They Shall Not Grow Old (documentary) - Peter Jackson

[Neil]

I tried to see this yesterday (it was showing in cinemas via a live broadcast for just one night) but it was booked out. It looks stunning - https://www.theguardian.com/film/201...-peter-jackson To mark the centenary of the first world war’s end, Peter Jackson has created a visually staggering thought experiment; an immersive deep-dive into what it was like for ordinary British soldiers on the western front. This he has done using state-of-the-art digital technology to restore flickery old black-and-white archive footage of the servicemen’s life in training and in the trenches. He has colourised it, sharpened it, put it in 3D and, as well as using diaries and letters for narrative voiceover, he has used lip-readers to help dub in what the men are actually saying. The effect is electrifying. The soldiers are returned to an eerie, hyperreal kind of life in front of our eyes, like ghosts or figures summoned up in a seance. The faces are unforgettable.

[shootemindehead]

Was trying to find a showing of this in Ireland. No such luck. Strange that it was only on for one night, given the year we're in? Although, I don't think the colourising effect is all that great, to be honest. There's still that pastel-like effect going on that plagues the process. What does look well, though, is the interpolation that was used to smooth out the frames in the picture to make it more lifelike. I spose that this will pop up on streaming somewhere soon? I'll catch it then, I reckon. I do hope it's not just all British and Commonwealth troops though. The Western Front was largely France V Germany for the most part. It would be nice to see footage of other combatants too.

[MinionZombie]

I was just watching a Mark Kermode interview with PJ on this: As said, the interpolation looks excellent and really breaks down that little barrier that you get with the old camera technology (hand-cranked, hence the herky-jerky nature of it). That smoothness and those extra frames kind of allows the viewer to reach back further into that moment in time, if that makes sense? I see what you mean about the colourisation being a bit 'pastel', although in some ways it kind of reminds me of postcards from the era that were in colour - but the colour process of then - and it does look more natural compared to the colourisation of old. I remember my first time watching Night of the Living Dead was on a colourised videotape, and it was so dreadful looking (almost neon loud colours) that I just turned the colour down on the telly.

[shootemindehead]

Yeh, there used to be quite an industry of hand colouring old photos years ago. They all looked very washed out though, because trying to go too real made the photo look worse in many ways. There's a few sites around now that feature people's colourised photos in Photoshop and some of them are quite good. I've had a bash at it myself and it isn't an easy thing to do. The flesh is always the most difficult thing to get right. Skintones are just too varied. The sky, as well, is hard to get correct. Equipment and hardware is easier to do. In fact, there's a scene in 'They Shall Not Grow Old' with some MkI's that looks like it was shot yesterday. Very convincing. LOL, I remember I had that Hal Roach colourised version of 'Night of the Living Dead' on VHS. Jaysis Christ, it was tragic looking. There was another version made later that was colourised better and looked ok, for the most part.

[Neil]

I was just watching a Mark Kermode interview with PJ on this: As said, the interpolation looks excellent and really breaks down that little barrier that you get with the old camera technology (hand-cranked, hence the herky-jerky nature of it). That smoothness and those extra frames kind of allows the viewer to reach back further into that moment in time, if that makes sense? I see what you mean about the colourisation being a bit 'pastel', although in some ways it kind of reminds me of postcards from the era that were in colour - but the colour process of then - and it does look more natural compared to the colourisation of old. I remember my first time watching Night of the Living Dead was on a colourised videotape, and it was so dreadful looking (almost neon loud colours) that I just turned the colour down on the telly. I'll grab this on bluray when it comes out - Which I assume it will... ps: Peter Jackson sounds like he's just run 400m? Slightly worrying when he's just sitting in a chair!?

[MinionZombie]

Peter Jackson sounds like he's just run 400m? Slightly worrying when he's just sitting in a chair!? This was likely conducted in the usual 'round of interviews' style with new interviewers cycling in every few minutes, so he's probably been blathering away for some time, but then again he always kind of sounds like that. He has regained a fair bit of the weight he had lost between Rings and Hobbit movies, mind, but to be fair it is difficult to keep it off.

[Neil]

There's another showing at some cinemas next Monday. I'm booked in this time round!

[Moon Knight]

Wow this looks interesting!

[Neil]

Well, what a very interesting and rather unique documentary! The much touted modernised footage isn't used throughout the documentary, but where it is, at times it's very haunting as it bring the material to life, and makes it feel contempory instead of historical. The view of the soldiers heard during it is also unusual in their views of the war. Definately worth a view for anyone interested in WW1. ps: And the thought of 16 and 17yr old boys going through that? OMG! ps: Dentistry has moved on a long way in 100yrs!

[Neil]

UK folks... It's on tonight: BBC2 9:30pm

[shootemindehead]

Good man Neil!

[MinionZombie]

UK folks... It's on tonight: BBC2 9:30pm I knew I'd forgotten to post something - so thanks for posting it! I'll be recording it tonight and very much looking forward to seeing it.

[MinionZombie]

BTW there's a half hour doc that you can download from catch up services, it was shown on the BBC IIRC, called "What Do Artists Do All Day?" or something like that ... anyway, there's an episode that's all about the making of "They Shall Not Grow Old" and it's very much worth checking out to see how much effort went into making the film!

[shootemindehead]

Saw it on the beeb. Mixed opinions about it. On the one hand it's nice to see a colour representative of images I've been looking at since I was a child. On the other, the colour in these colourised photos and film never seem quite right. It's always a pastel shade, very soft and very unrealistic. They got the colour of the German uniforms woefully wrong too. Although, in one scene showing MK I tanks crossing a short ravine, it did look as though it was shot very recently and was really impressive. As far as the history was concerned, it was nothing that I hadn't heard or read many times before. So, it was really just retreading well worn areas for me personally. It was also a bit too focused on the "oh what a lovely war" aspect of trench life and too many commenters were saying that it wasn't that bad. That may have been true for the few lads on the mic at the time of the interview. But, there are tons of other interviews with other fellas that would tell you a very different story indeed. But, I suppose in contrast with having to actually attack an enemy trench, sitting around in your own trench would seem idyllic. Over all, it was an interesting exercise, but not an altogether successful one.

[MinionZombie]

You should check out that 'What Do Artists Do All Day?' doc, you should find it on iPlayer (it's on there until some time in December, IIRC). Jackson says he wasn't interested in doing another 'history of the war' doc, as there's plenty of those, and wanted to focus on the troops, and likewise there's plenty of docs out there describing the dreadful nature of it all, but amidst the dark there was light as well and that's what he wanted to focus on. I'm intrigued by the comment about the German uniforms. Now, I'm not clued up on these things, but Jackson has a huge wealth of WW1 memorabilia from the time - a vast collection of uniforms, weapons, and even planes (!!!), a lot of which are from the war itself, and they used those as colour reference and photographed them in different conditions to help make them match. There's always going to be some limits to the colourisation process, but they showed how it used to be done (which, indeed, is dreadful) and there's a world of difference when you compared it to what they did and how they were focusing on little details (e.g. if a solider has just been through combat, their cheeks might be a bit redder through the exertion) ... but yeah, because you're building on top of an existing black and white image, 'colour painted on top of black and white' in other words, it's never quite the same as 'simply colour', if that makes sense. I take it you're quite into your WW1 history, so I suppose this wouldn't necessarily bring much new to the table for you, but as more of a layman on the subject I found much more information and context than I'd had before.