das leben der anderen (the lives of others)

[Keith Mottram]

finally got to see this when i was away in new york (missed the london run) it was me and about three other people in the whole cinema (what this says....). i was blown away, i cannot remember seeing such an impressive debut feature as this by the wonderfully named florian henckel von donnersmarck! it was so absorbing that i forgot where i was and double taked when i left the screen. the anamorphic photography was beautiful (I haven't seen any of hagen bogdanski's other work but will now be looking out for more of it) and elegant and was trukley cinematic without ever distracting from the action. the acting and other technical were all of a consistantly high standards, with the two male leads (particularly ulrich mühe as the stasi spy). it deservedly one an oscar and in my humble opinion pretty much shat over all the best picture nominations!

[Adam Frisch FSF]

Great movie - can't recommend it enough.

 

The look and cinematography is also absolutely right for the story. Very sparse and simple.

[Max Jacoby]

I saw a screener of this last year, so I don't really want to comment on the cinematography. I thought it was a nice entertainment film, except that the ending annoyed me a bit. I felt it was unnecessary and catered too much to the audience. I do understand though why it won all these awards (I didn't vote for it though at the European Film Awards!), as it is a typical 'Oscar worthy' film.

[Keith Mottram]

I saw a screener of this last year, so I don't really want to comment on the cinematography. I thought it was a nice entertainment film, except that the ending annoyed me a bit. I felt it was unnecessary and catered too much to the audience. I do understand though why it won all these awards (I didn't vote for it though at the European Film Awards!), as it is a typical 'Oscar worthy' film.

 

Pity you didn't get to see it in the cinema as i do feel it is one of those films that benefits from the big screen. i agree that the 'second' ending was unnecessary, but it wasn't so bad as to fit into the classic hollywood afterthought tack-on. by typical 'oscar worthy' are you refering to it's redemption theme, as personally i didn't feel that it was shmaltzy enough for that somewhat damning category!

 

keith

[Leo Anthony Vale]

by typical 'oscar worthy' are you refering to it's redemption theme, as personally i didn't feel that it was shmaltzy enough for that somewhat damning category!

 

It did win out over 'Pan's Labyrinth' for the best foreign film Oscar.

[Christian Appelt]

Just wait for the U.S. remake - somewhat bizzare, like making a Finnish version of ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN. :rolleyes:

 

Weinsteins To Remake The Lives of Others

[Christian Appelt]

Just wait for the U.S. remake - somewhat bizzare, like making a Finnish version of ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN. :rolleyes:

 

Weinsteins To Remake The Lives of Others

[Max Jacoby]

Just wait for the U.S. remake - somewhat bizzare, like making a Finnish version of ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN. :rolleyes:

 

Weinsteins To Remake The Lives of Others

I don't believe it...

[Keith Mottram]

i just threw up a little bit...

[Morgan Peline]

Hi,

 

I thought this was by far the best film I have seen this year, probably lasty yera as well. I found it a very sad and touching film in the end.

 

Hollywood is going to destroy it as usual, like they did with 'Nikita'. They'll probably add a few explosions to get more bums on seats.

 

I saw it a few days ago at Cineworld near Leicester Square.

 

Was this definitely shot on 35mm Anamorphic? I think I saw a digital projection so it confused me.

[Max Jacoby]

Was this definitely shot on 35mm Anamorphic? I think I saw a digital projection so it confused me.

It's shot on the Hawks. Are you sure that you saw it digitally projected, because they didn't want to do a DI and also recorded the sound on a Nagra, so analogue was the way to go it seems.

[Keith Mottram]

the print that i saw looked damned good- sharper than most anamorphic blowups and compared to shitty soft s35 blowups... i suppose it could be mistaken due to it's 'crispness'...

[Morgan Peline]

Yeah that's kind of why I was confused because the image was extremely sharp and then two times there were a few small white circular blips that appeared on the screen. For some reason I thought they were digital artefacts rather than marks on the print...

[Peter Moretti]

I just saw this film last night; what I loved so much was the extremely shallow depth of field.

 

Would you say the very shallow DOF was due to using an anamorphic lens, or more of a stylistic choice that could have been executed on "standard" equipment? In other words, could you easily get such a shallow depth of field from a non-anamporphic set-up?

 

Thanks much!

