View image A stunning shot from "The Bourne Supremacy" that does preserve spacial integrity: It begins from the inside of the car, looking out the rear window.
"['The Bourne Ultimatum'] has been described as bare-bones but it’s actually quite flashy. All the crashing zooms (accompanied by whams on the soundtrack), jittery shots, drifting framings, uncompleted pans, freeze-frame flashbacks, and other extroverted devices call attention to themselves."
-- David Bordwell
View image A beautiful example of indirection: Bourne is still looking in the rear-view mirror at the cop cars that are chasing him. His attention is not focused on the road ahead of him -- or the side-street visible to us out his driver's side window, as he passes through the intersection.
View image The police car is already trying to brake/swerve to avoid collision, but Bourne's attention is still behind him.
It is possible that there are four non-moving-camera shots in "The Bourne Ultimatum." That's how many I thought I saw, anyway. I wasn't taking notes, but I believe the only shots that weren't shaking, dollying, zooming, tilting, panning, refocusing or some combination of all those things are: two consecutive shots as Bourne breaks into Daniels' CIA office in Madrid; a high-angle flashback image of Bourne sitting in a chair in The Room; a shot from behind the desk of a committee in a hearing room. There could be a few more tripod (or non-telephoto, carefully hand-held) shots -- a brief establishing shot of Turin (which may have been taken from a hovering helicopter), a really quick interior or two during a chase through some buildings in Tangiers, a couple dark underwater night shots where there are no fixed visual bearings -- but that's out of approximately 3,200 shots (by David Bordwell's count) in a 105-minute movie. They really stood out. Bordwell determined the average shot length in the film to be about 2 seconds, and the stationary shots I couldn't help but notice were probably in the one- to three-second range.
View image Bourne turns his head away to look back. He doesn't see what's coming, though we do, and that makes it feel all the more suspenseful and shocking -- all in less than a second.
View image Crash. This is a hand-held shot (lasting only 2-3 seconds), but it feels logical and natural, like the head-motion of a passenger looking back and then to the side at the driver, which magnifies the impact.
I sat in the third row, as usual, in a fairly big auditorium at Seattle's Oak Tree Cinemas (maybe 500-600 seats?), and I found Paul Greengrass's style in this film to be distracting almost to the point of self-parody. I was a big fan of "Bloody Sunday" and "Bourne Supremacy," but this one (and "United 93") didn't impress me as much. "Supremacy," I thought, was stronger because it was better at establishing your (and the characters') bearings. "Ultimatum" made my eyes hurt a little, but I didn't get nauseous -- as some reportedly have. I hung around and listened to ticket-buyers exiting the theater, and while I overheard a couple of say the movie had made them extremely "nervous" and "edgy" (and that's by no means a negative reaction to a thriller), I didn't hear anybody complain that they felt like throwing up.
My problem with the film was that the "look-at-me!" technique kept whiplashing me right out of the picture. This kind of camerawork, with its rapid and disorienting glimpses of abstract motion, is often effective during a chase or an action sequence, but Greenglass chose to shoot every moment in the picture this way, including simple dialog scenes around a desk or a table in a cafe. (The repeated use of the back-of-the-head eclipsing half a person's face in close-up, for no particular reason, was so silly it made me laugh inappropriately.)
People's heads, of course, are not usually perfectly steady, but we're not conscious of every single move our eyeballs make, either. If we were, well, we'd probably puke a lot more often. The exceedingly self-conscious camerawork in "Bourne Ultimatum" didn't feel organic or (as Peter Debruge calls it, "immersive") to me; it actually felt studied, like a formal strategy that was simply being pursued to the point where it became counter-effective. Maybe that's in part because of what I'd already read about the movie -- and also because of my customary vantage in the third row, I don't know.
In the middle of the movie, when I should have been into the movie, I found the pile-on style so abstract and distancing/alienating (a Brechtian espionage thriller?) that I began to wonder if Greengrass had actually shot the movie with an eye for the small(er) screen rather than the big one. Perhaps on a reduced scale, even on a large HDTV set, the illusion would be less distracting and more involving. Disorientation can only be pushed so far before it all becomes a blur, like taking a hand-held video camera on a roller coaster. The illusion tends to be more dizzying and exhilarating if the camera is mounted on the front of the car, so that it positions you in relation to the forces of gravity -- like some of the fixed-camera shots using the "Go-Mobile" rig in "Bourne Supremacy."
