2 ms·

Pulp Fiction was one of the first movie that came to my mind as well. It's a beautiful movie (visually), and could be made today for the same cost as it was in

Pulp Fiction was one of the first movie that came to my mind as well. It's a beautiful movie (visually), and could be made today for the same cost as it was in 1994. Looking back at movies from several decades ago, the credit scroll had a few hundred people at most. Now there are a few hundred animators for something like Arrival. Interestingly, Arrival's credits list about the same number of people as Terminator 2. Both excellent movies, but one is small and intimate, and the other grand and explosive - same size crew, much higher balance on visual effects in Arrival vs. practical engineering and effects in T2. Would Arrival have been significantly different or less effective if made with 1991 technology? Probably not. "[They] were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should."

baddox 10y ago
How "accurate" are credits lists though? Couldn't it be that the credits simply list every employee of every company that did any contract work for the film? It seems plausible that many of the people listed didn't even work a full day on the film.
- pfranz 10y ago
  Credits aren't accurate at all. When you "subcontract" out something, it usually includes a fixed number of credits no matter how many people worked on it.
- cdtwigg 10y ago
  While this is possible, longer credits mean more filmstock to be duplicated and fewer showings per theater screen, so there is an economic incentive to keep them as short as possible. I know when I worked in the VFX industry an artist had to clock a certain number of hours on a given show to be given credit for the work.
  - baddox 10y ago
    Surely the difference is nearly negligible. With the exception of movies with popular after-credits scenes, I assume people leave when the credits start anyway, and I suspect the employees can begin cleaning when people clear out even if credits are still running.

baddox 10y ago

How "accurate" are credits lists though? Couldn't it be that the credits simply list every employee of every company that did any contract work for the film? It seems plausible that many of the people listed didn't even work a full day on the film.

pfranz 10y ago
Credits aren't accurate at all. When you "subcontract" out something, it usually includes a fixed number of credits no matter how many people worked on it.
cdtwigg 10y ago
While this is possible, longer credits mean more filmstock to be duplicated and fewer showings per theater screen, so there is an economic incentive to keep them as short as possible. I know when I worked in the VFX industry an artist had to clock a certain number of hours on a given show to be given credit for the work.
- baddox 10y ago
  Surely the difference is nearly negligible. With the exception of movies with popular after-credits scenes, I assume people leave when the credits start anyway, and I suspect the employees can begin cleaning when people clear out even if credits are still running.