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Spreading The Disease
Tom Maguire
6 August 2007
I received this e-mail from my Aunt about The Bourne Ultimatum :
"...We liked it except for the way the action scenes were filmed. It was like the characters had cameras mounted on their shoulders or heads so in a fight or chase scene you had a hard time figuring out what was going on. Is there a name for that? The way they film I mean. I really didn't care for it. Other than that the movie was pretty good.
-C".
My fellow TFB dwellers and I have for years been bemoaning the hand held method of filming action and fight sequences. My Aunt and Uncle, not film geeks by ANY stretch of the imagination, fit in the category of Average Moviegoer as well as anyone could. When I hear a comment about camera work and shot composition coming from them, I know this issue lies not with a bunch of angry and frustrated film school graduates who aren't making movies but with the style of the filmmaking itself.
First, a brief history. The use of hand held camera work as practiced today can be traced back to the French New Wave movement of the late 1950s and early 60s. Directors associated with this movement worked under a theory of filmmaking which came to be known as Cinema Verite. Directors who practiced this theory looked to strip away the conventions of cinema and make films that felt real and of the moment. The intent was to capture events as though they were actually happening and with no external intervention. In addition to handheld camera work, other features of Cinema Verite include the use of natural surroundings (as opposed to sets), natural lighting, the use of non actors, absence of voiceovers and so on. Some of these ideas, mostly the look of a handheld camera, have found their way into television police drams such as Homicide: Life on the Streets and the Law&Order shows. I say "the look of a handheld camera" because in reality none of these shows are actually shot handheld. Hollywood camera crews use equipment that simulate handheld movements instead of actually employing the technique for real. As with almost everything in Hollywood filmmaking, what looks real isn't.
But regardless of how the look is achieved, it's use has grown by absurd proportions. Mark and I have joked for years that there must be some affliction among camera operators in Hollywood that makes them unable to hold the camera still. We quip that movies like this suffer from The Disease. Other terms include ShakyCam, PalsyCam, and SpasmCam (tm Matt Goltz). However it's referred, except for few rare instances where a director has a strong visual understanding of how to cover a fight or action sequence, the handheld technique has become the norm in Hollywood.
The Cinema Verite theories of the New Wave directors were developed and used by renegade French filmmakers of the 1950s and 60s who looked to challenge the conventions of classic cinema. Ironically these practices have mutated into a language of film now used by the very people they looked to break from - the establishment. The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum are directed by the most extreme practitioner of this questionable method - Paul Greengrass. His use of these techniques may arguably work in certain types of films like docudramas United 93 or Bloody Sunday, but in a Hollywood action movie they only function as barriers to comprehension. Greengrass's attempt to serve his own desires instead of the needs of the film can only be interpreted as visual masturbation at the expense of audience enjoyment.
And I say not just the use of these techniques but the entire theory itself is flawed. In just about any documentary, the inability to see what's happening on screen is not a feature I've noticed. And as far as simulating reality, I can't speak for how any other person observes the world around them but I know I generally see in a steady and level field of view and not as though I'm in a life threatening earthquake. Perhaps directors like Paul Greengrass live in a world of perception far different from mine.
In the end I simply look at the handheld method, as used today in commercial Hollywood films, as 
sloppy camera work used as a crutch to hide the fact that actors can't really fight and that directors lack The Eye for shot composition. Hopefully soon, like in the past, a new breed of filmmakers will rise to challenge the conventions of commercial Hollywood filmmaking and reclaim for the Action Movie what once was held in high regard for all genres - the beauty of the well composed shot.
-tm
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