One repeated theme in director Edward Zwick’s very good new autobiography Hits, Flops, and Other Illusions is the importance of practical effects. For example, when he made The Siege, Zwick managed to shut down both Times Square and Brooklyn Bridge for a few hours to deliver a palpable sense of verisimilitude. If it had been made today, “it will all be CGI and something ineffable will have been lost,” he says.
Zwick couldn’t have possibly predicted this, but by chance he happened to make his claim in the midst of a glut of actors admitting that they are so dedicated to preserving the ineffable that they managed to bugger up their bodies beyond all comprehension in the name of audience satisfaction.
