OT - Peter Jackson's WWI Documentary

[yeahtoasty]

For anyone with the slightest interest in history, "They Shall Not Grow Old" is a stunning experience. Jackson was given access to the British War Museum's archived film footage, and given the challenge of bringing it up to modern standards. Via digital filmmaking magic, he added frames to reduce the herky-jerky motion of old-timey frame rates, stabilized the images, and added the most realistic-looking colorization that I've ever seen.

As a result, the footage comes alive with the humanity of those soldiers in a way that we never could've imagined. The audio is also nothing short of amazing. Jackson used archived interviews with soldiers as his primary story-telling device. He also added sound effects to the film footage, very realistic -- and he even went as far as hiring forensic lip-readers to figure out what the soldiers in the footage were saying, and then tried to the extent possible to figure out where those soldiers likely came from, and then hired voice actors with those accents to give voice to those soldiers.

All in all, an amazing film experience. I wish it was showing more widely, but they chose to release it only in the dreaded "select theaters" and it's only playing on two dates -- one of which was last night, and the second of which is December 27th.

(Apologies, I realize there was another thread on this but it approached a level of bizarre-ness that was truly exceptional, even for this place. It's not currently on the first page, maybe it got buried or deleted.)

 

[Woodpecker]

Previous discussion

 

[yeahtoasty]

Previous discussion

Ah, thanks. That's not the thread I was referring to -- it's civil and sane, so well worth looking through unlike yesterday's. The one I was referring to does seem to have been deleted. Good.

 

[JosephNit]

For anyone with the slightest interest in history, "They Shall Not Grow Old" is a stunning experience. Jackson was given access to the British War Museum's archived film footage, and given the challenge of bringing it up to modern standards. Via digital filmmaking magic, he added frames to reduce the herky-jerky motion of old-timey frame rates, stabilized the images, and added the most realistic-looking colorization that I've ever seen.

As a result, the footage comes alive with the humanity of those soldiers in a way that we never could've imagined. The audio is also nothing short of amazing. Jackson used archived interviews with soldiers as his primary story-telling device. He also added sound effects to the film footage, very realistic -- and he even went as far as hiring forensic lip-readers to figure out what the soldiers in the footage were saying, and then tried to the extent possible to figure out where those soldiers likely came from, and then hired voice actors with those accents to give voice to those soldiers.

All in all, an amazing film experience. I wish it was showing more widely, but they chose to release it only in the dreaded "select theaters" and it's only playing on two dates -- one of which was last night, and the second of which is December 27th.

(Apologies, I realize there was another thread on this but it approached a level of bizarre-ness that was truly exceptional, even for this place. It's not currently on the first page, maybe it got buried or deleted.)

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It played at three theaters in the Baltimore area yesterday, and the 7:00 seats were pretty well sold out. So my wife and I caught a 4:00 show.

It was very good, no question, and I'd recommend it for sure. Pretty stunning digital technology used on the old film footage.

In the category of war documentaries, I think Ken Burns's The Civil War and for that matter the 1970's series The World At War, narrated by Laurence Olivier, were actually better, but that's not intended as a criticism of Peter Jackson's product.

Speaking of The World At War, there's a quotation in it from a German soldier at Stalingrad that came to mind while watching They Shall Not Grow Old:

The street is no longer measured by meters but by corpses. Stalingrad is no longer a town. By day it is an enormous cloud of burning, blinding smoke; it is a vast furnace lit by the reflection of the flames. And when night arrives, one of those scorching howling bleeding nights, the dogs plunge into the Volga and swim desperately to gain the other bank. The nights of Stalingrad are a terror for them. Animals flee this hell; the hardest stones cannot bear it for long; only men endure.

"Only men endure."

I thought of that line as They Shall Not Grow Old brought to life the hellish reality of WWI front-line trench warfare. The ability of the human spirit to survive such things is pretty incredible.

I wonder whether the Snowflake Generation would be up to it.

 

[BOSCO2]

For anyone with the slightest interest in history, "They Shall Not Grow Old" is a stunning experience. Jackson was given access to the British War Museum's archived film footage, and given the challenge of bringing it up to modern standards. Via digital filmmaking magic, he added frames to reduce the herky-jerky motion of old-timey frame rates, stabilized the images, and added the most realistic-looking colorization that I've ever seen.

As a result, the footage comes alive with the humanity of those soldiers in a way that we never could've imagined. The audio is also nothing short of amazing. Jackson used archived interviews with soldiers as his primary story-telling device. He also added sound effects to the film footage, very realistic -- and he even went as far as hiring forensic lip-readers to figure out what the soldiers in the footage were saying, and then tried to the extent possible to figure out where those soldiers likely came from, and then hired voice actors with those accents to give voice to those soldiers.

All in all, an amazing film experience. I wish it was showing more widely, but they chose to release it only in the dreaded "select theaters" and it's only playing on two dates -- one of which was last night, and the second of which is December 27th.

(Apologies, I realize there was another thread on this but it approached a level of bizarre-ness that was truly exceptional, even for this place. It's not currently on the first page, maybe it got buried or deleted.)

View embedded media

That trailer was freekin awesome. Gotta see this film.

 

[Nitt1300]

I plan to see it- WWI was horrible, those soldiers deserve to be remembered and honored.

 

[ILLINOISLION]

That trailer was freekin awesome. Gotta see this film.

Saw the trailer at a theater on Fri night.....was stunningly beautiful and absolutely terrifying.

 

[yeahtoasty]

I plan to see it- WWI was horrible, those soldiers deserve to be remembered and honored.

The film includes a short piece about the attempts to build a WWI Memorial on the National Mall. Absolutely a worthy cause, I'll be contributing.

 

[Evan Ceg]

The film includes a short piece about the attempts to build a WWI Memorial on the National Mall. Absolutely a worthy cause, I'll be contributing.

The National WWI Museum and Memorial is in Kansas City and it's excellent, if you ever get the chance. The site was first dedicated in 1921 with international heads of state and WWI generals in attendance, and "Liberty Memorial" opened in 1926 to great fanfare. It eventually fell into neglect, was closed, and then, after $102 million was raised, the site was thoroughly refurbished, expanded and reopened in 2006 as our Congressionally-designated National WWI Museum and Memorial.

I look forward to seeing Peter Jackson's film.

 

[BobPSU92]

According to Steph Curry, WWI never happened.

 

[ILLINOISLION]

According to Steph Curry, WWI never happened.

No, not true.....he just thinks it happened after WWII.