman of Weinstein Co
Without the new deal, Kodak was planning to close its film manufacturing plant in Rochester, NY, since film orders have all but dried up, with only 4% of producers and directors needing to use celluloid for their projects. Fuji saw the handwriting on the wall last year and pulled out of film creation, leaving Kodak as the last man standing in the film manufacturing world.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Kodak desperately tried to get the studios to participate in a joint venture to invest the Kodak film manufacturing facility and modernize it. But that deal fell flat, and it looks like film would go the way of the dinosaur. But this group of filmmakers have succeeded in pushing the studios to keep film as a viable option.” We had to build a coalition among all the parties in order to reach a solution,” said Kodak CEO Jeff Clarke.
The argument that Tarantino, Abrams, and Nolan — and even Marc Webb used film on The Amazing Spider-Man 2 — have made is pretty simple … it costs about the same for equipment on the set, whether digitally or film based. The only real savings comes during the post production and distribution processes where digital provides a faster turnaround and lower costs. And filmmakers have been able to convince studios that those additional costs are worth it for the end result.
As such, Kodak has been able to put together another deal that will provide long-term film orders to Hollywood for the foreseeable future. And Clarke believes that while they won’t be able to completely reverse the collapse of motion picture film in the industry, he does believe that, like black and white before it, that film will find its place in the industry. In fact, it’s become something of a rarity to hear a movie is screening on 35mm film, and it becomes a special engagement. “I am confident we will see a slowing of the [revenue] decline,” said Clarke. “But a large part of this will be a deeper recognition that film is valuable.”
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