Martin Scorsese's magnum opus, The Irishman, is a powerful final chapter for the 2019 film. In addition to the plot, its most notable is the extensive use of de-aging effects. It's a very magical special effect. Just like frame-by-frame PS, it can smooth out the wrinkles on the face, add rosy colors, and make the actors younger. The expensive anti-aging effects were the most expensive part of The Irishman, at $159 million, and the final film contained up to 1750 visual effects shots. Anti-aging effects are now quite mature enough to resist the gaze of 4K shots with fake realism.
But at the same time, it is difficult for the audience not to notice that the results of the superb acting emperor and the so-called perfect technical partner are not satisfactory. The character design and performance effect in the film are really contradictory. Technology can erase the wrinkles of an actor's forehead, but it cannot erase the vicissitudes and faltering steps in their eyes. All three movie stars have entered their old age (De Niro and Pesci are 76 years old, Pacino is 79 years old), and the rickety figure in the film has already betrayed the actual age of the actors. When De Niro, who plays the killer, trembles and shoots in the dark, it is really dramatic and sad. Perhaps, using a stand-in or a young actor may not be less effective than playing in person, but despite this, the producers still choose to let the old actors play in person.
Robert De Niro before and after the de-aging effect
The Irishman is not an isolated case of using this technology. In the past 2019, there have been many films that use anti-aging special effects technology: Samuel Jackson in Captain Marvel; Robert Downey Jr. in Avengers 4: Endgame; Linda Hamilton in Terminator: Dark Fate; Will Smith in "Twin Killers"... The use of anti-aging effects has become a trend and trend.
It's an interesting fact – driven by studios, directors and platforms, audiences continue to see familiar faces appear on the screen twenty or thirty years younger, and their charm transcends time and freezes forever in the film. With the gradual maturity of special effects technology, we may have long been accustomed to special effects serving gorgeous visual presentations, but we never thought that one day we would be able to use special effects to resist the years. The absurd-sounding, seemingly subtle, but constantly unfolding industry trend of rejecting aging is a sign that producers and investors are increasingly eager to cut out the attractive elements of a movie and squeeze out its last shred of value. The movies we know every day are as Martin Scorsese criticized, "You know that [Marvel movie] isn't called a movie, and to be honest I think of the most accurate title is theme park, the kind of theme park where well-made actors try to perform as best as possible." But he himself was inevitably trapped in this torrent.
Star Dependence: The Box Office Guarantee of Eternal Youth
If science fiction films like The Curious Tales of Benjamin Button, Twin Killers, and The Terminator have a very strong appeal to age-reversal technology because of the background and narrative needs of the story — youth/old age is the core concept of the film — then the adoption of age-reversal technology in a plain,comfortable film like The Irishman is not only because it's a film with a story spanning decades, but also because of the need for certain actors. This can be seen from the film's publicity, almost all the publicity revolves around the topic of "godfather reunion", and the audience has also said that it is enough to see young godfathers in the same frame in the movie, which is enough to make people intoxicated, so they can forgive them for not playing the flaws of young posture.
The Irishman reveals a secret: Stars are at the heart of the demand for age-reversal technology. In fact, if it were not for the golden lineup of Scorsese + the three major movie emperors, Netflix might not be willing to invest so much money in special effects production. After all, the cost is perfectly enough to hire several young, new-generation actors. Scorsese himself said in an interview that when the film passed the project, there was not even a complete script, just a concept, Netflix is obviously not going to the story, for them, the star is the biggest guarantee of the box office.
The anti-aging technology that came out of nowhere solves the big problem of star aging. The industry has long been plagued by this problem, especially films involving children/teenagers, such as the Harry Potter series of films due to the long shooting and production cycle, the small actors grew up faster than the characters in the film, and their appearance has also changed significantly, which once caused controversy among fans. Another example is the "007" series of movies, due to the long span of shooting, even if some actors have performed very well and have been recognized by the public, they have to change the male protagonist all the time. Sometimes, some film and television works will change actors through clever story settings, such as "Doctor Who" cleverly adopts the setting that the protagonist will change appearance, but obviously, this is only a very rare exception. More film and television practitioners are no longer satisfied with the young and attractive faces of Robert Deroni, Will Smith, or Robert Downey Jr., who just stay in their past films, but want to repeat the cycle and never tire of letting the audience watch them until they squeeze out the last shred of value until they lose the last bit of attraction.
Therefore, the development of anti-aging technology is very necessary. In recent years, many commercial films have continued to make similar attempts. In the beginning, it was a fusion of CG and real people, such as the young Captain Jack in "Pirates of the Caribbean 5: Dead And No Proof", which combined the images and expressions of actor Johnny Depp and a young man, and then "mixed" by computer CG.
