Sunday, May 22, 2016

The Curse of the Cameraman

Newly fashionable among Hollywood cameramen, the under exposed shot.  In a recent Bond movie (Skyfall) we have a furious hand to hand fight between to black silhouettes.  I guessed one was Bond and the other was a Bond villain, but there was no way to tell  one fighter from the other.  Which makes the whole fight scene pretty meaningless.  A recent Marvel comic book movie (Dark Thor) all the scenes are super dark. Ocasionally we can make out the actor's faces in an otherwise black scene, but some times not even that.  These aren't the only ones. 
   This ultra dark fashion makes watching movies a real PITA.  It's as bad as the fad for shake-the-camera shots of a few years ago. 
    And we still have the curse of the soundman out there.  You know, the sound man allows the score or the sound effects drown out the dialog.
    Hollywood used to get this right, well lit scenes with understandable dialog.  But lately directors have been allowing cameramen and soundmen to screw things up. 

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