Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

**Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk** is episode 183 focusing on the movie of the same name, as part of the Podback Mountcast miniseries covering the films of Ang Lee. Posted 23 September 2018.

## Summary

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> Blank it, thank it! J.D. Amato (The President Show) returns, in the last episode of our mini series devoted to the filmography of director Ang Lee, to discuss 2016’s high frame rate Iraq War drama, *Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk*. But what makes this movie so revolutionary? What is the evolution of frame rates in film? Who are the shortest and the tallest actors according to IMDB? Together they examine the history of cameras from film to digital, the BIG3 basketball league and never doing an episode on *The Happytime Murders*.
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J.D. Amato is in to talk nuts and bolts about the technical filmmaking experiments Ang Lee pulled in this movie. Get ready for four years of film school tech classes packed into 150 minutes - it's Talking the Walk 2018!

J.D. is passionate about film technology and theory, and big swings, and trying stuff, and blank checks. And man oh man, does it ever show up here in this episode. From explaining how film camera shutters work, to persistence of vision experiments, to the effect of frames per second on how a moving image is perceived by an audience, to makeup and props and f/x and film editing and THE ACTING ITSELF needed for these different technologies.... sit back and listen, you are in for a ride.

Were Douglas Trumbull and Peter Jackson going too far with pushing frames-per-second technology, or not far enough? How many versions of this film screened in theaters, and which ones are available now in physical media? Which version is closest to Ang Lee's original intent, and why? Was Steve Martin thinking about how well his suit fit while he was in this movie? What does pizza have to do with camera shutters, anyway?

If you want to see what the crazy-heavy camera setups looked like on this movie set, check out this article by the Society of Camera Operators. Bonus: the behind-the-scenes photos in the article were taken by Mary Cybulski... mother of friend-of-the-show Ray Tintori.

Add your contributions to this article, Blankies!

### Milestones and Ephemera

* I LOVE MOVIES.
* David says in the first 20 minutes that "if we ever did J.D.'s choice ... it would be Toys". J.D. doesn't disagree, saying "I have so much to say about Toys" and it's a "good movie[]".
* The "40 page PDF" about the tech details. Or is it this "40 page" (66 page) Sony press kit PDF? Further press info.   My god, the envelope... J.D. knows Griffin well. He earned 1000 Comedy Points for the bit, cited by Griffin and David in the 5th Anniversary Special as the funniest moment of the podcast.
* David Sims’ Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk review on the Atlantic
* Remember, Pennywise sez: #HackMyMac
* J.D. bows out from the fierce competition for Most Appearances On Blank Check! Emily and Richard should be more frequent guests than him, he says, because they have better opinions on storytelling.
* See you next year, for Talking The Walk 2019!
* Box office game: Weekend of November 11, 2016

### Sponsors

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* **Brooklinen** sheets. Griffin says he tried to no-effort his way into an award for bedding, but he didn't count on Brooklinen competing. Fastest-growing bedding company in the world: David and Griffin and Ben all are big fans and satisfied users. Listeners, get $20 off and free shipping: go to brooklinen.com and use that CHECK promo code
* The Soundtrack Show, on HowStuffWorks
* new Blank Check merch! "I Talked The Walk 2018" designed by... Robert Hosley!?! Is there hope for Ben's dad to appear on the show one day after all???

## References

1. ↑ Blank Check Podcast. Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk. Audioboom. Retrieved on May 16, 2022.
2. ↑ @benhosley on Twitter. Retrieved December 20, 2020.