Ben Sayer reviewed Side by Side for The Yorker. He points out that cinematographers and visual artists are as important as the directors and actors and that is the director’s needs that drive companies to create new technologies to make the filming of even the smallest scene possible. In closing he sums it up nicely saying:
Both technologies are uncertain, film cameras are no longer being produced and digital, unlike film, can’t be put into physical storage and theoretically be kept for hundreds of years at the moment and could be lost forever if something doesn’t come about. Side by Side therefore lingers in the back of your mind, its initial entertainment comes from its star quality, yet its brilliance comes from the way it takes the subtleties of the debate and pushes them very gently your way for you to mull over.
The entire review can be read here.