Following the premiere of his documentary feature Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who at the Kensington Odeon Theater in London, director/editor Paul Crowder was joined onstage by The Who band mates Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend for a Q&A. “I’m thinking this is the closest I am going to get to playing on stage with them, but it’s close enough, related Crowder, who is also a musician and huge Who fan.
That’s why he practically jumped out of his chair when he received the e-mail from Spitfire Pictures’ Nigel Sinclair, one of the producers of the film, saying he was looking for someone to co-direct and edit The Who documentary. “I was just beside myself, I was like, ‘How much do I have to pay to get this job?’ I was really excited about it,” said Crowder.
Sinclair tapped Crowder, whose commercialmaking home is bicoastal Nonfiction Spots, after seeing his first documentary, Once In A Lifetime about the legendary New York Cosmos soccer team, which was featured in last year’s Tribeca Film Festival.
Sinclair had started The Who project with Academy Award-winning director Murray Lerner, who compiled footage and conducted interviews with the principals in the film. When it came down to finding someone to co-direct and cut the film, Sinclair was looking for someone to give it a different feel and he liked the energy Crowder brought to Once In A Lifetime.
An amazing experience
Spanning over four decades, Amazing Journey reintroduces The Who now and to generations to come. The film tells the unfolding story of The Who and how they have straddled the rock world for 40 years. The film features exclusive, never-before-seen interviews with Townshend, Daltrey and others, rare and recently discovered concert footage, artist profiles and more. Following theatrical premieres in London, New York and Los Angeles, and commercial free broadcasts on VH1 and MTV’s hi-def music channel MHD, Universal Studios Home Entertainment released the film on DVD in November. “It’s a very honest film. I wasn’t surprised by the honesty they gave us, but I didn’t realize they would be willing to share so much. They dealt with so much death within the band and so much turmoil in the mid ’70s onwards–it just brought Roger and Pete to this new sort of bonding brotherhood level,” Crowder said.
“It makes for a fascinating journey, which is why I thought the title was so appropriate. Because it really is amazing considering how individual they both were, how they went from where they started, to how much love they have for each other. I found that fascinating as a fan. It was a really nice surprise. I was expecting it to still be a prickly relationship and it isn’t at all. There is always that possibility that Pete will wrap his guitar around Roger’s head–but he’ll do it with love,” he continued with a laugh.
Crowder said that Daltrey hasn’t watched the film and won’t because he lived it but has faith in what the filmmakers did. “Pete did watch it and he thought it was fantastic. He made a special effort to let us know that we did a great job with it. You can’t ask for more than that. I don’t care what the other reviewers think,” Crowder mused. “It’s his story. If he’s happy, I’m happy.”
Not being involved in the project in the early stages posed some challenges for Crowder. Early on when the team shot, compiled and digitized everything, they decided to make it 25-frame HD. But a lot of the film footage was shot 24-frame and then everything had to be delivered at 23.98-frame HD.
“We had an amazing nightmare doing the online,” Crowder recalled. “But we had an incredible HD online editor in Benjamin Murray from Post Works in New York. We had the most difficult online color correction that I ever had to deal with. We had more than 8,000 different clips and sources, an incredible amount of stuff to locate, master and transfer.”
Crowder said he is a big fan of the Avid Nitrus.
“It’s a brilliant machine. And when you have a good operator like Ben Murray, it’s just a dream.”
Crowder is looking forward to applying some of the technologies he used during the project to spots.
“Technically it is always eye opening when you get to the online stage how much more you can do all the time–to know what is available in post so you set up your shoots so you can take advantage of all of those technologies. I see all these things I will get to use in the future.”
He is not working on any spots currently but is keeping busy directing and editing the Morning Light project, a full-length documentary film produced by Roy Disney’s Pacific High Productions in association with Disney Studios. (Roy is Walt’s nephew.) Disney, a sailor, spearheaded the project. The film, to be released in 2008, chronicles the recruitment, training and performance of the youngest and most diverse crew to participate in the Transpacific Yacht Race, a biennial 2,225-nautical-mile sail from Los Angeles to Honolulu.
Crowder said he is anxious to get back into directing commercials. “I love my Toyota Prius. I would love to come up with something really neat for that. I also like the Guinness ads and would love to direct one of them.
“And anything soccer related, that’s another project I would pay to do.”
Supreme Court Allows Multibillion-Dollar Class Action Lawsuit To Proceed Against Meta
The Supreme Court is allowing a multibillion-dollar class action investors' lawsuit to proceed against Facebook parent Meta, stemming from the privacy scandal involving the Cambridge Analytica political consulting firm.
The justices heard arguments in November in Meta's bid to shut down the lawsuit. On Friday, they decided that they were wrong to take up the case in the first place.
The high court dismissed the company's appeal, leaving in place an appellate ruling allowing the case to go forward.
Investors allege that Meta did not fully disclose the risks that Facebook users' personal information would be misused by Cambridge Analytica, a firm that supported Donald Trump 's first successful Republican presidential campaign in 2016.
Inadequacy of the disclosures led to two significant price drops in the price of the company's shares in 2018, after the public learned about the extent of the privacy scandal, the investors say.
Meta spokesman Andy Stone said the company was disappointed by the court's action. "The plaintiff's claims are baseless and we will continue to defend ourselves as this case is considered by the District Court," Stone said in an emailed statement.
Meta already has paid a $5.1 billion fine and reached a $725 million privacy settlement with users.
Cambridge Analytica had ties to Trump political strategist Steve Bannon. It had paid a Facebook app developer for access to the personal information of about 87 million Facebook users. That data was then used to target U.S. voters during the 2016 campaign.
The lawsuit is one of two high court cases involving class-action lawsuits against tech companies. The justices also are wrestling with whether to shut down a class action against Nvidia.... Read More