Since its release internationally on 30 August, the film has already taken USD65 million at the box office and it's understandable why. You don't have to be a fan of boy bands, or rock music, or even a teenage girl to appreciate the sheer power of this amazing 3D experience. Due to overwhelming fan demand and the continuing success of the film overseas, One Direction: This Is Us will now release a week earlier in South Africa, and will show theatrically for four weeks.
It's not just a filmed concert and tour documentary, but an intimate and unique glimpse into the world of ordinary teenage boys of humble origin, whose unprecedented rise to fame and a fan-driven phenomenon enabled One Direction to conquer the world.
Filmed while the guys were taking their world tour to arenas around the globe - from Mexico to Japan to London's famed O2 arena - the movie mixes high-energy performance footage, candid interviews, and behind-the-scenes footage to offer a one-of-a-kind perspective into the talent, hard work and unbelievable mischief that goes into being One Direction.
In the summer of 2010, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Liam Payne, Harry Styles, and Louis Tomlinson entered Britain's biggest talent show, The X Factor, as talented individual artists. At the boot camp stage of the competition X Factor judge Simon Cowell offered the guys the opportunity to stay in the competition as a group. "I saw five solo artists who were five solo stars, but would be stronger in a group, it was that simple," said Cowell, a producer on One Direction: This Is Us. "I liked each of them individually and something made me think they would work really well as a group."
Calling themselves One Direction, they were immediate sensations: a group of talented and cheeky guys who immediately captured a nation of young girls. They didn't look or sound pre-packaged, they just exuded talent, friendship and charisma both on and off stage.
Said Cowell: "Right from the start, if I'd be honest, I was very much of the attitude, 'I'm not gonna tell you what to do. You can probably tell me what to do,' you know? 'You've got to sort it out for yourself, 'cause I think you're smart enough.' And that's always been the way it's worked with these boys. I had this just amazing confidence in them."
Fans responded in their thousands, flooding social media, waiting for hours outside TV studios and voting the boys through each round of the competition through to the grand final. Though they came in third overall on the show - narrowly missing the record deal awarded the first-prize winner - the boys knew instinctively that this was not the last the world would see of One Direction.
That instinct to stay together instantly paid off. The band signed to their X Factor mentor Cowell's record label, Syco Records, and quickly got to work recording their debut album whilst performing across the UK and Ireland on the X Factor Live Tour.
The band's debut album, "Up All Night", released in October 2011, was an instant smash; a feat forecast by the fact that their first single, What Makes You Beautiful, had already become the biggest single pre-order in Sony Music's history.
With three MTV Video Music Awards, a Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Award (for Favourite UK Artist), and three MTV Europe Music Awards (including Best New Act and Best UK & Ireland Act), it truly seemed there was no stopping their rise to the top.
The band's second album, "Take Me Home", turned 2012 into a banner year for the boys, hitting the top of pre-order charts in 50 countries. The album's first single, Live While We're Young, went straight to number one. All in all, "Take Me Home" topped the charts in 37 countries. The Take Me Home tour, which continued into 2013, was a global sell-out, taking Niall, Zayn, Liam, Harry, and Louis to Europe, North America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan.
The fun and cheeky video of Best Song Ever, a track written specifically for the film (Directed by Ben Winston) broke records on VEVO with 12.4 million views in one day, making it the most viewed debut video ever on the platform.
Cowell said: "What I've loved about working with the boys is that they haven't taken anything for granted and they still appreciate, and still are in awe of what's going on. They've survived and they'll continue to survive because, first of all, they're smart and, secondly, they understand their audience and respect their fans. They've matured really, really quickly."
During the tour, though, the notion of a film came together, giving the boys a chance to conquer an entirely different medium.
When Morgan Spurlock was approached to make a movie about One Direction, he jumped at the chance. "One of the things I've always tried to do from the very beginning of my career is create very popular documentaries," said the Super Size Me director. "And I think that this film, coming off the work I've done in the past, is the next step. Making something that's successful to a large audience that tells a great story, that is really intimate and gets you into their lives, but at the same time, is also really entertaining and engaging, with great music."
It's not enough, said Spurlock, that they're "five good looking guys that get put together in a band. That happens all the time. But the fact that, you know, they actually had the talent and the ability and the drive to kind of push it as far as they have, and continue to do, is remarkable".
Spurlock filmed in various locales for almost six months, including the band's performance in Mexico City in early June, 2013. The crew number ranged anywhere from Spurlock alone holding a camera without even an audio person, to fully co-ordinated concert set-ups involving, said the director, "an army of people". Filming the band's O2 performances alone was a massive undertaking for someone used to the run-and-gun nature of most documentaries. Said Spurlock: "Probably about, I don't know, 250 people were working on the concert when we shot at the O2, it was massive."
As for the behind-the-scenes footage, which runs the gamut from backstage mischief before the show to touching home-town scenes, like Harry working at the family bakery, those moments alone amounted to 500 hours of material.
Read more about the film One Direction: This is Us at www.writingstudio.co.za/page4818.html