In an post entitled "[insert your favorite Bourne pun here]" that delves even deeper into "Bourne Ultimatum" than his previous entry, "Unsteadican chronicles," Bordwell reports that a second viewing of the film has only confirmed his reservations about it:
There’s every reason to believe that the success of the series, plus the critical buzz surrounding the third installment, will encourage others to imitate Paul Greengrass’s run-and-gun style. In an earlier blog, I tried to show that despite Greengrass’s claims and those of critics:"The Bourne Ultimatum" didn't bug all that much (though I thought it was a come-down from "Bourne Supremacy," and I did think it wasted a lot of its locations by not giving us much of a feel for them), but I don't disagree with any of Bordwell's observations or criticisms.(1) The style isn’t original or unique. It’s a familiar approach to filmmaking on display in many theatrical releases and in plenty of television. The run-and-gun look is one option within today’s dominant Hollywood style, intensified continuity.
(2) The style achieves its effect through particular techniques, chiefly camerawork, editing, and sound.
(3) The style isn’t best justified as being a reflection of Jason Bourne’s momentary mental states (desperation, panic) or his longer-term mental state (amnesia).
(4) In this case the style achieves a visceral impact, but at the cost of coherence and spatial orientation. It may also serve to hide plot holes and make preposterous stunts seem less so.
And I love this:
In general, the run-and-gun look says, I’m realer than what you normally see. [...]And Bordwell finds a perfect quote from Andrew Davis ("The Fugitive," "Holes"):I’d say that the style achieves visceral disorientation pretty effectively, but some claims for it are exaggerated. So far Greengrass has matched the style to hospitable genres, either historical drama or fast-paced espionage. But isn’t immersion something we should try for in all genres? Wouldn’t "High School Musical 2" gain energy and magic if it were shot run-and-gun? If a director tried that, some critics might say that it added intensity and realism, and suggest that it puts us in the minds and hearts of those peppy kids in a way that nothing else could.
When you think about the beginnings: everything was very formal and staged and composed, and then years later people said, “We want it shaky and out of focus and have some kind of honest energy to it.” And then it became a phony energy, because it was like commercials, where they would make everything have a documentary feel when they were selling perfume, you know?In the end, Bordwell says: "Whether you agree with me or not, I’m glad that 'The Bourne Ultimatum' raised issues of film style that audiences really care about."
For much more, and some shot-by-shot analysis of "Bourne Supremacy," go here.
P.S. Has anybody written about the spiritual/psychological kinship between Jason Bourne and Roy Batty? (No, not because they both appear to be anthropoids with superhuman strength, stamina and agility, though poor Matt Damon may has well have been replaced by a cyborg for all he gets to do in "Bourne Ultimatum.") The Replicant from "Blade Runner" becomes virtually human through the accumulation of experiences and memories:
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.Bourne is almost the reverse: His memories have already been erased (or at least repressed), perhaps along with his personality, yet he's still physically alive. All he says he can remember are the faces of every person he's ever killed. He just doesn't know who they are or why he killed them. Unlike "Blade Runner"'s Rachel, Bourne knows he's a Replicant, but he also knows he was once human -- or, at least, someone else. He's trying to get back. That's the poignant, human heart of the Bourne series.
I heard a whole lot about this before I went to see the film. When I finally did, I walked out asking my dad, "What in the world was everyone talking about?"
The style, from what I can remember, was very close to Supremacy's style, though I think it was a tad more extreme. I noticed that the shakiest shots were either during fights or moments when Bourne was disoriented (or on the run).
While it may be true that this sort of style can cover up some choreographic flaws or even plot flaws as noted, I do not think it is a "lazy" approach as some people have stated. They think just because it's handheld it means it's taking the easy way out. That's not true.
You want to know what actual handheld looks like? Go watch Julian Donkey-Boy or any other Dogme95 film. The style of Ultimatum is not extremely difficult to achieve, but I believe it still must be achieved -- that's my point -- and it's done so through the camerawork, through the lighting (I felt Supremacy's colder look was much better than this one), and it's done, yes, through the quick editing (I hear so many complaints about the quick shots, but people were so forgiving when The Departed came around. There are a lot of good and bad movies with rapid-pace editing). The result is a film that, once you see a few seconds of it, is easily recognizable. It's relatively unique.
