Chris Nolan on his preference for using motion picture film

[Nicholas Kovats]

Christopher Nolan on his preference for using motion picture film. His forthcoming film "Interstellar" is about to be pre-released on 15-perf 70mm (IMAX), 5-perf 70mm and 4 perf 35mm on Nov. 5, i.e

"For the last 10 years, I've felt increasing pressure to stop shooting film and start shooting video, but I've never understood why. It's cheaper to work on film, it's far better looking, it’s the technology that's been known and understood for a hundred years, and it's extremely reliable. I think, truthfully, it boils down to the economic interest of manufacturers and [a production] industry that makes more money through change rather than through maintaining the status quo. We save a lot of money shooting on film and projecting film and not doing digital intermediates. In fact, I've never done a digital intermediate. Photochemically, you can time film with a good timer in three or four passes, which takes about 12 to 14 hours as opposed to seven or eight weeks in a DI suite. That’s the way everyone was doing it 10 years ago, and I've just carried on making films in the way that works best and waiting until there’s a good reason to change. But I haven't seen that reason yet."

Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/in-contention/the ... ZM4BYj2.99

The 'hitfix' article references the original quote extracted from a lengthly interview with the Directors Guild of America (DGA), i.e. http://www.dga.org/craft/dgaq/all-artic ... nolan.aspx

[JeremyC]

I think, truthfully, it boils down to the economic interest of manufacturers and [a production] industry that makes more money through change rather than through maintaining the status quo.

From my broadcast engineering background I can well relate to that statement, but its not just limited to media, its the constant need for stimulation that runs through the heart of western society. Why all these new curved '4K' TV sets I only stumbled across last week in the large 'electronics' chain next to the broadcaster I'm currently at?

Thinking about Nolan's statement an example of this in broadcast, not film, would be that in the world of broadcast we have gone analog -> digital -> SDI digital -> multichannel -> widescreen (outside of the US that is) -> HD -> YouTube -> 3D (failure) -> 3G (another failure.....perhaps) -> .movs across servers with networking and now 4K and next 8K(?). How much was useful change and how much was economic interest or the need for constant stimulation described as 'progress'?

[Nicholas Kovats]

An excellent inversion of Nolan's statement for the digital age.