Earlier this year Kramer Morgenthau, ASC, won his first ASC Award on the strength of his fourth career nomination, topping the One-Hour Episodic Series category for “The North Remembers” installment of HBO’s Game of Thrones. He is also a five-time Emmy nominee, earning that status the last two times in 2011 for his cinematography on an episode of HBO’s Boardwalk Empire and the HBO telefilm Too Big To Fail.
During an ARRI-sponsored session at the recently wrapped Cine Gear Expo in L.A., Morgenthau reflected on Game of Thrones, his collaboration with director Alan Taylor not only on “The North Remembers” episode but also on the theatrical feature Thor: The Dark World which is slated for release in November. Taylor won a DGA Award in 2009 for an episode of Mad Men and an Emmy in ’07 for his direction of an episode of The Sopranos.
Regarding Game of Thrones, Morgenthau said that HBO “allows you to do more extreme cinematography.” That and his collaborative track record with Taylor freed Morgenthau to go to town with the ARRI ALEXA. Morgenthau recalled that towards the end of “The North Remembers” episode there’s a brothel scene which lent itself to the “extreme cinematography” he cited–“a lot of red light, hot bluish daylight coming in, no fill, extremes of shadow, light and color.”
He added that the show’s medieval setting lent itself to having to often rely on candles and daylight for illumination. The DP assessed that the ALEXA performed well under these challenging circumstances. “It’s hard to push it [the camera] too far…It handles wide dynamic ranges.”
Morgenthau observed that Game of Thrones, one of HBO’s marquee series, is akin to a small independent feature in terms of filmic quality. Still, the schedule is ambitious and pressing–18 days to shoot “a true hour of screen time.” It’s what he calls a “true hour” because there are no commercials on HBO. The series entails extensive lensing in Ireland and Iceland. He deployed a mix of Cooke S4s and Angenieux zoom lenses on Game of Thrones.
The DP took ALEXA to another plane for the Thor feature, opting to shoot anamorphic. Morgenthau said he was drawn to “the big movie look” and “painterly quality” afforded by anamorphic. “The way the background falls off is so beautiful.” For storytelling, it “takes your characters and lifts them out of the background.” He further observed that anamorphic brings “a photochemical quality” to digital cinema.
As for what’s next, Morgenthau is slated to again deploy ALEXA on the Jon Favreau-directed comedy Chef starring Robert Downey Jr. At press time, Morgenthau was still in prep on the movie which he would also like to shoot anamorphic.
“Conclave” Tops BAFTA Film Awards With 12 Nominations, One More Than “Emilia Pérez”
Papal thriller “Conclave,” which stars Ralph Fiennes as a cardinal overseeing the election of a new pope, leads the race — just — for the British Academy Film Awards, with nominations in 12 categories, one more than the genre-busting trans musical “Emilia Pérez.”
But with the wildfires in Los Angeles over the past week fresh in the minds of everyone in the movie industry, Wednesday’s announcement of the latest BAFTA nominations was understandably subdued.
“We are very much thinking of our colleagues, friends, community over there,” said BAFTA chair Sara Putt. “It’s devastating what’s going on.”
She wouldn’t be drawn on whether the fires may impact the BAFTA ceremony, which is due to take place on Feb. 16.
“The ceremony is a month away, it would be inappropriate and far too early to say anything about that,” Putt said.
The five films nominated for the prestigious best film award were “Conclave,” “Emilia Pérez,” the 215-minute postwar epic “ The Brutalist,” the Palme d’Or-winning comedy/drama “ Anora “ and the Bob Dylan biopic “ A Complete Unknown.”
“The Brutalist” ended up with nine nominations, including leading actor for Adrien Brody, who faces stiff competition from Fiennes and Timothee Chalamet, who plays the young Dylan in “A Complete Unknown.”
The other actors nominated are Hugh Grant for his creepy role in the horror film “ Heretic,” Colman Domingo in real-life prison drama “ Sing Sing “ and Sebastian Stan for his portrayal of a real estate mogul — a certain Donald Trump — in “ The Apprentice.”
“Anora,” the sci-fi epic “Dune: Part Two” and “Wicked” each received seven nominations. “A Complete Unknown”... Read More