Movie Review: SOMETHING’S GONNA LIVE

GO  SOMETHING’S GONNA LIVE Warmly nostalgic, Something’s Gonna Live sheds light on film industry professionals most moviegoers disregard unless they’re filling out their Oscar pool sheet: production designers and cinematographers. Documentarian Daniel Raim previously paid homage to acclaimed production designer Robert F. Boyle (North by Northwest) with his Academy-nominated short The Man on Lincoln’s Nose. For this new full-length piece he brings together several elderly (and sometimes ailing) craftsmen, including Boyle, to reminisce about the films they worked on and their feelings about the changes in their industry. Taking 10 years to complete the project, Raim has made a film that’s, literally and figuratively, haunted by ghosts — several of his interviewees died over the course of filming, adding more poignancy to their on-camera comments about the way cinema both does and doesn’t grant its practitioners a sort of immortality. Because of the subject matter and the frailty of the participants, it’s impossible for Something’s Gonna Live not to be touched by sentimentality, but Raim is judicious in not overselling the emotions. Cineastes will enjoy hearing behind-the-scenes production stories of The Birds and In Cold Blood, but what’s most striking is how the documentary corrects the misconception that so-called “below the line” talent is only concerned with a movie’s visual aesthetics. Instead, the craftsmen assembled expound on the essential importance of serving the story — a lesson one hopes doesn’t get lost in our increasingly technologically-dependent film industry. (Music Hall)