They don’t make ’em like they used to.
That’s a line you’re bound to hear anytime you talk to someone fixated on the yesteryears of cinema. Their position: Movies are a paradise lost. But if you know even the surface lore of some of these projects, then you know they barely got made, even then.
Take 1979’s Apocalypse Now, which recently screened on 70mm at the 16th TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood. Apocalypse covers a lot of territory, from the simple admission that war is hell to the horrors of Manifest Destiny and the futility of imperialism. Director Francis Ford Coppola famously said his movie isn’t about Vietnam; it is Vietnam. And the making of this movie was one of the most plagued shoots in Hollywood history. The fact that Apocalypse Now exists is a miracle in itself.
“This movie’s everything,” filmmaker Antoine Fuqua — who directed Denzel Washington to a Best Actor Oscar for Training Day — said in his pre-screening remarks at the Egyptian Theatre. “First time I saw the film, I thought: ‘Why bother being a filmmaker? How can you achieve anything of this magnitude?’ ... It remains a goal for me to make a film that’s even close to Apocalypse Now. I don’t think I will, but I’mma go for it.”
Big and with a crowd
Every spring, TCM takes over the movie palaces of yore along Hollywood Boulevard to screen movies as they were intended: big and with a crowd. The Apocalypse Now screening produced an image so overwhelming it’s easy to feel like you are inside Coppola’s impressionistic nightmare of American warfare. Others, like Daisy Kenyon (1947) and Mildred Pierce (1945), screened from 35mm nitrate prints — an archaic format that produced a shimmering picture, but was highly flammable and can now only be seen in a handful of venues worldwide.
Even less available is the 1950s widescreen format, VistaVision, a popular filming process that had rare exhibitions even in its heyday. As Paramount archivist Charlotte Barker explained in her presentation, VistaVision was a high-resolution format that captured more detail than average celluloid but could be converted to standard 35mm so any theater could screen the 100-plus movies shot using the process .
While filming in VistaVision was common, only a few projectors were built that could then project the film as it was meant to be seen, similar to how some movies are filmed with IMAX cameras. Every theater can show an IMAX movie, but not all have IMAX projectors.
For those who packed the 916 seats of the TCL Chinese Theater, TCM flew two projectors in from Boston Light and Sound for We’re No Angels, a delightful 1955 Christmas comedy, and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, a ho-hum 1957 Western retelling of the Earp-Clanton dustup.
Of the two, We’re No Angels is the superior film, but the chance to see both, presented with this level of clarity and care, was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity most moviegoers in the 1950s didn’t even have. It’s moments like these that make the TCM Film Fest a pilgrimage every cinephile ought to make at least once.
Then again, maybe they do
Two movies do not make a trend, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that The Brutalist — nominated for 10 Oscars at this year’s Academy Awards — and the upcoming One Battle After Another, from director Paul Thomas Anderson, were shot using the VistaVision process. Ryan Coogler’s historical drama of vampires in the Jim Crow South, Sinners, was filmed with IMAX cameras and will soon be rereleased on 70mm, as will anything Christopher Nolan and Quentin Tarantino have coming down the pike. Maybe they do make them like they used to.
Movies are never just what they’re about, because the how goes a long way. And it’s not just how the filmmakers chose to tell the story, but how you’re going to experience it. Sure, it’s convenient to watch these movies and any future movies at home on your TV from the comfort of your couch, but it’s not immersive, and it’ll never be overwhelming. Not like this.
Much like a live concert where the music fills the space and connects everyone in the room, you can only get this experience in a movie theater. You have to leave your couch. You have to go to the cinema. And, if it’s spring and Hollywood is calling, you have to go to the TCM Classic Film Festival. There’s no place like it.
Never get out of the boat. Good advice for all involved in 1979’s Apocalypse Now, which screened the 16th TCM Classic Film Festival on 70mm. Courtesy: Zoetrope Studios