With Rachel Morrison the first woman cinematographer nominated for a Best Cinematography Academy Award, we’re running today online from our current print issue David Leitner’s interview with her about shooting her nominated film, Dee Rees’s Mudbound. When Dee Rees’s Mudbound premiered at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, the director was returning to the fest six years after her feature debut, Pariah, launched there. The same year also marked DP Rachel Morrison’s first feature to be included in the festival, Zal Batmanglij’s Sound of My Voice, and she returned the following year with Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale Station; Mudbound is her eighth […]
Since the 1990s, Peter Kunhardt has produced and directed documentary works on Lincoln, JFK, Nixon, Ted Kennedy, James Foley and Gloria Steinem among many others. His latest film attempts to offer a new perspective on the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. King of the Wilderness was shot by DP Clair Popkin, who previously worked with Kunhardt on his HBO docs Becoming Warren Buffett and Living with Lincoln. Below, Popkin shares his experiences from the production and recalls in particular the challenges of filming in the Lorraine Motel room outside which King was assassinated. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being […]
Director Brad Anderson returns to Sundance for a sixth time with Beirut, a political thriller from screenwriter Tony Gilroy (Michael Clayton, The Bourne Identity). The film stars John Hamm as a U.S. diplomat who returns to Beirut after his wife was murdered there 10 years prior. Belgium-born DP Bjorn Charpentier shot the film with the work of David Fincher and Roger Deakins in mind. Below, he gets technical with his approach to lighting and lenses on the film. Bleecker Street Media will release Beirut theatrically on April 13. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the […]
One of 12 films to compete in the World Cinema Documentary Competition at Sundance this year, The Cleaners tells the story of so-called “digital scavengers.” These are individuals outsourced by Silicon Valley companies to delete supposedly inappropriate content from the internet. The Cleaners takes place in a nocturnal Manila designed to evoke Blade Runner and Gotham City. The film’s cinematographers – Axel Schneppat and Max Preiss – spoke with Filmmaker before the film’s five showings at Sundance. Below they discuss the cinematic challenge of shedding “light on an industry virtually kept in the dark.” Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up […]
Prolific cinematographer Drew Daniels has shot more than 40 shorts and features since 2009. His recent credits include the films of Trey Edward Shults (Krisha and It Comes at Night) and the SXSW-winning short Thunder Road. Daniels was tapped by first-time feature director Jonathan Watson to shoot Arizona, a darkly comic thriller featuring Danny McBride, Rosemarie DeWitt and Seth Rogen. Below, Daniels discusses the film’s visual influences, his love of natural light and capturing the “dusty, burnt out quality of the suburban Southwest.” Arizona screens in the Midnight lineup at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind […]
One of Filmmaker‘s 25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2015, Reinaldo Marcus Green makes his feature debut as a writer/director with Monsters and Men. The film tells the story of a police shooting and its aftermath in the community of Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn. Green hired cinematographer Patrick Scola (Southside with You) to shoot the film, which screens in competition at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival. Ahead of the film’s premiere, Scola spoke with Filmmaker about how he sought to blend both “naturalism” and “heightened reality” in the film’s visual approach. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your […]
The directorial debut of Argentine actress Valeria Bertuccelli, The Queen of Fear holds its world premiere at Sundance 2018 as part of the World Cinema Dramatic Competition. The film was co-directed by Fabiana Tiscornia and stars Bertuccelli as an actress set to open a one-woman show. Matías Mesa, the film’s cinematographer, has DP’d a number of Spanish-language shorts and features in addition to his camera operator work on Okja, Triple 9 and The Road. Below, Mesa speaks with Filmmaker about lighting a blackout sequence and the visual influences on The Queen of Fear. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of […]
Kirsten Johnson was among the most in-demand documentary DPs even before her much-celebrated 2016 film Cameraperson. Johnson has shot more than 50 films for such directors as Laura Poitras, Alex Gibney and Kirby Dick. Her latest film, A Thousand Thoughts, is a doc on the Kronos Quartet from directors Sam Green and Joe Bini. The film will be presented at Sundance as a “live documentary” with Green narrating live and the Quartet conducting the score in person. Before its premiere, Johnson spoke with Filmmaker about finding innovative ways to film a concert and how a shot from Cameraperson wound up in A […]
Veteran cinematographer Tom Hurwitz has shot more than 100 documentary features and TV series since 1974, when he helped shoot The Grateful Dead, a concert film of the eponymous band live in San Francisco. Hurwitz has worked on such seminal series as Nova, Frontline and American Masters, while his feature doc work includes Wild Man Blues, The Queen of Versailles and last year’s Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold. Having worked on Valentino: The Last Emperor in 2008, Hurwitz again teams up with director Matt Tyrnauer for Studio 54, a doc on the legendary New York nightclub. Studio 54 makes its debut […]
Cinematographer Zak Mulligan has worked on roughly 30 shorts, features, documentaries and TV series over the past decade. Mulligan served as DP on We the Animals, which premieres at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival as part of the NEXT lineup. The film marks the first narrative feature from Jeremiah Zagar, a documentary filmmaker whose 2008 In a Dream was shortlisted for an Academy Award and whose 2014 Captivated: The Trials of Pamela Smart screened in competition at Sundance. Below, Mulligan speaks with Filmmaker about blending digital and 16mm footage, stretching the number of shoot days and twisting his ankle on the set […]