(Jim, when you say third row, do you mean THIRD ROW, as in from the front? Because at my theaters, that makes everyone's chin look like Jay Leno's)
I definitely thought Greengrass overdid it in this film. I agree that it felt studied and forced at times. Noah Vosen (Strathairn)getting out of a car and walking into a building: cut, cut, cut, cut, cut, cut, cut. As I struggled to keep up, needlessly, I kept thinking "I shouldn't have to work so hard to watch a simple scene like this." And there were definitely times in the action sequences, especially the fight in the apartment, where it felt like they were covering up for a lack of choreography or logic in the action. Given that, I still thought it held up far better than most sequels and I wasn't sorry I went out to see it.
...I found the pile-on style so abstract and distancing/alienating...that I began to wonder if Greengrass had actually shot the movie with an eye for the small(er) screen rather than the big one. Perhaps on a reduced scale, even on a large HDTV set, the illusion would be less distracting and more involving.
That's an interesting point, Jim. Some of the reviews I've read that have been critical of Greengrass's shaky-cam style in The Bourne Ultimatum have compared the style to the TV series 24. But, even when watching 24 in its shakiest scenes on high-definition, I never felt distracted enough to the point of a headache as I occasionally felt at Ultimatum---which leads me to conclude that perhaps, in this case, size does matter, and that maybe this film will play better (read: less distractingly) on a smaller screen.
Love the compare and contrast to "Bladerunner". I've been listening to the "Bladerunner" soundtrack in my car the last few days non-stop. One of my favorite movie lines is Roy Batty's as he's preparing to die. Maybe it's because I live in LA, but last night the music really took hold, and that line on the soundtrack made me pull over and sit in my car for awhile.
But to Bourne, I didn't find the camera work at all distracting. I found the lack of real emotional punch to be distracting, and the second act kinda sorta reveal that Styles character had more to do with Bourne before he was Bourne to fill that emotional void to be really distracting. She says, "You were harder to let go." What? And, "You really don't remember anything, do you?" But she remembers something from before he was who he is now? What? What?? "Supremacy" worked in all of it's glorified camera work because there was a strong emotional story line, cause and effect: girlfriend dead + gotta get revenge = insane camera work. In "Ultimatum" it was girlfriend still dead + vague notion of what Bourne wants = insane camera work. There's an emotional chasm there. But the camera work didn't bother me. I write more about "Ultimatum" and it's story at my own place of blogging, http://philzine.wordpress.com/2007/08/29/ultimatums-badness-and-falling-stars-and-yes-in-that-order/.
After all, the camera should emphasize the story, right?
I'm glad that these discussions help clear up some distinctions in styles. Adjectives and nouns like "documentary-feel", "docudrama", "realistic", "naturalism", "You-are-there", "Fly-on-the-wall", etc. are often used indescriminately by critics and confuses me to no end. It drove me nuts last year when people kept referring to United 93 as "documentary-style".
"It drove me nuts last year when people kept referring to United 93 as 'documentary-style'"
Why?
pacheco: You're right that this is a very deliberate stylistic choice (in fact, thousands of very deliberate stylistic choices) -- not "lazy" at all. I might have preferred "lazy" because it might have been less distracting. A tripod, a dolly -- these tools can actually be used for effects that are less obtrusive and artificial than the hand-held work that's become so popular in recent years. (Brian DePalma's 1970 "Hi Mom!" has a whole b&w "documentary-style" segment that is a satirical essay on the use of this pseudo-doc effect.) Greengrass says he wanted the hand-held work, and told his cameramen (he likes to shoot with several cameras at once -- something usually reserved for action scenes) to simply go for it with their coverage. The question is: What is the intent? If it's to involve the audience more deeply, I think it failed here where it worked in "Supremacy." Perhaps it's just a matter of degree between the style pulling you into the film or pushing you out of it. For me, it was more the latter.