[Max Jacoby]

The AC article mentions that they shot some scenes at T2.5, which should give you less depth of field than spherical T1.3, but then again one needs to take these articles with a grain of salt, since it is hard to believe that they would shoot at such a wide stop regularly, becasue anamorphic lenses don't look very good near wide-open.

[Peter Martin]

The AC article mentions that they shot some scenes at T2.5, which should give you less depth of field than spherical T1.3, but then again one needs to take these articles with a grain of salt, since it is hard to believe that they would shoot at such a wide stop regularly, becasue anamorphic lenses don't look very good near wide-open.

 

DoP Hagen Bogdanski has indeed shot sequences of "The Lives of Others" at stops around T2.5. The achieved shallow depth of field is a typical characteristic for anamorphic capturing.

 

It would be fallen short to calculate the relation between focal length and t-stop down to spherical 35mm. The difference in the aesthetic impression results in the longer focal length and differently designed lenses used to shoot anamorphic.

 

Of course Hawk Lenses can be used wide open. The commonly held opinion "one have to stop down to T4 or 5.6" can actually refer only to lenses of an older design or to anamorphic lenses which are slightly misaligned due to a permanent use for rentals and which are not maintained perfectly. Modern anamorphic lenses from various manufacturers offer very good shooting quality also wide open.

 

Peter Martin

 

Vantage Film - Hawk Anamorphic Lens Design

www.vantagefilm.com

[Max Jacoby]

I give you that the Hawks look much better wide-open than some older anamorphic lenses (and even one newer design), as a test I saw recently revealed, but on the other hand that same test also showed that stopping down increases the performance of any anamorphic lens, especially chromatic abberation and sharpness in the corners. The difference is much more pronounced than with spherical lenses for instance. Obviously these are objective tests of charts and grids on one hand, and on the other hand people actually like what wide-open anamorphic does to an actual scene where technical perfection is secondary to the overall feel.

[Peter Moretti]

Peter, et al,

 

I have a question about anamorphic lenses and DOF.

 

My understanding is that a longer anamorphic lens is used when composing a shot with an than would be used with a spherical lens.

 

Is the longer focal length the primary reason for the shallower appearing depth of field? (In actuality, longer lenses create the impression of less DOF, but the effect is caused by the background images being magnified making their softness more pronounced.)

 

Or is the shallower anamorphic DOF mostly caused by the larger image size being projected on to the film? (This would result in a truly shallower DOF, even when comparing same focal lengths of a spherical setup.)

 

Thanks a lot for the input! It's much appreciated!

 

-Peter

[Peter Moretti]

/\ I know I'm asking you to do what you said would fall short of truly explaining the effects of anamorphic lenses, LOL! But I'd love even a partial explanation. Thanks much!

[Max Jacoby]

Since anamorphic lenses have a squeeze factor of 2:1 they will give you twice the width of the equivalent spherical lens. In other words a 50mm anamorphic lens for instance will give you the width of a 25mm spherical lens, but obviously with the depth of field of a 50mm. So for the same stop, anamorphic gives you half the depth of field of spherical. Also because of the anamorphic element, these lenses make the out-of focus background slightly elongated, which gives a very painterly feel that is different from spherical.

 

Since depth of field doubles with every two stops, to achieve the same depth of field as anamorphic the equivalent spherical lens theoratically needs to be open two stops more. But like Peter says, that still does not account for the longer lens look one uses in anamophic, nor the squeezed out-of-focus background.

[Peter Moretti]

Max,

 

Just to be sure I'm following you. Would it be accurate to say that a 50mm anamorphic lens has half the DOF of a 50mm spherical lens?

 

Now I know you wouldn't use those lenses interchangeably, and that a 50mm anamorphic is most equivalent to 25mm spherical in terms of composing a scene.

 

But I'm trying to nail down how much the decreased DOF is caused by the large image size of the anamorphic lens and not the perceived depth of field lessening that's actually attributable to using longer focal length.

 

Hope that was clear, and thanks much!

[Adam Frisch FSF]

Max,

 

Just to be sure I'm following you. Would it be accurate to say that a 50mm anamorphic lens has half the DOF of a 50mm spherical lens?

 

Now I know you wouldn't use those lenses interchangeably, and that a 50mm anamorphic is most equivalent to 25mm spherical in terms of composing a scene.

