With awards season underway in Hollywood, the American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) announced its highly anticipated nominations in the feature film competition; the choices also have links to the commercial production industry. This year’s nominees are: Emmanuel Lubezki, ASC, AMC for Children of Men; Dick Pope, BSC for The Illusionist; Robert Richardson, ASC for The Good Shepherd; Dean Semler, ASC, ACS for Apocalypto; and Vilmos Zsigmond, ASC for The Black Dahlia.
This is the eighth ASC nomination for Richardson, the third for Zsigmond who won in 1993 for the telefilm Stalin, the second for Lubezki and Semler, and the first for Pope.
“Favorable reviews tend to mention beautiful images, but that’s a matter of taste,” says ASC president Daryn Okada.
“Artful images can be distressing if that’s what it takes to properly affect the emotional flow of a film. Our members judge whether the cinematographer helped to create a sense of time and place that pulls the audience into the story. We ask how the visual language affects the emotional content of the film. Great cinematography is something you feel.”
Okada also points out that all five nominees trace their origins to different countries. Semler was born and launched his career in Australia, Zsigmond in Hungary, Lubezki in Mexico, Richardson in the United States, and Pope in England where he still resides.
SHOOT caught up with some of the nominees to discuss their nominations, their work, and the state of cinematography for both entertainment and advertising.
Emmanuel Lubezki Coincidentally, SHOOT connected with Lubezki as he was readying to fly to Argentina to shoot an undisclosed commercial for directing team Traktor of bicoastal/international Partizan. He was thrilled with his ASC nomination. “It’s a great honor,” he says. “I can’t tell you how happy I was when I received the call.”
Children of Men was shot on 35mm, primarily on location in and around London. “The biggest challenge was to find a language that was appropriate for the film and be consistent. One of the things that worried me the most was that there were violent, war-like scenes; I wanted to make sure we would not glamorize the violence.The message [of the film] is war should be abolished. [But] film likes smoke, and tanks look good on film; we didn’t want to glamorize it even more. One of the ideas was to treat the movie as if we were a group of documentary filmmakers, and we were just following the actors.
“I had an incredible camera operator, George Richmond,” Lubezki adds. “This nomination is for both of us, and the whole crew was incredible. Especially with this movie, it was only possible with the collaboration of such a great crew.”
Steve Scott of Hollywood-based EFIlm served as the colorist for the digital intermediate work. “DI allows you to do so much in postproduction,” Lubezki relates. “Unfortunately, it almost feels like DIs are in a very young state.”
“What DI offered, in the case of Children of Men, is peace,” he continues. “We improvised a lot and sometimes I couldn’t light with the precision I would like. [DI] relieved some pressure. But the reality is DI is in the early stage. And the quality of the image is much better if you don’t go though a DI.
“Same with HD, 2k and 4k; everything I see is incredible. It’s another tool, but I don’t think you can compare it to film at all. It’s ironic that we are living at a time when film is the best it’s been, printing is the best it’s been and the [film] cameras are amazing and lenses are incredible. It’s kind of ironic that it’s this incredible time for film and this new technology is trying to replace it. I like the idea of another tool, but it shouldn’t replace film.”
Lubezki says that between features he enjoys lensing commercials. “They are a great way to work with different directors and try different things,” he says. “It keeps you from getting rusty. Every commercial demands something different.”
As to working with the aforementioned directing team Traktor, Lubezki says, “They work in a very interesting way. They work two at time but it is a group, and they are incredible creatively and they like to take chances. They are very good storytellers.”
Robert Richardson Robert Richardson, who has directorial representation through bicoastal Tool of North America, was also working on a commercial when he learned of his ASC nomination. The DP was in New Zealand, shooting a Budweiser commercial with director Mike Maguire of Hollywood-based The Directors Bureau.
Via e-mail, Richardson reported that he has lensed a number of commercials over the past few months. “We just returned from Japan where we shot for Sapporo,” he writes. “And prior to that I worked with Mike [Maguire] on Rolling Rock, as well as two long format GE mini-films. During that time period I also shot with Mark Romanek on a Cadillac spot.”
On his ASC nomination, Richardson says, “This ASC nomination, in particular, is recognition from my peers, as to the overall quality of the film, The Good Shepherd.” I perceive this as a collective honor for all departments involved.”
The biggest challenge in his work on The Good Shepherd, he relates, was “to visualize a hall of mirrors and to capture on film what I would say is luminous darkness, to balance a hidden/secretive world with the search for soul, and foremost to maintain the subtle grace of [Robert DeNiro’s] direction.”
Richardson reported that his next film project would be an as yet untitled Abu Ghraib documentary helmed by Errol Morris. Morris is represented for commercials via bicoastal/international @radical.media.
Vilmos Zsigmond “It feels great. I was so excited and so honored,” Zsigmond says about his ASC nomination. “It was such a big year for cinema with so many good films. I didn’t expect it.”
The legendary cinematographer, who has also maintained a commercial career over the years, primarily in Europe, explains that The Black Dahlia was shot in Super 35 and achieved a “classic film noir look, like the old black-and-white film noir movies of the late ’40s,”
The film went through a 4k DI process at Hollywood-based Laser Pacific, working with colorist Mike Sowa. “I really believe there is a difference,” Zsigmond says of 4k as compared with 2k. “Unfortunately not too many people want to admit it because it is costly. We did tests before [Black Dahlia], and I really saw a big difference in the quality.
“I think that’s the way to go,” he continues. “You are not sacrificing the quality. [4k] means films should look as good as they did in the past. We should go 4k, maybe we will end up with 6k.”
When asked about resolution and advertising, Zsigmond says, “For commercials, if they are only being shown on TV, there is no reason to go to 4k.”
Zsigmond suggests that shooting film and finishing HD is appropriate for this medium, although he pointed out that if home theater screens are going to get larger, “then maybe I will say 2k is going to show up.”
At press time, Zsigmond was in prepro on his next feature, Bolden, which tells the story of New Orleans jazz musician Buddy Bolden.
ASC Awards Last week, the ASC announced 10 nominees for top honors in the two television categories of the ASC Awards. The finalists in the Television Movie/Miniseries/Pilot category are Thomas Del Ruth, ASC for Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (pilot); Adam Kane for Heros (pilot); Walt Loyd, ASC for The Librarian: Return to King Solomon’s Mines (telefilm); Bill Roe, ASC for Day Break (pilot); and John Stokes for the “Umney’s Last Case” episode of Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King (miniseries).
The nominees in the Episodic Television competition were chosen by their peers based on one episode of a series. They are Eagle Egilsson for “Darkroom”/CSI: Miami; Nathan Hope for “Killer”/CSI: Crime Scene Investigation; David Moxness for “Arrow”/Smallville; Bill Roe, ASC for “What If They Find Him”/Day Break; and Gale Tattersall for “Meaning”/House.
The annual ASC Outstanding Achievement Awards will be presented during an awards gala on Feb. 18 at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles. There DP Allen Daviau, ASC–accomplished in features (E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, The Color Purple) as well as spots and recently–will receive the ASC Lifetime Achievement Award. Additionally, Donald M. Morgan, ASC (Something The Lord Made, Out of the Ashes) will receive the first ASC Career Achievement in Television Award.
