I miss movies being shot on-location, in American cities, out in the streets
I re-watched Bullitt and it occurred to me how cool it is to just FEEL San Francisco circa 1968 seeping into the film. Just watching it, you can completely absorb the way the city looked and felt, its size and shape, what people were doing there and even aspects of the culture. That kind of verisimilitude is really beautiful.
And that level of verisimilitude can’t be faked. Could you imagine The French Connection or Taxi Driver or Midnight Cowboy if they were shot anywhere EXCEPT New York? You can’t just go to Canada or shoot it on a soundstage or shoot in on green screen and hope some geeks can draw a cartoon into the background and expect it to have that real, street-level, tangible quality.
For the record, this is just one of many, many reasons to watch The Wire.
