1917 and the one-shot-wonder - Luke Leventis

Imagine this: a mysterious man makes the last adjustments to a ticking time bomb, which he then places into a car. He scampers away from the vehicle and into the safety of a dense, sprawling city. The owners of the car- a man and a woman -get in unaware of the fate about to befall them. They drive off and sometimes drift out of view behind some buildings, while you wonder if they will ever come back into sight. 

The path of the car crosses with that of a couple, one of whom seems to be a lawman or detective. Interesting, but right now the car is passing through some kind of checkpoint. They are at a border. Then the woman in the car says she hears ticking. The man at the checkpoint ignores her. The detective goes on with no idea as to what is about to happen. Suddenly the car goes up in flames. Pretty good story. But what is it? And how does it relate to“1917”?

That is the beginning of Orson Welles’ “The Touch Of Evil”, and the opening scene is one of the first (and best) one-shot scenes in film history. Why is it better in one shot? Firstly, there is a reason people cut in films. It is what makes cinema an art form, instead of just high-budget filmed theatre. When there is no longer a reason to keep going with the shot, you should cut. In the case of the scene, the camera is following the car, and it is in one take to fit the scene. The unbroken shot creates an ominous sense of suspense that we are experiencing this in real time; we are following these people to their deaths. Welles executes the scene perfectly and knows when to cut, which is when the car explodes. In short, a perfect scene.

If you make a whole film in one take then either there’s a reason for the camera to follow a certain thing throughout the whole runtime, or the director doesn’t know where to cut. Every cut, or absence of one, and camera movement should emphasise a point. 

Recently the film “1917” has been in the spotlight for its cinematography and the fact that the whole film appears to be in one unbroken take. 

While this does sound impressive, this is not by any means a new phenomena, as for decades filmmakers have been using this  “One shot wonder” technique in order to impress audiences around the world.

I would like to say that most one-take films aren’t actually done in one take. Clever editing is used to disguise the break between shots. If you watch “1917” carefully, you can see how the darkness of the protagonists crawling through the trenches could create good opportunities for hiding a cut, as at times the screen may go to complete blackness in the damp and gloomy trenches.

Camerawork should always be done to help the story, and to aid the plot and symbolism of the film. Most war films work by placing the audience in the shoes of an average soldier, a little guy fighting against the establishment. Someone who has lost his innocence in the horror of war. By allowing you to follow the characters in one take, the film places you in the shoes of a WW1 soldier, on the ground experiencing things as they happen, without an editor cutting between your experiences. I personally think that the fact that it is a one take film is too conspicuous and stylised, taking you out of the illusion that this is really happening (which is vital for a war film), creating a barrier between the audience and the events in the film. However, it is an interesting way of doing things. It would have worked better if the camerawork was more subtle, not too upfront about being in one take. These normally make the best one-take films.

One such film is “Birdman”, a 2014 film about an actor who is forever shadowed by his role playing a superhero character in a 1990s film franchise. The camerawork is so seamless that you don’t realise it is in one shot, allowing you to be immersed in the story. The film goes deep into the protagonist’s subconscious, as he often talks to his superhero alter ego, and the dancing camerawork mirrors the way he dreams of flying like the character he once played.

Perhaps the earliest example of doing a whole film in one take was Hitchcock’s “Rope”, in 1948. “Rope” was a hugely impressive feat at the time, created using the same editing techniques used today. Hitchcock is known for making works full of tension, and “Rope” is no exception. “Rope” is a murder story set in the dizzying hights of a New York apartment, and the fact that it is done in one shot amplifies the suspense by making the whole thing unbroken, and unrelenting.

In filmmaking, camera movements need to follow something like an object or character. If you are doing a take and it is no longer motivated to move by something, then you may as well cut, as what’s left is just dead space.

The one-shot-wonder is a stylistic choice and sounds impressive in theory, but like all camera movements THERE MUST BE A REASON, or else it is done purely to fuel the ego of the filmmaker.