While I have been dining, impromptu singing, running up and down urban beaches this summer, I’ve kept a shaky, handheld record of my friends and our adventures. Snapping every toast, recording every song, filming every low, breaking wave.
I like remembering things with a lot of motion and elements. Photos are nice sure, but an audio recording of my daughter singing “I Am the Walrus” or a moving image of a stranger practicing thai chi with prayer flags have a lot more punch.
I love handheld work. Maybe it’s because growing up in the 1990s Blair Witch, MTV’s Real World and Reality Bites were these kind of staples that classified the “I don’t have enough money for a tripod” productions. Rachel Getting Married had this awesome, home movie feel. And while each shot was carefully calibrated– the feel of moving through each intricate doorway, hallway, passage way of the country home was intimate. Intimate the way a small wedding should be.
If you have ever flipped through your friends wedding photos there’s always photos of girls in curlers, pictures of the catering feast and sloppy late night shots of strangers dancing with one too many. These were the photos I always liked. Weddings have this tendency to become so manufactured perfect dress, crisp monograms, chicken breasts beat until they’re flat and lifeless. I always hated the posed pictures: groom kisses bride on cheek, bridal party line up on staircase, mutual wedding cake feeding.
I like that this film never goes there– there meaning that perfect every-girl wedding. It’s lovely and whoever is responsible for planning a faux wedding to be shot has an eye for elements that make journey dreamlike. This sounds contrary to the almost documentary piece I am describing, but somehow the two are reconciled and beautifully packaged.
While I was not particularly blown away by the story (recovering addict sister on hiatus from rehab for sister’s wedding and lots of feelings and storming out of houses ensues) the aesthetic is one I will remember, and refer to.
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From Filmmaking Magazine, Winter 1998:
Handheld Hell
Thanks to the trendiness of handheld camera-work, most filmmakers assume they have some leeway when it comes to cinematography. “Fashion aside, it’s probably a good idea to spring for a tripod. I’ve seen some incredibly bad camerawork, and I feel sometimes it’s done on purpose, like handheld stuff that makes you want to vomit,” complains Rosenberg. And Blush comments, “Handheld is a big staple. It’s like, ‘My film is very cinema verite,’ when you know that the filmmaker couldn’t afford a tripod. It’s all about motivation. Is there a reason why this film has lots of shaky cinematography? If so, great, but if not, you’ve got to make the time to lock your shot down. Not everything can be justified as art.”
So how do you get good handheld camerawork? According to Nick Gomez, director of the upcoming illtown as well as Laws of Gravity, the film that boasts perhaps the best use of handheld camerawork in recent years (and which may be responsible for the technique’s continued popularity), the key is getting the right cinematographer. Gomez explains: “I knew that Laws of Gravity would be handheld, so I put out the word that I needed a good handheld D.P. Jean de Segonzac’s name kept coming up. While he didn’t have a lot of dramatic experience he did have experience in documentary filmmaking.”
Gomez notes that there’s a common misapprehension regarding the skills to shoot handheld. “D.P.s are very macho about handheld cinematography — they all want to put the cameras on their shoulders and prove that they can do it. But some can’t. It takes a special kind of skill, and either you have that sense of composition and grace or you don’t.”
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For the record, my handheld skills should have me in the DP time-out corner with a Dunce cap.