MovieChat Forums > The Girl from Monday (2005) Discussion > Awful Cinematography

Awful Cinematography

posted 19 years ago by tehsuck
10 replies | jump to latest

Does anyone understand what was going on with the "motion blur" effect throughout the WHOLE film? I understand Hal was going for a different sort of look, but I don't think using a cheesy digital in-camera effect is very effective. I really liked some of the dialogue in this film, and I thought the acting was on, but the lack of wide shots and constant changing of shot framing from standard to 45 degree was too hard to ignore.

I felt like this film was ripping off too many other films (Sayle's Brother From Another Planet, Gattaca etc.) to be original. I personally really enjoyed Hartley's No Such Thing, which I consider sci-fi, and wonder what happened between that film and this?

[–] Krustallos 18 years ago

I've not seen any of his work since "Henry Fool" so this came as a bit of a surprise.

But I think I know where he was coming from with the filming - have you seen Chris Marker's work? ("La Jetee" for example. Lots of still photographs with the occasional bit of movement). This seemed like a less extreme version of that. There's a bit of Wong Kar Wai in there too.

It was also like a half-way house between a comic-book and a movie. I quite liked it once I got used to it.

I agree the movie wasn't that original in terms of ideas; the whole thing seemed pretty much an updated gloss on Godard's Alphaville. But I still liked it, for what it was. And it's good to see a director with some success taking risks and heading for the edge rather than playing safe and heading for the mainstream.

"I don’t like the term torture. I prefer to call it nastiness."

Donald Rumsfeld

[–] asr_rec 17 years ago

I'm a bit obsessed with Hal Hartley's work myself. In my opinion, his writing is so good that if the movies turn out poorly executed is beside the point.

What I can't get my head around is his choice of picture quality. It can't be because it's digital video, the frame rate is all screwed up and the blur is like... dude, if you wanted to mask out your use of a cheap camera, wasn't there any other filter you could use? Both The Girl From Monday and Book Of Life are like this, and it only makes them a bit more difficult to watch. Does anyone know why they look like this?

[–] asr_rec 17 years ago

... Updating myself. Found this on Possiblefilms.com:

HAMILTON: (...) Hartley’s previous video work has always tended towards the visually extreme. 1998’s The Book Of Life found him pushing the boundaries of the cheap and easy technology to it’s breaking point. He prefers the abstract, expressionist images he can create with the lower-end consumer cameras.

HARTLEY (on DV): There’s something very temporary about it. Even the people who manufacture this stuff more or less tell you it’ll be obsolete in a year. And that is very much how a lot of contemporary culture feels to me. So, that seemed a way in for my design. It fit the attitude of the story. A disposable medium which, however, carries something permanent. Like a TV commercial for something the producers fail to recognize. A car commercial that convinces people not to drive. I wanted to use this essentially disposable technology like that. A superficially attractive delivery of something permanent - rage and love.

OK, so at least the guy has an idea behind it. But I still don't get it. Wouldn't cheap DV look overly sharp, just like VHS video or something?

[–] 17 years ago

[deleted]

[–] travisk 17 years ago

I just saw The Girl from Monday and I read an interview with Hal Hartley in Green Cine. He said he was going for the Wong Kar Wai button, referring to the stop motion blur. He says he wants to use video as its own medium, not trying to look like film.

[–] jnatch 17 years ago

no long shots because he had no money

I agree about the cinemtagraphy, very annoying. Also the editing where you can see them remove a few frames right in the middle of dialogue for no reason but the editor may have thought it was "cool" to do

[–] ribo 17 years ago

yea, I thought my media player was dropping frames or something; it's a terrible effect to go through the entire film.

[–] PhrenicGermal 16 years ago

My impression was that this was probably one of his first films, and that it was probably edited together on the powerbook that we see in so many scenes. Digital video edited together in iMovie could take on that look if he was playing around with some effects, didn't understand the technical aspects of what he was doing, and didn't have a clear picture of how things would look on a television or movie screen as compared to a computer screen. Using certain stylistic methods, and so much, like shooting at an angle and/or those cuts to black and white gave me the impression that he was an inexperienced filmmaker who had a few good tricks and ideas but didn't know when to use them. As a photographer I can appreciate a lot of what he is doing, but also know that some of the cool looking tricks and angles only work well in some situations, and that those situations should be chosen with care.
Using these styles probably would have worked better on a short 5-10 minute movie.
So I see he has other experience with making films?

[–] LudwA 16 years ago

yeah it sucked, it looked like a high school class doing their first project or something. (and I usually love Hartley's films, this must be his worst though)

[–] Tchoutoye 14 years ago

Hartley was going for the Brechtian distancing (a.k.a. alienation) effect, which, to quote Brecht "prevents the audience from losing itself passively and completely in the character created by the actor, and which consequently leads the audience to be a consciously critical observer."

Hartley is very much inspired by Godard and Fassbinder, who resorted often to this effect in their films.