That was directed by Michel Gondry, who also had some wonderful things in the best music video thread.
And it’s much better with the sound turned off.
That shot baffled me until I saw the movie on cable for the first time. For some reason, cable makes (or did in the 90s, anyway) different shot elements look really different. The rocks Luke levitates while training with Yoda looked like they were in different movies.
Anyway, When Lois says goodbye to Superman, she’s on the set. Superman on the ledge is a rear projection (or something similar). Chris Reeve is waiting behind the apartment door, dressed as Clark. Projected Superman flies away, Lois walks inside the apartment and opens the door, Clark enters. Easy peasy.
My favorite story about that Touch of Evil shot is that the guy with a line half-way through kept fucking it up and instead of just firing him, Hitchcock had him silently mouth the lines and dub the sound in later.
This one from The Protector. One very long, badass fight that starts at 0:06.
[quote=“beagledave, post:52, topic:753279”]
The Anna Kendrick video for Cups, starts a one shot at 1:09 in until about 3:20, including some tricky steadicam work in the diner.
[/QUOTE]Yet another thing that reminds me of OpalCat. See thread here (but with a dead fathom link, of course.)
Not only shot in one take, but done with 4 synchronized cameras.
There is a second great tracking shot in Goodfellas when the crew gets introduced.
The infamous Spaz Can’t Stack scene from that bucolic masterpiece, Meatballs. Almost a full minute before the first cut!
BUMP
Big bump because there is a new movie screening now that ups the “one take” game to a new level. I am going to spoiler-box it, but I do not think the knowledge of the spoiler would ruin the movie, though I guess you might disagree. Worth it to make the movie one to seek out:
One Cut of the Dead
A Japanese movie that opens with a 37 minutes one take of a zombie attack on a movie set. Neat, right?
Well…here is the thing…
The last 30-40 minutes of that movie revisit it and we learn that while they did the 37 minute take, they were also filming a both fictional and nonfictional set of takes of how they made the take and it is filled with wonderful jokes, alternate angles, and is really the most brilliant 30 minutes of movie making you’ll see this year. The whole thing is hilarious and wonderful and elevates the initial 37 minutes by showing how much fun and creativity went into it. It has scripted jokes made earlier that pay off and the whole thing is more amazing than I am explaining it to be.
You HAVE to see this movie if you have not had a chance. One of the great “how movies are made” movies you’ll ever see.
Weird Al’s “Tacky” music video seems to be one long shot. Yes, it’s only three minutes, but it’s clever and has a boatload of guest stars. And the costumes are a scream.
Not exacty action heavy, but I’ve always been impressed by this nearly 5 minute shot from the opening of *Free Zone, *which shows Natalie Portman doing more acting than she was allowed to do in the three SW prequels put together.
As yet unmentioned, this exceptionally long dolly shot from Forty Guns (1957); I think it’s the longest one ever done up to that time (certainly, one of the longest):
There’s an excellent single shot in Black Panther in the casino fight that essentially moves from the casino floor up to the balcony and then back to the floor and then back to the balcony again seamlessly, with obviously a ton of stunts and practical effects going on everywhere. It’s not immediately obvious it’s a single shot which makes it all the more effective once you realize you’re immersed in the sheer kinetic energy of the action due to movement and not just cutting.
I couldn’t find it available on YouTube, but director Ryan Coogler is no stranger to that kind of choreography. Here’s a boxing match from Creed that also takes place in one shot. Note how incredibly immersive it is, with punches and hooks happening in and around the camera, not just watching the match from afar. Really impressive.
Because Weird Al is at the top of the building and reappears again at the bottom, and because they were filming inside the closest elevator, he talks about how he had to run down the stairs and do his costume change in a mercilessly short amount of time. But he pulls it off.
Guns N Roses video for “Garden of Eden” :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuhLVl5qf2Ahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuhLVl5qf2A
VERY impressive! How do you think they did the make-up on the fly? If they CGIed it in post, don’t tell me.
In regards the famous Goodfellas shot through the club (already referenced): I heard it was called the Scorecese Stroll, and that it’s a fixture in his movies.
Regardless, Swingers makes a reference to this Goodfellas scene right before recreating it with its own long tracking shot. If you aren’t familiar with Goodfellas, you might miss the reference.
Here’s an interesting side-by-side of how an uninterrupted shot is done with the scene changing in the background. Shooting Shaina’s Sequence.
I’m surprised no one has mentioned the opening shot of Brian DePalma’s Bonfire of the Vanities, which is almost five minutes long. Here it is, and here are some notes from the Steadicam operator who filmed it.
The Steadicam, a wearable camera stabilization system invented in 1975, revolutionized filmmaking by making it possible for “handheld” shots to have the stability and smoothness of dolly shots. Continuous shots in close quarters like Bonfire’s opening would have been impossible with the massive dollies needed for the huge cameras of the 1930s through the 1950s. Note that Welles shot the opening of A Touch of Evil outdoors, where his truck-mounted crane could move around freely.
And BTW, Gravity, as great a film as it is, does not belong in this thread, because that shot was CGI. The challenge of long shots is the difficulty of choreographing a complex live-action scene like Bonfire’s opening. Using computers may be complicated (although less so every day), but it’s not the same as a long live-action shot.
An episode of the new Netflix show Haunting of Hill House has one episode that was just a few long takes. https://www.indiewire.com/2018/10/haunting-of-hill-house-episode-6-watch-long-take-1202014188/