Among the features presented at the AFI Fest, which is wrapping this week in Hollywood, were By the Sea (Universal Pictures), the festival’s Opening Night Gala presentation, and Where to Invade Next, a Centerpiece Gala screening. The former–which made its world premiere at AFI–was directed and written by Angelina Jolie Pitt while documentarian Michael Moore directed Where to Invade Next, which made its formal West Coast debut at AFI. (Where to Invade Next is being released by a new, yet to be named distribution company formed by former RADiUS founders Tom Quinn and Jason Janego, and Alamo Drafthouse founder/CEO Tim League.) As with a number of films rolled out at AFI Fest, By the Sea and Where to Invade Next are in the early awards season Oscar conversation.
SHOOT connected with Christian Berger, AAC, BVK, for insights into his lensing of By the Sea, while Moore was on stage after the AFI screening, sharing some backstory on Where to Invade Next and affirming his intent to appeal the “R” rating placed by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) on the documentary.
Christian Berger, AAC, BVK
Berger made industry history in 2010 when he became the first cinematographer to win the ASC Award for Outstanding Achievement in Theatrical Releases for a non-English language film, The White Ribbon, which also earned him Oscar and British Society of Cinematographers Award nominations. Directed by Michael Haneke, The White Ribbon additionally garnered the Palme d’or at Cannes in 2009, and the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film in 2010. Berger has thus far shot five features for Haneke, the others being Benny’s Video, Hidden, 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance, and the Camerimage Golden Frog nominee, The Piano Teacher.
By contrast, By the Sea–which is slated for wide U.S. release this Friday (Nov. 13)–marks Berger’s first career collaboration with Jolie Pitt. The film is a drama in which she stars with her husband Brad Pitt. They portray a wealthy American couple spending time at a French seaside retreat. But their time at first consists of efforts to avoid one another as we witness a clearly strained relationship fraught with the personal demons of each. That toxic relationship begins to change, though, when they befriend and secretly spy on a newlywed couple who are on their honeymoon.
“I was drawn to Angelina’s script and the chance to work on her third film as a director and her first as a writer, director and actor at the same time,” related Berger.
As for how he got the gig to begin with, Berger recalled, “After seeing a video called ‘A River of Light’ about my lighting style and Cine Reflect Lighting System (CRLS), Angelina called to talk about my approach to cinematography. When I first received her script for the film, it came with no writer or director name on it. I was instantly drawn to the complexity of the characters and their concerns.” (CRLS is an energy efficient system developed by Berger to mimic nature; like the sun, it uses a single powerful beam light source, and deploys a range of reflectors and scrims to alter the character of the light and to light entire scenes),
Berger noted that he teamed with Jolie Pitt to create the look of By the Sea “with a feeling for European films of the 1970s–a mix of humor and tristesse [a state of melancholy]. For me there is no need to have rainy autumn days for a sad scene–and it can be very funny in a dark corner.”
The DP added, “The challenge for me was to find the style Angelina wanted, to serve her way of storytelling, and to catch a bit from the atmosphere of European films from the 70s…all while keeping in the same time my signature.”
By the Sea entailed shooting in Malta. Berger related, “In an empty bay on Gozo Island, production designer Jon Hutman had to build a hotel and a cafe. For me, it was like a studio ‘on the rocks.’ We had an interesting mix of studio and on-location conditions, which resulted in many challenging light situations. The conditions in Malta were hot, with harsh sunlight. Despite the isolation of the location, it was a very professional production setting.
“My gaffer Jakob Ballinger created a unique rig for my Cine Reflect Lighting System. It allowed us to quickly change from day to night, from night to day, to keep the sun stable, or make a shady day. And we could always maintain a free view of the sea or the rocky hills through the windows of the set.” Berger added that Ballinger’s rig allowed them to “achieve a special visual aesthetic and we could be very fast. I prefer to wait for make-up and costume than they wait for the camera or light department.
On the technical front, Ballinger shared, “I used Digital Capture, 2.39:1, Alexa XT Plus, Arri/Zeiss Master Prime, 45-250 Fujinon Alura, because I like the look generated from the Alexa and it is very reliable on the set, with no ‘no-go’s’ and no ‘wait a moments.’”