 

But I'm trying to nail down how much the decreased DOF is caused by the large image size of the anamorphic lens and not the perceived depth of field lessening that's actually attributable to using longer focal length.

 

Hope that was clear, and thanks much!

 

No, they have the same DOF. It's just that a 50mm in anamorphic has got twice the field of view crammed in there (since it's squished), which means it will

get used as a wide-ish lens (when in fact it's a mid to long lens). A 50mm spherical lens has the same DOF, but you tend not to use it for wide shots (unless you're Tony

Scott).

 

A 50mm anamorphic lens has the field of view of a 25mm lens, but it's still a 50mm lens. Make sense?

[Peter Moretti]

Adam,

 

Thanks for your reply! I THINK I've put it all together.

 

Real DOF is dependent upon two things: focal length and the size of the image projected onto the focusing pane.

 

With an anamorphic lens, the width of the projected image (albeit squeezed) is the same as it is for a spherical lens projecting onto 35mm film in standard widescreen format. So there should be no difference in DOF.

 

But the vertical size of the image projected onto the film by an anamorphic lens is considerably larger than what its spherical, widescreen counterpart projects. This will cause a difference in DOF.

 

The net result is a horizontal DOF that is the same as it is for spherical lens shot in standard wide screen format but a vertical DOF that is shallower.

 

Sound odd, but it may explain anamorphic lenses' elliptically shaped bokeh. It's a result of DOF that is shallower vertically than it is horizontally.

 

Do you think that's accurate?

Edited May 19, 2007 by Peter Moretti

[Satsuki Murashige]

Hi,

 

I just saw this film tonight and also had a few questions (I don't mean to derail the current topic, though!).

 

I noticed that there were a lot of rack focus shots, and that some of them breathed (old-school anamorphic breathing, very noticeable) while others did not. Is this the difference between the V Series Hawks and the C Series? The AC article on the film also mentioned that a zoom lens was used, but does not specify which one -- but that surely couldn't cause the anamorphic breathing because the anamorphic element on a modern zoom lens would be rear-mounted, no?

 

And some shots had noticeable barrel distortion (and I'm excluded the few super-wide angle shots) while using (presumably) a 50mm-ish focal length while other shots with a similar focal length did not -- again, is this a difference in the lens series that I'm seeing?

 

I also had a question about the grain structure, which varied quite a bit from scene to scene. The AC article mentions that the film was shot on 5218 and 5205 and pull-processed. But some day exterior scenes were extremely fine-grained and sharp, while others were quite grainy and soft (I'm thinking of the scene where the conspirators walk through the park and discuss whether Dreyman's apartment is bugged or not). Could the grainy scenes have been underexposed and printed up? Anyway, that scene definitely resembled "The French Connection" shot by Owen Roizman in the 70's, which apparently was the look they were going for.

 

There was definitely at least one scene which was underexposed at least a stop and printed up -- the scene in the bar where Col. Weisler approaches Christa and convinces her to go back to her man. All the shots except for his CU at the end have milky blacks. Anyone have any idea why that might be?

 

The 1st AC's job must have been a nightmare, pulling focus on wide open 'scope lenses. I noticed maybe 6-7 soft shots (actor's eyes out of focus). There was one boom shot that started very tight on Col. Weisler laying on his couch and pulled back into an MCU -- his eyes were sharp the whole way, and I felt like cheering in the theater after it was over! The actor's temples were out of focus at the end of the shot, which should tell you just how critical the focus was. And I'll bet it was probably done with remote focus too. Now that's talent!

 

I thought the framing was superb, great use of 2.40. The DP Hagen Bogdanski, BVK used a lot of just slightly raking angles in his compositions, something I'd like to incorporate into my shooting style. I noticed that the coverage of the scene in the Stasi headquarters cafeteria jumped the 180 degree line a few times though, rather unfortunate. Overall, the look was subtle and controlled, sort of like a less-flashy version of "The Conformist." Some great cinematography.

[Satsuki Murashige]

* I just have to add, there was a very funny anamorphic artifact in several shots where just the top and bottom of the frame (1/8 of the frame, maybe) were much more out of focus than the rest of the image. (Imagine a slightly letterboxed image where instead of black bars, you have blurry "bars"!) Any idea what that might be from?