The theater in which I saw "Ultimatum" has a pretty big space between the front row and the screen. The third row is already on the rake, so when I get into my customary viewing position (slouched, head against the back of the seat), I'm looking pretty straight-ahead, only slightly up at the screen. No viewer's-eye "keystoning" or Leno chins (great image).
Liz: You sum it up perfectly for me. If the technique makes you aware of it to the point where you're thinking, "I shouldn't have to work so hard to watch a simple scene like this" -- and that's not the response the filmmaker is seeking, then it's not serving the movie. But I think the Bourne series has been a generally terrific series, and as much as I'd like to see another one, I think they may have gone as far as they should. (I love what Matt Damon said on "The Daily Show" -- that if they do a fourth picture it should be called "The Bourne Redundancy.")
Jim, you quote Bordwell as saying,
"Whether you agree with me or not, I’m glad that 'The Bourne Ultimatum' raised issues of film style that audiences really care about."
This is the most important point about the debate over "Ultimatum." I think there is a recognizable shift in the culture towards regular people becoming more analytical viewers when my grandparents can go see a movie and come out saying not just "I liked it" or "I didn't like it," but "I thought the use of the shaky-cam style was a little overdone."
Is this even an issue aside from a few disgruntled viewers? "The Bourne Ultimatum" has made over $180 million dollars in the United States. It was #2 at the box office, a month after it opened. Popularity does not equal good movie, but "Ultimatum" has that covered as well, with high Metacritic and Rotten Tomato scores. Everybody seems to have loved it. If the camerawork was just so fast and the shots were just so furious, then why has the movie been a huge financial and critical hit? This so-called debate reminds me of nerds and geeks arguing about the esoteric fine points in a film/game/whatever. Nobody in their right mind would know or care about such an argument if the piece of art was good.
Alex: Watching films isn't exactly a democratic endeavor. Everybody has an individual experience, and is entitled to interpret it using evidence from the film, as Bordwell says in his final paragraph. There's no "majority rule" that clears everything up for all viewers, and for all time. I think you're confusing a discussion of the film's technique with its popularity, "arguing about the esoteric fine points" (e.g., what's happening in the film from shot to shot) with your definition of "good" art. As I said, I actually thought "Bourne Ultimatum" was pretty "good," but I have some reservations about the technique, which I found a bit over-the-top and needlessly distracting. (And I say this as a big fan of Greenglass's "Bloody Sunday" and "Bourne Supremacy.") Whether you agree with Bordwell's conclusions or not, his analysis is firmly based in what is actually in the film -- it's not just a few generalities about what's "good" or "bad."
PC, because I don't think it is at all "documentary style". I think the film is a drama, historical fiction, with some vérité techniques to enhance the feel of realism. Other than casting some real-life people as themselves or in their own professions, how is it documentary-like? I didn't feel like I was watching a documentary or even a reenactment scene in a documentary (like Touching the Void). The film is not naturalistic. It's staged, shot, edited and scored for maximum dramatic effect. Even compared with Greengrass' previous film Bloody Sunday, it seems more stylized and less free form. I don't mean any of that as criticism of the film, I'm just trying to nail it down correctly. Like I said, I read "docu" this or that thrown around a lot without much attempt to distinguish between the style and purpose of real documentaries and movies just trying to create dramatic associations with reality.
I'm rambling now, but maybe I've made my confusion on this issue clear, which was the point of my earlier post anyway.
Jim,
While the camerawork of a film should almost always focus on "involving" the audience, I think part of Ultimatum's (and Supremacy's) camerawork was to disorient the viewer. Yes, it's easy and cliched to resort to the ol' "the camera's supposed to convey the character's state of mind!" excuse (one annoyingly used to justify 12 Monkeys), but I think there's something to it here.
The whole series is about a man who's always on the run, doesn't know who he is or what he's looking for, and is almost racing against something. That's why I found it almost appropriate to have cameras that are racing just as well. I liked the struggle, if you will. There was a particularly fast shot of two men pursuing Bourne as he approaches a train (if I'm remembering correctly). The shot was so fast and "off" that I thought to myself, "Did those guys just jump on the train? I'm not sure." And I think that's the intended purpose. Bourne never feels safe, never feels sure, and never feels in control (sort of), and we are to feel the same way.
Yet, again, if my memory is working, I believe the technique was used more extremely in Ultimatum than in Supremacy.
