By Robert Goldrich and Mildred Takaki

For DPs looking to make their mark as directors, varied inspiring examples come to mind. For one, it was just five years ago that accomplished feature (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Lost In Translation) and commercials cinematographer Lance Acord of Park Pictures earned a coveted Directors Guild of America (DGA) nomination as best spot director of ’03 for Nike’s “Cross Country Spirit,” out of Wieden+ Kennedy, Portland, Ore.; adidas’ “Wake Up Call” via 180 Communications, Amsterdam; and Mitsubishi’s “Part Car/Part Religion,” for Deutsch LA.
    More recently, Ellen Kuras–who is professionally first and foremost a cinematographer spanning notable features (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and commercials (Coca-Cola’s “It’s Mine,” Nike’s “Hello Tomorrow”)–saw her directorial debut, Nerakhoon (The Betrayal), earn an Academy Award nomination this year for best documentary.
    Telling the story of a refugee family from Laos, the film is a mesh of documentary, soulful dramatic narrative and intimate love story. Kuras conceived of, shaped, directed and shot the film in her spare time over the past 20-plus years. (For the full backstory on the film, see SHOOT’s coverage in the 1/25/08 issue.) Kuras shot and directed Nerakhoon (the Lao word for “betrayal”) but shared directorial credit with her window to that Laotian family and world, teacher/translator Thavisouk (“Thavi”) Phrasavath.
    Nerakhoon has scored on numerous fronts. Well before it received the Oscar nomination, the documentary was showcased at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival and made its New York premiere at the Human Rights Watch International Film Festival at Lincoln Center.
    With such successes as reflected in examples like Kuras and Acord, SHOOT sought out some other notable cinematographers who are extending their reach to the director’s chair: Emmanuel “Chivo” Lubezki who recently joined bicoastal/international production house Station Film for spot directorial representation; and Wally Pfister and Janusz Kaminski whose commercial directing roost is Independent Media, Santa Monica.

Lubezki    “As a cinematographer, I like to do different things. Once you find a formula for something, I try not to use it again. That sometimes gets you into trouble. Once you find something is working, you don’t keep applying it to everything. You look to reinvent and create something else from scratch that will work,” said Lubezki, a four time cinematography Oscar nominee (for Children of Men, A Little Princess, Sleepy Hollow and The New World).
    This quest to find different challenges has led to Lubezki recently signing with Station Films to move into spot directing. In years past, he’s helmed some Latin American commercials but is now committed to taking on a more ambitious slate of U.S. spot assignments. “For me, branching out into other areas of filmmaking such as directing seems like a very natural extension of my career.”
    Stephen Orent, Station Film’s managing partner, said upon signing Lubezki, “When I think of what Emmanuel has seen through the lens of the camera, the directors he’s collaborated with and the innovation he has brought to the industry in such a short amount of time, I get extremely excited about the possibilities [he has as a director].”
On the feature front, Lubezki has shot for and collaborated with such filmmakers as The Coen Brothers, Terrence Malick, Tim Burton, Michael Mann and long-time friend Alfonso Cuaron. As a commercials DP, Lubezki has lensed for directors who include Cuaron, Traktor, Fredrik Bond, Malcolm Venville and David Fincher.
    “Every time you work with a good director, you learn something about how to be honest with the material, how to find the essence of the story,” said Lubezki who cited his collaborations on spots with Traktor as an example. “Those guys are always trying to find out the best way to do justice to the story, which point of view is going to be the most effective for what you’re trying to accomplish. Working with this kind of talent is better than any film school. With each different director and script, there are different sets of limitations and necessities, which have you looking to find the right equation to tell the story in the best way possible.”
    With the experience of working with major actors and real people, movies and commercials with complex visual effects, shooting film and digital–the latter including scenes he lensed for director Michael Mann on Ali–Lubezki simply related, “I want to bring all of this to bear in commercials as a director, to help communicate and connect with viewers.”
    Asked about his digital cinematography endeavors, Lubezki related, “Digital doesn’t look like film and I don’t think it replaces film. But digital is a new toolset that is of great value.” Lubezki has shot projects or portions of projects with such electronic cameras as Red, Phantom and Genesis. He’s also done test footage on the Viper.
    Lubezki noted that for a feature, a DP and director have to pretty much maintain the style and language they shape and create for the project over an extended period of time, perhaps 100 days of shooting. “For each commercial, though, the style and language change and so within a relatively short time frame you get to delve into something entirely new and creative. I’m looking forward to doing more of that as a director through Station.”

