WILD LINES:
I have done MANY MANY wild lines. They are a life saver (for SOUND DEPARTMENT) only because we dont want ADR to come in.
Having said this - wild lines work or do not work only based on the ACTORS - their concentration, their performance.
Most of the time, requests for wild lines are ignored by direction department and get delayed 'till the end of the scene', etc.
The sooner a wild line is done the better. And in this day and age, 57640 takes happen of a shot. Digital domain... However, if there is a problem with take 1 of the 57640 takes, and IF it stays that way over all takes, obviously a wild take needs to ameliorate this problem.
I remember a film i did in 2005 - period piece (1857 AD) being shot in the most inconveniencing locations for sound. NYC based Producer was a moroness who came up to me on Day 1 of the shoot and did not want me to wire up actors because 'this is not TV! you need to use boom mics!'
After i relaxed for a day of shoot after this "instruction" from the producer - i felt pangs of dissatisfaction. so i started asking for wild takes.
The entire film - wild takes, wild takes... 36 days of shoot... wild takes wild takes... Not one or two, but at times MANY... heh
Later - no one thanked me for this, but i heard the film was done MOSTLY because of the numerous wild takes i had done on location.
-vin