Lost in London Live – Unpopped Review
Synopsis:
Lost in London is Woody Harrelson’s directorial debut and the first feature length scripted film that was taped and streamed live to thousands of theaters. It recounts a mostly true story of one night 15 years ago when he was at his lowest point when he found himself in a misadventure in London that winds him up in prison.
Review Summary:
I wouldn’t call Lost in London a great movie, but I would say that it demonstrates a huge achievement in filmmaking while giving an entertaining and often hilarious story.
The Good:
Woody Harrelson – Woody Harrelson is great. There really isn’t much more I can say. In Lost in London Harrelson needed to be over the top hilarious, run around the streets of London losing his breath, and then bring it down to a level where you feel sorry for him. In any movie that would be difficult but doing it in one take increases the difficulty significantly.
Filmmaking Achievement – I already stated that this was an achievement in filmmaking, but I just want to go into a little bit why. A large part of movie making is the ability to cut film, stitch together different camera angles, and show a cohesive story. This process takes time. From hours on set acting the same scene till it’s absolutely perfect to hours in the editing room making sure that it all flows correctly. Since Lost in London was live and shot with one camera there is no way to achieve this.
Different than Theater – Some may make the argument that this is essentially what theater does. Technically yes, but even then a lot of plays have different acts, intermissions, and chances to improve when something goes wrong. But a theater stage is essentially a closed set, there’s little chance that a pedestrian can run through fame and completely ruin a scene. But Lost in London increases that chance by filming a number of scenes outdoors. Plus a stage confines the audience’s view to simply in front of them. In movies the camera movies revealing different angles, different people around corners by moving the camera rather than having someone walk onto stage. And using a single camera with a single uncut take increases the level of difficulty because any wrong move can reveal something that takes the audience out of the experience. And as far as I could tell, little to no mistakes were made which is completely amazing.
Story – There is no doubt in my mind that Woody Harrelson is one of TV and movies greatest actors. He’s truly been part of some magnificent works, but that wasn’t always the case. So having Harrelson recount one of his lowest point in a comedic fashion is genius. After the film Harrelson references a quote from Mark Twain that states “Humor is tragedy plus time.” This is exactly what Harrelson used to create Lost in London, and seeing it through his eyes as he went through the ordeal as if in real time was fantastic.
The Comedy – It is good that Woody Harrelson doesn’t take himself too seriously because many of the jokes in Lost in London reference his large body of acting work and how he hasn’t done anything good since Cheers (a fact that has thankfully improved since 2002). Then adding Owen Wilson to the story made it even better. There is one scene where Harrelson and Wilson are just going back and forth making fun of each other’s acting styles, movies, and looks. It was the funnies 10 minutes of the movie and showcast great screenwriting and comedic acting.
The Ehh:
Before I mention anything in this section I just want to say that almost everything in here is because of the style of filmmaking. It was a near impossible task that they took on and there were bound to be some issues.
Sound – hundreds of different kinds of microphones had to be used in order to pick up the actors as they move between sets. Unfortunately sometimes the volumes of the mics just weren’t loud enough to hear everything that was said. Sometimes one actor would be louder than the other, wind would blow drowning out the dialog, or the volume just wasn’t turned up enough. After a few words in any condition it would be fixed. So I imagine there were a number of people behind the scenes choosing the mic, mixing the audio, and feeding it to the live stream all in real time. So it’s technically incredible it was as good as it was, I just wish I knew what was said those times I couldn’t hear.
Verdict:
Lost in London is an amazing film that will go down as the history books for being the first live streamed feature length movie. I’m just glad that there was more too it than that. It also was an interesting story from Woody Harrelson’s lowest point with great comedic beats to keep you laughing. Especially if you’re a fan of Hollywood and the drama surrounding actors.
I’m not sure if Lost in London is ever going to have a wider release, but if you ever get the chance to see it I’d say to give it a watch.
