What Productions Can Learn From “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour”

NAB

Earlier this year the Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour movie crossed the $216 million mark to enter the record books as the highest-grossing concert/documentary film of all time.

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In a 2024 NAB Show session, “SMPTE’s Future of Cinema: How Capturing a Musical Event for Global Audiences Enhances the Immersive Experience and Breaks Traditional Barriers,” the film’s director, Sam Wrench, who has previously worked on concert films for Blur and Billie Eilish, explained how he approached the project. Watch the full discussion in the video at the bottom of the page.

“Most of these things start with a conversation with the artist about how they want that show to feel and how do they want it to feel to the audience in the cinema or at home?

“Different artists have different takes. Some want the show to feel like it comes from the audience’s perspective. Some want it to feel as if you are onstage with them,” Wrench said.

“We take a very broad approach to that first conversation and then start to build a camera plot, which can be a fairly complex process, taking anywhere from three to six weeks to put together.”

The Eras tour film was shot over the course of three nights at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, and edited from upwards of 100 cameras.

“It’s part of my job to work out where those cameras need to be and what’s going to give us that cinematic intention and then what’s also going to convey those key words that we’ve taken from the artist, whether that be a scale, or intimacy, or a kind of raw energy,” Wrench said.

Filming over multiple nights allowed them to concentrate on a different aspect each time. They created a previs of the shots in Unreal Engine and, using a system called Q pilot, Wrench was able to decide on the exact cuts and camera direction of each camera.

“Although we’re working in a cinematic medium, we do not get the luxury of multiple takes. Maybe we get two nights, but the chances of those cameras being in the same position both nights is slim.”

In a concert film, the audio is clearly just as — if not more — important than the visuals. Laurel Canyon Live president John Ross, who supervised the sound mix for the Eras film, explained that they captured audio from 128 mics mixed into various formats including IMAX and Dolby Atmos.

“The main thing we’re trying to do is provide the theatrical audience with the best seat in the house,” Ross said during the panel discussion. “It’s about being able to find the right energy, capture that energy, and translate it because it’s different live than on screen. So, you have to take something that people were processing live, and then allow people in an auditorium to also feel that and experience it.”

While Taylor Swift’s success is a singular phenomenon, the model for the concert film could be repeated to generate further hits in the cinema.

Given that distribution and presentation at movie theaters is now digital, that can and should mean, more content supply, better rates, and more flexibility for target audiences, Jackie Brenneman, founding partner of cinema industry consultancy The Fithian Group, said during the panel.

The Fithian Group has developed a software platform that will act as a marketplace to connect filmmakers and distributors with exhibitors directly, she said.

“Not only that, but it’ll allow a different range of booking options. Right now, many of the booking decisions are based on past decisions about what type of film worked or didn’t work in a theater.”

Brenneman said that process was out of date and that new data should be used to book films into local cinemas. This included information about where fans of certain films might be located.

“For instance, where are most of Taylor Swift’s followers? What do they have in common? What are the demographics in this area?”

Data like this shared with exhibitors and perhaps known only to local exhibitors would give exhibitors greater power at local level to schedule films, Brenneman said.

“I think we’re at a point where we should be asking a lot of questions, experimenting, and be willing to actually take in that information. Let’s be a little more curious, let’s curate and be flexible. Let’s evaluate how we can do better. Technology is the best way to do that.”