After that, the technology developed further and became more and more mature. There are two main ways to use the current anti-aging technology: one is the motion capture used in "Twin Killers", the main method is to paste the capture points on the actors, and then use these capture points to determine the actor's expression and action direction, and then transplant this direction into the modeling. The other is the infrared tracking technology used in The Irishman, where the actor's face is coated with a special infrared paint, and a special camera captures the depth of the actor's face and the tracking information of the moving scene by taking infrared images. Finally, under the condition that matches the trajectory of the expression, the model in the database is replaced with the face in the real performance.
As a result, the audience successfully saw the flawless face of the young version of the star in high-definition shooting, and this technology has become a highly discussed topic, making the major Hollywood studios even more eager. In the future, the trend of anti-aging will continue. Not long ago, Ridley Scott, the director of the "Alien" series, revealed that he intends to make two more "Alien" films, and plans to "bring back" the young version of the heroine Ripley for fans through digital anti-aging technology.
Moreover, digital technology can not only allow popular actors to continue their screen careers and reshape their youth; they can also summon back ghosts who have passed away. For example, in the Star Wars "Rogue One" film, Governor Tarkin and the young Princess Leia were produced in computer CG, and the original character of Governor Tarkin, Peter Cushing, died in 1994, and Princess Leia's character, Kelly Fisher, died on December 28, 2016. So when they appeared in rogue one with the classic shape of the first Star Wars, the majority of fans were shocked and surprised.
This is a once-and-for-all approach for the producers, because once the database is established, the avatar of the star becomes an individual who is forever beyond time. For example, in Twin Killers, the special effects studio collected various body expression data of Er Smith. In The Irishman, the producers developed a new artificial intelligence face recognition program Face Finder between 2015 and 2017, collecting thousands of images and hundreds of sequences from the stars who participated in movies in the 30-55 age group, building an image library and classifying them (such as eyes, crying, close-ups, etc.) to find and produce the closest eye shapes, skin, textures and pore details. This means that as long as the technology is used once in a movie, the producer has fully grasped the actor's image itself and can modify the image at will. Perhaps, in the near future, stars will not have to star, and they can be completely replaced by their own avatars. That will be a new era of turning the world upside down.
The three machines behind The Irishman. Niko Tavernise/Netflix image
In such a future, will there be completely virtually constructed characters participating in film shooting? Will the boundaries between the virtual and the real blur further in the film? How much control do celebrities have over their image... We don't have answers to all of these questions.
But studios don't care about the answer, they're on the side of technology. With the development of the industry more mature, the market competition is more intense. At present, blockbusters/big production companies are fighting each other, and Internet streaming media is entering the film market, looking for opportunities to take advantage of. In order to reduce investment risks, major production companies and platforms want to quickly and effectively build brands in their own way, and stardom has become a shortcut: whoever can grab the attention of the audience through celebrities, famous directors and big IPs at the fastest speed can become a winner. They look forward to ushering in a more perfect world, filled with blockbusters who are never afraid of aging, and use their interpretations over and over again to bring box office glory.
"Serialization" flooding: the reproduction of the landscape that never fades
In addition to star dependence, another important background for the rapid development of anti-aging technology is obviously the proliferation of series of movies in recent years. Big IP is emerging in an endless stream, and the "XX universe" will appear at every turn. Today, around the world, whenever people walk into the cinema, they can see that a series of blockbusters with a huge "world view" is being released, which has become one of the most important film practices of our time. The narrative structure of these serialized films is huge, often spanning more than ten or even decades, so the age requirements for the actor's face and body are inevitable. That's the main reason age-related special effects techniques have been used in superhero movies so far: from the young Robert Downey Jr. in Captain America: Civil War, to Michael Douglas in Ant-Man, to Chris Evans in Avengers 4. Whether it is a return to juvenile style or an old age, it is realized by special effects technology.
The reason why the construction of the "world view" has become more and more rampant in mainstream commercial films in recent years is mainly due to two reasons. The first is because of the popularity of science fiction and magic films in recent years; the second is the inevitable result of the wave of contemporary film commercialization.
There was precedent for the release of sequels to acclaimed films as early as the classical Hollywood period, such as several Frankenstein films in the 1930s, including the famous "The Dart" trilogy and the "Godfather" trilogy in the 60s and 70s. This mode of sequel shooting is mostly a kind of late-acting behavior, because after the success of the first work, the intention to shoot a sequel was born, and the filmmakers tried to replicate the successful business model of the first episode in the sequel.
