Ignacio Aguilar

David Mullen wrote about John Mathieson: I was dissapointed to see in "Kingdom of Heaven" trailer (the upcoming Ridley Scott & Mathieson film) that they went back to Super 35 for that film, the same format they used for "Gladiator". I think it's the kind of film that really needs the larger negative of the anamorphic format.

More shots by Unsworth: I think Unsworth might have shot this early scene too, since it uses less light than other interiors by Cloquet: And now, some shots by Ghislain Cloquet:

According to IMDB, Unsworth died on October 28, 1978. If the shot for three weeks, the production must have started around the first days of October. But remember France is a country with a very inconsistent weather (R. Scott claims during the audiocomentary on The Duellists that it rained about 59 days of 61 of the shooting), so it's very surprising that they found such a good weather during that month (most scenes shot by Unsworth are very sunny). The other option is that they started production earlier so they could shoot the first scenes around september and then, as the story progresses, keep shooting into the winter (which I believe they did). If this is true, maybe Unsworth shot for more than three weeks, but how knows...

Thank you, David. I think you're talking about this shots: This frame belongs to the long opening shot of the film. It intercuts with: Both shots look unfiltered to my eye. But then the minister appers in a very foggy shot: I guess the following frame was shot by Unsworth, too. It's when Tess leaves home for the first time tp Durberville's house. Notice the Fog Filter and the resemblance with Mrs. Kent shot in Superman. One thing that surprised me is that some shots used the zoom lens (the seduction scene for example). Wasn't it too risky to use an anamorphic zoom lens with a fog filter for day-for-night scene? It's a pity that Unsworth couldn't complete this film. While his approach was very different from what Kubrick and Alcott did on Barry Lyndon, it would have been interesting to see how he would have done the interiors. Probably he would have used less fill light and more contrast than Cloquet, whose scenes look more high-key than Unsworth's in his previous films, and he probably would have relied more on the natural light sources of the sets. Anyway, the way Cloquet shot his exterior scenes for the second half of the film fit the story as well as Unsworth and his fog filters did for the earlier, "happier" scenes.

Yesterday I saw Roman Polanski's Tess. I had only seen it once, a long time ago. As we all know, british cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth died during the shooting and was replaced by Ghislain Cloquet. Anyone (perhaps Mr. Mullen?) knows if Unsworth was using his traditional Harrison Fog Filter #2 or it was a lighter one? Most exterior scenes during the first half of the movie were clearly shot with heavy diffusion, propably by Unsworth. But almost none of the interior scenes (I only remember one or two) show it. That's why I would like to know if Unsworth was varying his approach or if those scenes were shot by Cloquet. From what I saw, Cloquet did most of the interiors and the cloudy exteriors of the second half of the film with no diffusion at all.

The Duellists - Frank Tidy, BSC

Barry Lyndon - John Alcott, BSC

Hi, Anyone knows what film stock was used on this film? It was shot mostly with available light outdoors and a small single source indoors, so my guess is that they used Kodak 5294 (400 ASA) at least for interiors, the fastest film stock of the day. The DVD shows a few grainy shots, which probably were pushed or underexposed. I would love to hear your opinions about Bruce Surtees, a cinematographer whose low-light work I admire. Also, anyone knows why he stopped working with Eastwood?

Maybe Taylor was busy at that time, but I were Polanski I would have hired him to finish "Tess" (though Cloquet did a great job in that film).

:D

I would choose Ron Fricke's "Baraka".

I would assume it was shot on Kodak 5254 (100 ASA), the only stock available at that time. The original 5247 (100 ASA) was introduced in 1974 (According to AC article on "The Towering Inferno", which shot its miniature photography on it) but was pulled out due to some problems and was reintroduced around 1976-1977.

Dino de Laurentiis "Orca" and Irwin Allen's "The Towering Inferno" also had pretty good composites by Frank Van Der Veer [ASC]. I think he only did some additional visual effects for L.B. Abbott [ASC] on "Logan's Run". What I find amusing about the "Star Wars conflict" is that Taylor ended up using diffusion filters on most of his following projects ("Dracula", "Flash Gordon"), when it's well documented that Lucas wanted Gary Kurtz to fire Taylor because the cinematographer was shooting the film clean (except the Tunisian exteriores at the beggining) while the director wanted a diffused look. A long time ago I found this article at www.reddwarf.co.uk:

Also, remember that Duke Callaghan replaced Gil Taylor ("Dr. Strangelove", "Star Wars") early during production. Taylor had worked previously with Dino De Laurentiis on "Flash Gordon". Most of "Conan" was shot in the same places where a few years before Milius had done "The Wind and the Lion".