Berger said of Jolie Pitt, “I tried my best to make her life easier with her multiple functions–author, director and actress.” The cinematographer also noted, “Angelina is very warm, straight and concentrated. I respect and like her speedy intelligence, hungry curiosity and one-hundred percent devotion to each scene–she has unbelievable energy. She is always open and collaborative. If you direct and play the main part in a film, it can lead to tense situations. But this also brought us good surprises. Angelina pushed all of us to get the best results.”
Where to Invade Next
Director/producer/writer Michael Moore is a two-time Oscar nominee, winning the Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary in 2003 for Bowling for Columbine, and again getting nominated for the same honor in 2008 for Sicko. His latest is Where to Invade Next which calls for him to travel or as he puts tongue-in-cheek to “invade” other countries to see what he can get of value from them to bring back the U.S. Among those practices and ideas worthy of being co-opted for American use are, for example, the healthy and balanced diet of school cafeterias in France which put their counterpart meals for kids in the U.S. to shame; the quality of life as reflected in vacation time, maternity leave and other policies for workers in Italy, which makes companies more productive and leads to longer employer-employee relationships; and Iceland’s imprisonment of bankers responsible for an economic meltdown in the country.
After the AFI screening, Moore and a couple of the film’s producers appeared on stage at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, with AFI Fest director Jacqueline Lyanga moderating the discussion. Moore objected to the “R” rating given to Where to Invade Next by the MPAA. He contended that the MPAA has “a political thing” going on with him in that “R” rating was also undeservedly placed on many of his other documentaries, including Roger & Me, Fahrenheit 9/11 and Bowling for Columbine. Moore promised to fight the “R” rating imposed on Where to Invade Next, saying it can keep teenagers from seeing the documentary, which is damaging since he regards teens as the “most important” audience for this film. He said the MPAA rationale for the “R” rating is based on violence, nudity and drug use. When placed in context, those criteria are not valid, claimed Moore, noting for example that the nudity, briefly showing a couple stepping into a sauna/spa in Germany, is “the most asexual nudity” he’s ever seen in a movie.
While the norm for documentarians, including Moore, is to identify and shine a spotlight on problems, this time around he took a different tact, looking instead at positive developments in other nations and what the U.S. could learn from them. Moore quipped that he and his crew referred to Where to Invade Next as “The no problems, all solutions movie.”
These other countries visited by Moore have prospective “cures” for what ails America, said the director, and they have gone through trial and error which we wouldn’t have to endure if we intelligently adopt what they’ve done and learn from their experience.
While addressing the AFI Fest gathering, Moore acknowledged several crew members on Where to Invade Next, including cinematographers Rick Rowley and Jayme Roy and editors Pablo Proenza, Woody Richman and Tyler H. Walk. Moore added that he has always regarded the audience as a key crew member in that the public makes a movie “complete.” He recalled in his early days as a filmmaker having an old beat up movie theater seat on set or location, symbolically representing the viewer for whom the documentary is intended. Raising viewer awareness of an issue or a societal problem, resulting perhaps in some people taking action, is what completes the documentary experience, he affirmed.
Moore shared that he was inspired to make Where to Invade Next upon seeing last year’s narrative feature Selma, directed by Ava DuVernay. Saying he was so “moved” and “shaken” by the “very powerful” film on the civil rights movement, Moore recalled that “weeks after seeing Selma, we were like, ‘Let’s do something.’” Moore went onto relate, “We weren’t going to make anything like Selma–this was going to be a documentary that dealt with something else–but we weren’t going to be afraid to say the things that needed to be said.”
Where to Invade Next is scheduled for U.S. release on December 23.
This is the first in a multi-part series with future installments of The Road To Oscar slated to run in the weekly SHOOT>e.dition, The SHOOT Dailies, SHOOT’s December and January print issues (and PDF versions) and on SHOOTonline.com. The series will appear weekly through the Academy Awards. The 88th Academy Awards nominations will be announced on Thursday, January 14, 2016. The Oscars will be held on Sunday, February 28, 2016, at the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center® in Hollywood, and will be televised live by the ABC Television Network at 7 p.m. ET/4 p.m. PT. The Oscar presentation also will be televised live in more than 225 countries and territories worldwide.
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