I think this discussion has less to do with the artistic merits of the style and more to do with our own individual physical responses to it. The fact that this style makes some people feel nauseous while others are not bothered by it at all shows that it doesn't have as much to do with their preferences as it does with their eyes and the part of their brain that controls them.
I don't think there's a right or wrong answer here as to whether or not this style is "too much." For some people it is. For some people it is not.
I do think you might have a point about it being easier to watch on the small screen... though, the new Battlestar Gallactica series has very similar camera work, and plenty of people still find it hard to watch.
I've greatly enjoyed this ongoing discussion of shaky-cam. Thanks for continuing the quality posts, Jim. I'm glad you're an avid linker to Bordwell, too, as he's one of our finest film academics.
However, that said, I can’t get behind every argument he's made about this style of camerawork. As I haven't seen Ultimatum (though I have seen the other two Bourne films), I can only comment on how his comments read to someone not entirely in-the-know. But here goes:
"(3) The style isn’t best justified as being a reflection of Jason Bourne’s momentary mental states (desperation, panic) or his longer-term mental state (amnesia)."
Why not? I don't think he's made a convincing argument here. Just because ALL the scenes are filmed in this style doesn't mean it can't still be an intended reflection of Bourne's mental state. To say that if scenes not directly related to Bourne are shot in this style they can no longer be a reflection of his personal mental state is taking artistic interpretation to a very literal, TOO literal, place, in my humble opinion. He’s also carefully choosing which mental states to list, as desperation and panic sound severe, and we would indeed expect such mental states to be momentary, and thus, why should the whole movie reflect them? But how about confusion or apprehension? Certainly given the premise of the series saying the general aesthetic of the film is meant to create a perpetual sense of apprehension and anxiety is no stretch. Utilizing this aesthetic in this manner allows us to connect with Bourne, to empathize with him. And using a uniform aesthetic simply (here comes one of those words people seem to be touchy about) immerses viewers into the experience more completely. It’s clear Greengrass doesn’t want it to let up, so why should the film be criticized for maintaining its style throughout? I think it’s quite likely that this style IS best justified as being a reflection of Bourne’s mental state. It’s not an exact duplicate of his psychological state of being, but I think it likely that it is a REFLECTION of, at the very least, an EVOCATION of, his mental state.
“(4) In this case the style achieves a visceral impact, but at the cost of coherence and spatial orientation. It may also serve to hide plot holes and make preposterous stunts seem less so.”
This one really baffles me. First of all, this no more trickery to me than ANY decision made by a director that attempts to emphasize or de-emphasize certain points. And I see no argument in Bordwell’s pieces that makes me feel otherwise. Art can be truth, but it is truth through artifice and trickery. If Greengrass not only achieves visceral impact with his style, but also aids an audience’s suspension of disbelief, more power to him. Also, given what Greengrass has said, and given that Bordwell acknowledges that the visceral nature of this technique seems to be the point, why is loss of coherence and spatial orientation a bad thing? This comment privileges a given viewpoint: specifically that spatial orientation is preferable over disorientation.
Of course, Bordwell tries to address this, stating as though it were fact: “In a film of physical action, the audience needs to be firmly oriented to the space and the people present.” But he provides no evidence to back up such a claim (I’m sure in the totality of his work he’s commented on this at length, but here he provides not even the slightest indication as to why this is so). Later he comments: “I’d say that the style achieves visceral disorientation pretty effectively, but some claims for it are exaggerated. So far Greengrass has matched the style to hospitable genres, either historical drama or fast-paced espionage. But isn’t immersion something we should try for in all genres? Wouldn’t High School Musical 2 gain energy and magic if it were shot run-and-gun? If a director tried that, some critics might say that it added intensity and realism, and suggest that it puts us in the minds and hearts of those peppy kids in a way that nothing else could.”
He seems to have become fixated on this term: immersion. The visceral impact is WHAT immerses us. If the visceral impact is a given, then so is the immersion. However, it’s probably true that defenders of the technique shouldn’t say “greater immersion” they should say it provides a different type of immersion. The Bourne action scenes create an entirely different effect than a carefully framed, carefully choreographed Hong Kong martial arts pic. And some people find the shaky-cam’s type of immersion more valuable. It’s simply a matter of personal taste.