The film series really matured after 2000. After continuous exploration, the business model of the series of films has grown into a conscious project development behavior, which can not only use the success of the previous work to gather popularity in advance, cause group effects, attract audiences to watch the film, and at the same time, the film mode that has been recognized and loved by the audience in the previous work can also be continued in the sequel, which includes the continuation of the film genre, the continuation of the role, the continuation of the dramatic conflict, the continuation of the narrative mode and so on. For film investors, this continuation and replication of successful previous works is often more likely to succeed again than investing in a new film project that has not been tested by the market.
At present, the mature series of film project systems often choose to plan in this way: the use of positive transmission to attract a large number of audiences, after establishing a certain audience group and cultivating audience stickiness, the identity background of the characters in the play or the form of the prehistory of the story are supplemented, and the form of the outer biography is expanded in the gap of the story timeline, constituting a macro flashback and interlude. The flashbacks and interludes are both related to the canonical story and have relative independence. For example, after the end of the "Lord of the Rings" series trilogy, the prequel "The Hobbit" series trilogy was released, and the "X-Men" series was followed by "Wolverine" and so on. The prequel, epilogue and canon are intertwined and echo each other, forming a very seductive world in which the audience will unconsciously pursue the integrity of the information, and the only way to achieve the goal is to watch the entire series of film and television works.
Marvel, for example, has adapted a series of movies based on its superhero comics, forming a "Marvel Cinematic Universe" with common elements and characters and a unified worldview. Since 2008, Marvel has successively brought superheroes such as Steel Man, Hulk Hulk, Thor, captain America and so on to the screen, first shooting each hero's own movie, and then gathering them together through "Avengers". Not only that, the profits brought by the series of film projects are far from only the box office revenue of the film, but also the glory of other media.
Henry Jenkins, a well-known American cultural scholar, wrote in Textual Poachers: Television Fans & Participatory Culture: "Narrative is increasingly becoming an art of constructing the world. Artists, he says, are trying to create a compelling storytelling environment that includes content that can't be thoroughly unearthed or studied exhaustively in a work or even a single medium. This leaves endless room for commercial operations. Marvel used the break of the timeline to successfully extend the Marvel Cinematic Universe beyond the screen, filling these time gaps through TV series and short films. For example, "Interesting Things Happened on the Way to Find Quake" tells the story of Agent Coulson, an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., who subdued two robbers at a gas station on his way to investigate Quake, while Item 47 takes place after "The Avengers" and tells the story of the process of recovering alien weapons left behind in the Battle of New York by S.H.I.E.L.D.. The "filler works" of these gap in story time are also part of the film's derivatives, making the story system of the Marvel Cinematic Universe more complete, while also encircling the audience in all directions, allowing the audience to fully immerse themselves in the unreal world it has built.
At the same time, the long-term "battle line" has given copyright owners more opportunities to sell related products. Many of today's Hollywood production companies are large, conglomerate multinational corporations that operate not only in movies, but also in related radio, television, new media, theme parks, licensed merchandise, games, and so on. The development of a series of film projects is a business act that involves the whole body, and its potential commercial profits are immeasurable.
Therefore, it is not difficult to understand why the film industry is now trying to develop age special effects. This special effect can not only restore the glory of the old star, but also allow the same actor to have multiple faces from young to old in the same time period to star in multiple works with complex timelines, achieving the purpose of series creation. This provides greater freedom for huge project planning and development. In the future, there will be more "serialized" film and television works.
For business investors, of course, this is a scene of great joy, but for the audience, it is inevitable to face the problem of repetition. At present, the unified "world view" has caused the flattening of the character's personality and the convergence of the plot. Although there are relationships between the timeline, these series of films are almost always in a repetitive picture, repeating the same theme story. The protagonist wears a similar costume, implements the same thinking pattern, and solves difficulties in a similar way. Many viewers have complained that the superhero movie narrative is very stereotypical, which can be summarized as: heroes appear - encounter difficulties - heroes win. Heroes are always desperate to take on the mission of saving mankind at the moment of crisis, which is the eternal "hero myth". In the series, the hero myth becomes an endless reincarnation, staged over and over again. For the audience, the only thing that is new is probably the gradual change of actors' faces. For example, after Ben Affleck announced last year that he would no longer play Batman, who would play the main role in the new Batman series of movies was a hot topic of discussion. And when the special effects technology helps the actors "transcend time", even this only freshness will be lost. Viewers will see the same faces forever staged in the same plot, like the character dolls in the theme park waving day after day, which is perhaps the future picture that worries Scorsese and us the most.