High frame rate or not at cinema?

I don't think that's quite fair.



I do appreciate, however, that higher frame rate enrage you in the same way that zombie-colorization enrages me. I do think that future audiences will choose higher frame rates, but also think that they shall UNDO the damage of Turner and the crappy color-bots that turn everything a muddy brown and purple and every human face into a shading-by-crayon. Or is that me deciding again?

It's sad that so many interesting topics of discussion end up being about one person trying to win by any means possible. It's been that way since I started posting almost 25 years ago...I wish people could discuss without ego.

We can't control how others in the future will consume art. Even if I think it is unfortunate in that high frame rates are just as ungodly ugly as horrible colorization, and (as stated) in many ways worse.


And while, yes, you can't separate my familiarity with 24 fps from my preference, this is always a Dodge of an argument. There are lots of things I was familiar with in my art growing up that I have never felt any need to return to. Most of my earlier viewing experiences were on washed out VHS recordings and I'm not clamouring to go back to them. Because I recognize the purity of image that DVDs restores was in keeping with the directors initial intent. High frame rates are an absolute perversion of the notion that 'this is what directors wanted their films to look like'. Outside of bad logic (it's more like how our eyes view reality) there is almost nothing that backs this stance up.


Find me some directors who want their past work transferred into this format. I dare you.

Peter Jackson. He did The Hobbit at 48 and upscaled and interpolated old WWI footage for "They Shall Not Grow Old."


As for having not other "prejudices," I'll note that my favorite copy of ALIEN is an old VHS which only looks "right" on a CRT. That is how I prefer to watch that movie. But that's my jam. Newer viewers will want clarity and color.



We see the world "faster" than 24 FPS. Future audiences, I predict, will demand higher frame rates for verisimilitude (see video gaming which is now our most lucrative mode of art in moving images). Death to flicker dome, long live the continuous image!

Yes. He made a choice to shoot a new film to be seen in that format. Fine. Has he gone back to previous films and demanded they look this way too? That is my question.


As for old World War footage, this was not art. It doesn't harm anything to change it. And Jackson reclaiming this footage and adding those frame rates changes the way we view it....which is what an artist should be doing. No artistic visions have been perverted for the convenience of modernity.

So we've gone from "wanting" (being open to, welcoming) to "demanding"? Not trying to decide what you're arguing, but the bar seems to be elevating here...



But he's added frames that weren't there. By your lights, that's adding words that were never on the page...

Crumbs question wasn’t “show me a director who has shot a new film in this format” but rather “show me which director wants to transfer their past works onto this format”.

There’s an important distinction between the two questions there.

We didn't "[go to]" that. That's clearly what he was asking the first time. And it is, in fact, a very relevant question: if this is the superior format, and you think that many (most?) filmmakers would've chosen it if it had been available to them, shouldn't we have lots of them clamoring for this?

As has already been stated, but I will reiterate, nothing changed about my initial point.





As I already explained, war footage isn't art. What are you not understanding here?

Just trying to calibrate it. Consider the following scenarios.



a. It's 2092 and a 240 FPS version of Star Wars is released. Does the ghost of George Lucas care? I don't think so.



b. Ridley Scott finds out I'm watching Gladiator on a TV the auto-interpolates frame to pump up the frame rate. Does he care? I don't think so. And if he does, I don't.



c. Guillermo de Toro is approached by the studio with a special director's cut which will include an upped frame-rate as one of the options. Do you think he refuses? I don't know. I don't see why he would as a matter of presumption.



d. Chris Nolan finds out in 2035 that Tenet has a planned re-release. The marketing nerds approach him because they want to up the FPS for modern audiences. Does he "welcome" this change? I think so.



e. It's 2022. Will Quentin Tarantino "demand" that Pulp Fiction be released with more frames? In this case, definitely not.



In many of these scenarios, I think the directors would welcome the change or not care that much. And as we head into the future I think the old school celluloid ascetics will die off, making these changes much less controversial and much more natural. Maybe we're not there yet? OK. But I don't doubt this is where we're heading.



Quite a bit, actually. It is MORE of a sin to monkey around with actual historical footage of significant events. Don't make that tank a color selected by an algorithm. Don't add CGI elements into the frame to enhance the drama. Preserve the original and make sure the experience of the viewing is equivalent to the light which would have entered the camera, as close as we can get what the eye would have seen in the moment. And upping the frame rate does not mangle history in this sense (where colorization does).

I just can't.

If I ever meet the genie in the vase, one of my three wishes will be to up the frame rate of every film ever made to 60 FPS. Just letting you know right now.

If I ever find a genie in a vase, I'm going to wish for you to see with wide eyes how frequently you misrepresent the arguments of other people.


I can be cruel with my genies too.

Come with the receipts or quit whining.

Not worth it until I've got me that genie.


I'm also going to wish for a plague of broken fast forward buttons in your future.


And I've still got one more wish, so be nice!

Fine, you win this time Crumb.

My final wish, a piece of tasty cake for Yarn!


*whispers suspiciously into ear of genie*


Very very tasty cake you must take a very big bite from to fully appreciate.


*genie stifles laughter*

Weirdly enough this is one of the most peaceful resolutions I've seen to an argument.

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Anyone seen Avatar 2 in 3D? Does 48 FPS make a difference?