Wally Pfister    A three-time Oscar nominee, most recently this year for The Dark Knight, Pfister has long harbored directorial aspirations. “In my heart of hearts, I’ve always been a storyteller. And as a cinematographer I’ve had the incredible opportunity to work with terrific people and learn from them, helping to make me a better storyteller.”
    One of those people is director Christopher Nolan whose films earned the Oscar noms for Pfister–Batman Begins, The Prestige and The Dark Knight. “Watching Chris closely over the past ten years, I’ve seen his incredible rapport with actors and the performances that have resulted–Pacino in Insomnia, Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight, Michael Caine and Hugh Jackman in The Prestige. Chris has been my mentor. I continue to watch and learn from him, and will be shooting his next project [Inception]. It’s a close collaboration I greatly value.”
    Pfister said he continues to occasionally shoot for directors from whom he can learn, citing not only Nolan but also spot gigs for MJZ helmers Rupert Sanders, Fredrik Bond and Craig Gillespie. While Pfister usually shoots 35mm film, he experimented for example shooting part of a Sanders-directed Nike commercial with Panavision’s high-def Iconix camera. “I really liked the Iconix. It’s a small camera that lets you get in the faces of the athletes. We even mounted one on a mop following Nike shoes across the floor. We mixed this imagery with 35mm film.”
    Amidst his lensing projects, Pfister has managed as of late to gain traction as a spot director via Independent Media. During his last extended window of availability, Pfister directed a Verizon job for Global Hue, New York, a pair of Toyota assignments out of Saatchi & Saatchi LA in Torrance, Calif., a Rolling Rock Beer campaign via Momentum, New York, and Subaru out of Minneapolis-based ad agency Carmichael Lynch.
    And while he understandably is known for his visual sensibilities, the latest advertising fare he’s taken on as director/DP has moved him into other genres. For example, the Verizon assignment was actor performance driven and had a documentary feel while one of the Toyota spots took the comedic form of a mock political ad. Subaru entailed a quirky story, and Rolling Rock was an anthem-like commercial showcasing actor performance. Additionally Pfister shot a concurrent print campaign for Rolling Rock.
    Getting these opportunities has been gratifying for Pfister who acknowledged that when it comes to a DP directing, agencies can be “hesitant to trust you with [actor] performance. I’m glad I’m starting to get those kind of opportunities. A real excitement and joy came when I started going to casting sessions, watching actors audition. I found I have strong opinions as to what worked and what didn’t. I’ve trusted that judgement and things have worked out.”

Janusz Kaminski    A two-time Academy Award winner (Saving Private Ryan, Schindler’s List) and four-time nominee for best cinematography (the other two noms being for The Diving Bell and The Butterfly and Amistad), Kaminski has settled nicely into the director’s chair with a couple of features (including the personal Polish language film Lost Souls) and varied commercials, among the notable being Reebok’s “Migration”–produced by Independent Media for mcgarrybowen, New York–which earned distinction as a SHOOT Top Spot of the Week last year.
    The :60 showed NFL players migrating to training camp from varied geographies and walks of life. While so much sports-related advertising is macho and aggressive, “Migration” departed from that norm by being powerfully quiet and even soulful.
    Kaminski related that his experience as a feature filmmaker–both as director and cinematographer–enables him to bring some of those sensibilities to commercials. “You tend to have a slightly different storytelling approach than strictly commercial directors,” he observed. “It comes from the size of the image you’re used to dealing with. You tend to go a bit wider than commercial directors. You think of the image not as a second and a half but more in terms of the emotion of the image…And the movie experience has you focusing more on performance than frequently unnecessary details–like whether or not the frame is pristine and perfect. The emotions and the story are more important than the details.”
    Kaminski has been directing spots since ’97. “Typically I do commercials for three or four months, then shoot a movie for seven months, then come back to commercials. I love directing commercials. The hard part is that whenever I come back, in some respects I’m the new guy again and have to be reintroduced to people. Sometimes agency people are new in their roles and we have to make an effort to connect or reconnect.”
    Working with world-class filmmakers such as Steven Spielberg and Julian Schnabel as a cinematographer, Kaminski said he has learned much that he has applied to his own directing endeavors. And he very much enjoys the collaborative nature of commercialmaking, noting that he has found working with agency creative teams “very enjoyable most of the time. They understand the medium very well, have created, lived with and thoroughly know the concept.”
    As for what new ground he hopes to break in commercials, Kaminski would like the chance to occasionally direct comedy, diversifying beyond his demonstrated prowess in visual storytelling. He feels energized after shooting Funny People, a comedy/drama directed and written by Judd Apatow. Kaminski likes the improvisational style of Apatow.
    “Great ideas will come up as the camera is rolling. He would feed lines to actors,” related Kaminski of Apatow. “It all started with the script and storyline but during the filming process, he would not be afraid to introduce new lines and ideas to advance that script and storyline. He would shape the film this way and it again shows the value of being open to what works during a shoot.”

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