As it stands, I’d say burden of proof is on Mr. Bordwell. He admits that by implementing the style as Greengrass does visceral impact is a given, that spatial disorientation is a given, and then says claims for it are exaggerated. How so? It’s being used in a situation in which these things are desired, so why are claims to its success exaggerated?
To address his point anyway, the truth is, shaky-cam has long been employed in genres that would be considered “less-hospitable” for the technique (or at the very least, in scenes and situations where the possible intensity of the effect would seem less beneficial). And I think it works wonderfully in many of these situations.
When, for instance, a dramatic dialogue between two characters is shot using shaky-cam, what is the point? Well, to use another of those seemingly maligned phrases, it DOES add a “documentary” touch. To clarify, by “documentary” I simply mean that a human hand is more evident in the film’s appearance.
It might be easiest to use a literary analogy: shaky-cam, which eliminates exactly precise framing and impossibly graceful camera-moves, removes a level of “omniscience” that steadicam provides. Steadicam is the third-person omniscient of film, it acts more as the eye-of-god than shaky-cam does. Shaky-cam is more like a roving third-person in these kinds of scenes, it lets us know that a level of omniscience has been removed. We may not be any more or less “immersed” in the situation, just as we can be equally immersed in a novel, regardless of its point-of-view, but our PROXIMITY to the action and characters is undeniably altered. And this changed proximity DOES yield entirely different effects that directors even of romances, straight dramas, musicals, etc. might find beneficial.
It seems to me Bordwell is challenging the technique (albeit while admitting its virtues) but is doing so discussing it primarily in relation to one genre. Does anyone actually think that even if High School Musical were shot in shaky-cam that it would be shot in nearly as intense a manner as the Bourne films? No. The technique would almost certainly be muted.
In closing, my views on shaky-cam vs. steadicam are best seen in that analogy, I think. It’s a rather basic decision in the crafting of a scene. Each style yields very different results that can be used for good or for ill. It’s entirely possible that when I see Bourne I’ll think the style is used excessively to the point of distraction, but when utilized correctly (some of my favorite films are shot with large doses of “run-and-gun” [I think Wong Kar-wai utilizes the technique brilliantly in Chungking Express, Fallen Angels, and Happy Together]), it does yield an experience that I find energized and intimate.
I have loved reading people's opinions about the "shaky-cam" style. I saw The Bourne Ultimatum twice. The first time I saw it, I was sitting four rows back looking up at the screen for almost two hours. I enjoyed the movie, but, because of the way the film was shot and where I was sitting in the theater, I couldn't focus on the whole screen. By the end of the movie, I had a headache, and my eyes hurt.
So I went to see it again the next day, but this time, I sat much further back. This enhanced my enjoyment of the film because, I believe, I was able to take in the whole screen at one time. At the same time, if there is another Bourne movie, I hope, whoever the director is, tries slowing things down a bit before the series dives to the depths of self-parody.
By the way, the movie sits at 93% at Rotten Tomatoes, and both times I saw the movie, people seemed to love it. It must be doing something right.
Jim,
Have you written a review of United 93? From the times you've mentioned the film in other posts I gather you didn't like it, but I'm always left wondering why.
Kirk: I've never seen a Greengrass film I didn't like: "Bloody Sunday," "B. Supremacy," "United 93," "B. Ultimatum." I just thought the first two in that list were better than the latter two. As for "United 93," I wish that the film had just stuck to the known facts and stayed on the ground. To me, the work of the air traffic controllers, military, FAA, etc., was a better story, and one that hadn't been told nearly so vividly. What actually happened aboard the aircraft can only be speculation (since nobody survived), and some of it had already been cast into doubt by the time the film came out. (Evidence was releases suggesting the passengers had never actually made it into the cockpit.) I also would have cut the scenes at the beginning showing the hijackers preparing in their motel room, just because it wasn't in the spirit of the major part of the film, which was to dramatize the official record, based on eyewitness accounts.
So, it wasn't that I disliked "United 93" -- it's just that, as drama and as filmmaking, I thought the last third aboard the plane was less effective than the two-thirds before it. I've seen it twice. I think the next time I may just stop after the plane takes off. That, to me, would have made a more powerful ending.