The digital revolution was the move from physical media to digital media, the transition from HD to 4K, but what does this mean for the future of film as a medium of acquisition? 



Well, at this point, I think we can safely say that although shooting on 35MM or 16MM film may have become specialist, even niche, it will certainly never die out completely, thanks in part to certain stalwart Hollywood directors like Quentin Tarantino who refuse to shoot digitally.



What digital acquisition of video content has done, is that it has reduced the costs of acquiring footage and essentially democratized the film-making process. Movies can be shot and produced for a fraction of the cost that they were on celluloid. Making a feature film is now accessible to everyone.



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 The main issue, however, with digital masters and acquisition, is how we archive and are those archives tried and tested? In a word, no, and herein lies the reason that 35MM and 16MM and film in general will never die out completely.



When we take a look at archiving in general – when high definition revolutionized television content acquisition way back in 2000 and 2001 and DVD became the norm for home video viewers – we all thought that this was the pinnacle of new technology, the picture clarity, the sound, the colors; could this ever be improved upon? It was improved upon in less than five years with the advent of 4K content acquisition. 



Take a trip down memory lane and look at some of those early features and TV series shot in high definition (1080p), films like Session 9 and Star Wars – Attack of the Clones – do their visuals hold up to today’s standards? No, they don’t. With 4K and even 8K content acquisition, HD seems positively antiquated and certainly looks that way when viewing these films.



This is where film still trumps these formats as a basic storage format. Movies shot on 35MM or even 16MM stock is a physical frame size. Now this individual frame can be scanned and blown up to any size you want it as, there is no limit in terms of mastering and remastering because it’s a physical medium. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">This is the actual frame of film, it exists, it’s organic, you can touch it, as opposed to modern digital acquisition which is merely terabytes of digital ones and zeros – it exists only on hard-drives. </blockquote>



Let me give you an example of bad digital archiving. There’s
a whole generation of digital photographs between 2000 and 2010 that have
almost simply ceased to exist whether it be attributed to a hard-drive crash –
a software upgrade or a computer crash. How are these modern movies going to be
archived and stored? Will one be able to revisit one of them, like a film print
in over a hundred years’ time and it’s still there, still plays and still
exists.



Gone with the Wind and Wizard of Oz, both shot in 1938 and released in 1939 have been remastered in 4K and they look like they were shot yesterday. In another five years, they can still access these prints, digitally scan them again and size them up to 8K if necessary. These films are now 80 years old – will you be able to access a digital feature in the same way? 



The truth is that only time will tell, but this does make
for an interesting debate.



Another example of retrieving amazing archives is the recently-released documentary Apollo 11 through CNN Films. The national archives in the US had recently discovered 65mm and 70mm film reels of the preparation for and the actual moon landing in 1969. Now the frame size of the film, much like the name suggests, 70mm, is huge. 



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These archive films were then scanned into modern film scanners and painstakingly remastered into the new IMAX digital format. Having recently watched the film, I can attest to the fact that the presentation is truly breath-taking. The details, the colors, the clarity, it truly is a sight to behold. One would never say the footage was shot in 1969.



Which brings me to my final point: Until digital can prove
to us all that in a decade’s time, all these ‘digital’ masters can still be
accessed and stored and made easily available – it hasn’t proved itself as good
an archive as good old-fashioned celluloid. Kodak may be all but dead in terms
of acquisition but its legacy lives on forever in the archives and will
continue to do so. 



– Robert Haynes is the Executive Producer of entertainment at CNBC Africa and the owner of film and TV production company, 42nd Street Films, in Johannesburg.

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Is Celluloid Dead?

The international worldwide box office has never been this
big or this competitive. 2018 proved to be a record year as Comscore reported
that the worldwide box office peaked at $41.7 billion. This is already a 2.7%
upward shift from last year’s $40.6 billion and marks only the second time ever
that it has cracked $40 billion.



At a time when blockbuster films are all but devouring the
lion’s share of traffic at the international turnstiles, we thought it
appropriate to pause and take a look at just what these figures mean for the
future of film and film releasing. Is Hollywood cannibalising itself by
creating these juggernauts?



Well, let’s take a look at the latest numbers sensation, Avengers: Endgame. The film broke a few records. It had the biggest international opening of all time raking in just over $1.2 billion in its first 11 days of release, an unheard-of figure. 



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As of May 13, Avengers: Endgame is sitting on a worldwide total of $2.5 billion and is guaranteed to go even higher in the weeks ahead. But where does this leave variety, where does this leave the smaller film, the adult-orientated film, the arthouse film?



The reality is that the mere existence of films like Avengers: Endgame means that this leaves such kinds of pictures nowhere. It’s impossible for any other picture to compete with a $356 million budget superhero movie with at least another $200 million in worldwide marketing costs behind it. 



Hollywood’s technique is complete saturation and to kill the competition. So while the film may have performed exceptionally, let’s be honest, with the kind of market saturation, brand name power and the sheer size of the international release, it should have.



Another important point when reviewing this film’s incredible box office performance is again to take into account the all-important Chinese market. Avengers: Endgame has already grossed over $600 million in China accounting for over a third of its total gross already. 



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But how has it performed from a historical perspective? When looking at ticket prices adjusted for inflation based on grosses in the United States only, the film slips all the way down to number 24 on the all-time grossers list. Top of the pops is still Gone With The Wind from 1939, followed by the original Star Wars from 1977. 



This brings me to my next point. Whatever happened to films that had legs, such as Steven Spielberg’s E.T. from 1982 or The Exorcist from 1973? The grosses of these films adjusted for inflation would be billions of dollars worldwide. The key to their ongoing longevity is that they had legs. 



These were films that discovered their audience week by week and although they were smash hits, they often grew in terms of their numbers from one weekend to the next as word-of-mouth spread, increasing their turnover. 



In this age of instant gratification and mass saturation, Avengers: Endgame is doing the opposite – it dived by 70% in its second week, numbers showing no signs of any real longevity.



So is Avengers: Endgame going to be the ultimate releasing strategy going forward? Does one push the film out into as many cinemas as possible, spend the equivalent of a small country’s GDP in terms of marketing power and try and pack in as many viewers into your first seven days with sell-out performances, then take the money and run?



Speculation is always circumspect so I’d like to pose
another question. If film is a business, should the business strategy be hit
and run? 



Will any of these films have the kind of longevity from a film fan perspective or will they disappear into the chasm of disposable entertainment. 



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Again, only time will tell. Where to from here for Hollywood? 



This kind of maximum impact output surely isn’t sustainable
and is surely too risky. You can’t spend half a billion dollars on producing
and marketing a film and then have any kind of risk in terms of the film not
connecting with its broad-based audience. 



All you need is two or three box office bombs and you’ll
sink a studio.



The old cliché that you can’t put all your eggs in one
basket exists for a reason. If entertainment tastes continue to split into
niches, the theatrical movie-going experience will also continue to take a
backseat to Video On Demand, and Hollywood may just be shooting itself in the
foot with this glut of summer tent-pole pictures. 



I sincerely hope this doesn’t mean the death of
“word-of-mouth”. Bigger does not necessarily mean better. 



– Robert Haynes is Executive Producer of entertainment at CNBC Africa and owner of film and TV production company, 42nd Street Films, in Johannesburg.

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Is Celluloid Dead?

Worldwide Box Office, The Best It’s Ever Been