Favourite: Man on Fire - Paul Cameron And in not particular order: The Passion of the Christ - Caleb Deschanel, ASC Collateral - Paul Cameron & Dion Beebe, ACS The Phantom of the Opera - John Mathieson, BSC The Village - Roger Deakins, ASC, BSC I haven't seen yet (release pending in Spain) "Ray", "Alexander", "Life Aquatic", "A very long engagement" and "Closer".

Am I the only one who thinks that the films that Richardson has photographed for Scorsese ("Casino", "Bringing out the Dead", "The Aviator") have much better cinematography than the films photographed by Michael Ballhaus ("Goodfellas","The Age of the Innocence", "Gangs of New York", among others)? I'm not a fan of Ballhaus. I generally find his work very flat, with very little contrast and pastel colors, even when he works with other directors like Wolfgang Petersen, Mike Nichols, James L. Brooks or even Barry Levinson. The only film photographed by Ballhaus that I really liked in terms of cinematography was Coppola's "Dracula".

Thank you, David. Great memory! A lot of movies where shot (at least some parts) here in Spain back in the 60's and 70's: "Lawrence of Arabia", Samuel Bronston's "King of Kings", "55 days at Pekin", "The Fall of the Roman Empire" and of course "El Cid", Franklin Schaffner's "Patton" and "Nicholas and Alexandra", John Milius' "The Wind and the Lion" and "Conan" and even the infamous "Krakatoa, East of Java". Of course, Sergio Leone shot here his famous "Dollars Trilogy", "OUATIW" and "Duck you Sucker" (AKA "A Fistful of Dynamite"). Last winter, Ridley Scott used a lot of Spanish locations for his new film, "The Kingdom of Heaven". :)

Talking about Doctor Zhivago... I love this shot. Next week I'll go to La Calahorra Station (Sierra Nevada, Granada, Spain) where second unit cinematographer Manuel Berenguer [ASC] shot it in a winter morning of 1965. I would like to take a similar photograph with my 35mm still camera. David, Considering it was taken fron a distance of about four miles, what focal lenght do you think they used? I'm planning to use a 300mm lens, cause the last time I went there (late afternoon of an August day) I only had a 200mm: It's funny, but that's the exact place where Sergio Leone, three years later, did many scenes for Once upon a time in the West, including the famous train arrival of Claudia Cardinale.

Serra would be a good choice and it won't surprise me if John Mathieson (or even Michael Seresin) photograph a Bond film in a near future.

Being a Kubrick fan myself, it was the obvious example :D I didn't like too Tattersall's cinematography on that film. The Cuban scenes were shot in Cadiz (Spain) and the Spanish light is very different from the Cuban, specially when you shoot in high noon, when the light is too harsh and boring if you're not careful. I prefer, with no doubts, Alec Mills' location photography on Licence to Kill. And I thought that the use of diffusion was very inconsistent through the film, as Fstop said. Ozzie Morris says in the commentary of The Man with the Golden Gun that when he replaced Ted Moore, Albert "Cubby" Broccoli told him not to use any kind of diffusion. I remember that Alan Hume shot portions of Octopussy with a net on the lens (it was a more glamorous film), but most of the time he used them only for close-ups on the Bond films he shot. My favourite Bond photography probably is The Living Daylights together with GoldenEye, on which I loved the way Phil Meheux lit the Russian Council scene (with a cameo of Michael G. Wilson) with the light coming through the windows and a lot of contrast. I have to watch again The spy who loved me because I don't remember any single source lighting on that film (perhaps the scene in the hotel?). I'm not British, but I don't like also the way the latest Bonds have been done. Lets hope they don't promote Christian Wagner as director as they did with Peter Hunt and John Glen in the past...

Well, Stanley Kubrick (and Doug Milsome) shot Full Metal Jacket in England and it looked fine without DI.

TEASER TRAILER.

As far as I know, Peter MacDonald only did the second unit work on that film.

Leone shot those films here in Spain, in a place called Almeria. I've been there and I can tell you that the sun is really hot, but he still used a lot of light for exteriors: That's why some shots show shadows in every direction: I think Leone and Tonino Delli Colli used even more light in Once upon a time in the West: Charles Bronson looks "sunburned" on that film: