Jump to content

Recommended Posts

I have this movie idea that is about a girl name Annie with multiple disabilities that can led to serious consequences such as death and self-abuse, and i've been watching movies that are made by my favorite directors: Dario Argento, John Carpenter, and Brian De Palma. Now Dario Argento is the main director that inspired me into wanting to direct movies and do cinematography because of the visual style he puts in through Suspiria, Inferno, and Deep Red, But after watching movies from directors Brian De Palma, and John Carpenter, their visual styles inmovies have alot in common. Not in genre though. My questions are:

 

How do I recreate their vision into my movie?

 

How do they do their movies the way they do now?

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 months later...

Personally, I think you're asking the wrong question. Vitorrio Storaro would argue that trying to recreate someone elses lighting in strictly technical terms would not create the effect you are looking for in a cinematographic style; and moreover, why would you wany to recreate someone elses lighting -- its your film, you have the creative control. Oftentimes the style of a film is developed out of necessity -- a lack of equiptment, slower film stocks, an over zealous studio exec, etc. If you really want to make this film, youre going to have to be practical, and assuming you dont have thousands of dollars to spend on renting the Alexa, you will have some limitations on what your visual style can be. This does not mean that you cannot capture interesting photography, however. In the film The Warriors, Andrew Lazlo, ASC shot the opening sequence without the comforts of the appropriate lighting equiptment to properly expose the much slower, late 70's film stocks on a night exterior wide shot, which, by taking a chance and shooting the train with uncorrected florescents and with a major portion of the frame severly underexposed, he created a very memorable opening sequence. This is the reality of style. It evolves as the day to day battles on set continue. Now, theres nothing wrong with using other cinematographers work as a reference of course; but as I said there is a danger here, and you should be careful not to focus too much on the technical instead focusing on the story and how you can beat serve the story with the cinematography.

Edited by Matthew Padraic Barr
  • Upvote 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

OK, that actually helps right there. Thank you very much Matthew Barr. Yeah the reason why I ask this question is because when I watched John Carpenter's movies and Brian de Palma films, they kind of have the similarities of Dario Argento's movies, kind of the thematic way I think I don't know. Plus one of them did say that he was their main influence on their styles so I thought you know, the way how they do their films was a recreational style from Argento. It was just a curious thought of mine that kind of got a little carried away.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have this movie idea that is about a girl name Annie with multiple disabilities that can led to serious consequences such as death and self-abuse, and i've been watching movies that are made by my favorite directors: Dario Argento, John Carpenter, and Brian De Palma. Now Dario Argento is the main director that inspired me into wanting to direct movies and do cinematography because of the visual style he puts in through Suspiria, Inferno, and Deep Red, But after watching movies from directors Brian De Palma, and John Carpenter, their visual styles inmovies have alot in common. Not in genre though. My questions are:

 

How do I recreate their vision into my movie?

 

How do they do their movies the way they do now?

 

 

 

For the purely pedagogical exercise, you take a scene/shot you 'like' and attempt to recreate that lighting, placement of talent, etc. that was in the original.

 

Some people claim one should not do this sort of thing... but that is how most people learn. The problem is when one attempts to match 'very closely' someone elses style, it is often for material that is not appropriate. In the case of "Susperia", this film was based on the 19th century writings of Thomas de Quincey, and are psychological 'phantasies' in the extreme. So, the lighting, framing, etc. should reflect that 'phantasm' aspect. Such camera work would not 'work' for a rom-com... well... perhaps a 'goth' romcom... but I digress...

 

Further... while Dario Argento is the director, often for camera work, one does better by looking at the cinematography credits.

 

In the case of "Susperia"(1977), the cinematographer is listed as Luciano Tovoli, who shot, among other films, Julie Tabor's "Titus"(1999) which also has very stylized cinematography.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

 

For the purely pedagogical exercise, you take a scene/shot you 'like' and attempt to recreate that lighting, placement of talent, etc. that was in the original.

 

Some people claim one should not do this sort of thing... but that is how most people learn. The problem is when one attempts to match 'very closely' someone elses style, it is often for material that is not appropriate. In the case of "Susperia", this film was based on the 19th century writings of Thomas de Quincey, and are psychological 'phantasies' in the extreme. So, the lighting, framing, etc. should reflect that 'phantasm' aspect. Such camera work would not 'work' for a rom-com... well... perhaps a 'goth' romcom... but I digress...

 

Further... while Dario Argento is the director, often for camera work, one does better by looking at the cinematography credits.

 

In the case of "Susperia"(1977), the cinematographer is listed as Luciano Tovoli, who shot, among other films, Julie Tabor's "Titus"(1999) which also has very stylized cinematography.

Wow, I never actually thought of that. Yeah I heard that Argento got the idea of Suspiria from author Thomas de Quincey. and when you mentioned about how the lighting and framing reflecting the phantasm aspect, that kind of actually put me in a surprising position. 'Cause from what I here in his interview, is that the color palettes and framing he did, mostly came from walt disney's snow white, (the color parts of it), and psychoanalysis or I don't know how the word is spelled, and mainly through film noir mise 'en scene tricks, which explains alot on shadowy geometrics in the movie, plus the scary music added into sum frames were from german expressionism films he was inspired also, but that's what he said. Plus with the help of his former wife Daria Nicolodi, she said that the story was her idea because it was based off of her grandmother's experience in being in a dance academy where witchcraft was practiced. Dario's inspiration for the story was quite different though but similar. In his view, he mentioned that he read through alot of children's fairy tale stories and de Quincey, as mentioned before and originally came up the story of Suspiria. Pretty interesting I must say.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...