Favreau's Swingers blew me away. A new kind of movie. Something I hadn't seen. Simple in appearance. Somehow raw, so damn funny. It was the tone, the world, the characters, the one liners. Favreau set out a phenomenal script, and then he, director Doug Liman, and a small dedicated group of filmmakers pulled off the production in a stunning way.
It's a top five all time favorite for me.
The spirit of this film, the production, the indie heart: it's all in line with itself, reflections, like so much good art is.
Mike's apartment lighting setup is a perfect example of this. Liman had an extremely limited production schedule. He wanted to give as much to his actors as possible, which meant cutting down on shot setup and lighting time. To do this for the apartment scenes, they placed practicals throughout the rooms and replaced the standard bulbs with high wattage bulbs. This minimized equipment on set, freed up the camera, and added just enough light to get some focal depth amidst a few general actor marks.
Check out the "I'm not going to Vegas" scene for this exactly.
A great move for an indie crew. Play to your strengths to solve your weeknesses; solve a dearth in production time and budget by going near documentary style in the lighting and camera control when a scene permits.
Long live Swingers.
Be well. http://www.LionSuit.com
