2″ of snow on the back-40, enough for a bit of slippery fun.

All photos by Kristine.

2007 could be unofficially titled “The Year Big Movie Makers Stopped Being Afraid of Digital Acquisition and Released A Bunch of Digitally Shot Films”. I think though, without one caveat, that title would be a bit misleading.

Oh, the caveat?

There were a bunch of crappy looking digital films released in 2007.

Don’t get me wrong, I think the move to digital acquisition is cool, but not if the films look like they were “shot with a digital camera that makes everything look like it’s being viewed through a bug-spattered windshield”.

I guess in some ways the move to using digital cameras for non-indie films has allowed medium/highly funded producers to believe hiring a competent DP was pointless. “The cameras are digital! It’s easy!”

I thought about making a comprehensive list of biggish-time films shot digitally but looked terrible. That list is out there; maybe someone else will write it, but for now, here are a few examples:

- Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead trailer - come on Sidney!
- Starting Out In The Evening trailer - puke
- Fay Grim trailer - most of Magnolia’s/HDNet Films releases suffer from bad cinematography
- Slipstream trailer - yuck for the cinematography, and double yuck for the “plot”
- The Lookout clip - right after this clip (peep the DVD), the film turns to terrible, DV quality REZ for the final bank shootout. Um, what? Why?
- Zodiac, though I did enjoy the color grading, was even unimpressive. I particularly remember some scenes in the dinner toward the end looking horrendous.

One digitally shot film released in 2007 that looks fabulous is Reign Over Me. Shot with the Panavision Genisis, cinematographer Russ Alsobrook and his crew had the city street night shots dialed in. Generally, it is the naturally lit nighttime scenes which expose digital acquisition weaknesses, but Reign doesn’t falter for a second.

The movie itself? Not bad. Found the “love interest” quite annoying to the point of undermining the rest of the moral.

But for what it’s worth, Reign features some brilliant filmmaking, including the editing which worked quite well given the tasty visuals.

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Anyone catch the name of Liv Tyler’s character?