Variety: On Warner Bros.’ remake of “A Star Is Born,” actor-director Bradley Cooper and co-star Lady Gaga refused to settle for the traditional practice of pre-recording their songs and later lip-synching on set. Instead, they embraced the more risky approach of performing the movie’s songs live.
5 comments:
While unique this is actually not the first time that movies have taken this approach to their filming. Personally, I find this method absolutely lovely! The performances are much better and feel not only more real, but full of so much more emotion. I know that the most recent film re-boot of Les Misérables used this approach as well which lead to heartbreak renditions of the songs with tears, sobs and more throughout the songs. In many cases I imagine that this makes the filming of these a much more drawn out process as it must be taxing on the actors to perform them like this over and over again for the various shots, but also limiting for the same reason as well as the level of perfection that is required. I would also be interested to know if with the variables of live performance, that editors find it more difficult to piece together the various cuts and shots.
I cannot wait to see this movie. I have heard so many wonderful things about it, and I am a huge fan of Lady Gaga, especially who she is as a person, and not just her music. The article was not exactly what I was expecting, but was really glad that it did go into the technical parts. I personally have found it kind of annoying how much movies and television are pre recording, editing, and lip syncing. When a production does have live singing, it is a big deal now. I think it really is a talent on the sound engineer and design, that is very little seen any more, that does make a huge difference. I can see why so many choose not to put in that time and energy requited when performing live, but the quality and authenticity I think is really worth it, especially in a move like this. I have also heard that the soundtrack for the movie is incredible, and I am forcing myself not to listen to it until I see the full movie.
This is very interesting, because it’s not very traditional. Truthfully, as someone who has already seen this movie twice, I like this sound better than most movies that just lip sync the vocals, but if I had not been told the vocals were live, I likely would never have noticed. The process of how they recorded was very interesting to hear about, because one assumes that the audience can hear the music, however they could not. It is also interesting, because the soundtrack sounds much cleaner in production, and in my opinion, much worse than it did in the movie, especially for Bradley Cooper’s first song. Whether or not it is because the album itself has a different mix, or just because the visual aspect is missing, I cannot tell as of yet. I do believe that the visual aspect does make a difference, as it immerses the view in the experience even more, which I believe is essential for this film.
I think that this is a really cool way of recording vocals for a movie. It takes it back to the past when everything was done live and nothing was pre recorded. I think that this is perfect for this movie and these actors as it allows for the authenticity the movie needed and the reality of the performance for the actors. I also think that having Lady Gaga as one fo the stars was a great move because she has really powerful vocals, so this way of recording her is perfect. She can perform like she normally does and that way when it is in the movie, all of her performances are authentic and not superficially perfect like other movie 'musicals'. In La La Land, all the songs vocals are very auto tuned and perfect so you can tell that they are pre recorded, with this method it will feel like a concert and I think that is something that should be utilized more.
I truly cannot wait to see this movie, since I've loved Lady Gaga since the fifth grade. However, I had no idea at all that all of the music had been recorded live, but that just makes me even more excited to see it. It's very fascinating how much effort had to go into both getting authentic acoustics and genuine audience reactions, when also dodging the obstacle of songs getting posted online prematurely. I wonder if it might have been easier to just collect the phones of all of the audience extras prior to them entering the set. I know I would have been perfectly happy to hand over my phone if it meant I got to watch Lady Gaga sing live for any period of time. That being said, I think if I did have my phone with me, I would automatically have the urge to record the performance, so it's a good call to just eliminate the possibility altogether by removing amplification.
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