What makes a movie cinematic?
We all know when something looks cinematic. It has that look and all the shots look professional and planned out to the T. Is it just those visual aspects that make something look cinematic? Or is it something more, something harder to define?
Merriam-Webster defines cinematic as “of, relating to, suggestive of, or suitable for motion pictures or the filming of motion pictures.”
What does that mean? What is suitable for motion pictures?
Oddly enough, cinematographers have trouble explaining that too. CookeOpticsTV interviewed cinematographers at the British Society of Cinematographers and Micro Salon shows in 2017.
The cinematographer for “Taken 2” and the show “Marco Polo,” Romain Lacourbas said, “I would say cinematic look is a look that that doesn’t stick to reality… but that you don’t notice more than the story on the script.”
The story was a theme that many of the people mentioned throughout the video.
Some of the cinematographers defined it as where you put the camera and what equipment you use to tell your story, but more than this they referred to the “frame your capturing, the acting, the what’s been staged,” said Dick Pope, cinematographer for “Mr. Turner” and “The Illusionist.”
Those are all abstract answers to a specific question. The problem is there might not be a specific answer to this question.
Script to Screen tried to answer this question from the writer’s point of view instead of the cinematographer’s. Script to Screen put together a panel of four writers and asked them to define what cinematic meant.
“I think ‘cinematic’ has to do with the depth the writer brings to the subject. There is no story that cannot be told in a cinematic way. What lifts a small story into a cinematic one is the writer taking a point of view on the material that mines all the thematic depth, making it resonate beyond the detail of the plot,” said Marilyn Milgrom, the New Zealand Film Commission’s Head of Development.
By this definition, it’s the depth of a script’s themes that creates that cinematic feeling. This agrees with some of the cinematographers’ thoughts on the story making something cinematic.
Is that as specific as we can get? Is it just to do with themes?
I think beyond the themes of the film and what you’re capturing, there is a more technical, concrete look and feel that makes something cinematic.
Cinema Shock discusses this point in their article. They talk about cinematic photographs that were sent to them and made them ask what cinematic means.
“We can see that there is a shallow depth of field, the image has widescreen aspect ratio (plus the black bars at the top and bottom), the colors are desaturated, the lighting is great and the composition is perfect,” said Cinema Shock about the picture “Vanessa” taken by Andrew Mohrer.
The point that they wanted to make though was that “Vanessa” made them ask questions more than anything else. The first question that came to the writer’s mind was “where is she looking?”
I don’t think there’s an exact answer to what makes something cinematic. It’s a very broad question that can’t be pinned down to a simple technical aspect of film making.
The technical aspects like a shallow depth of field and desaturated colors can play a role, but the look of movies can vary so much that I think it’s impossible to nail it down to just that.
When asked what to do if writers are told their scripts are not cinematic Milgrom said,
“ask that person what they mean. I don’t think I’ve ever said that to a writer and if I had, I can only hope I was able to explain what I meant.”
