Cristina Dunlap
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“I’ve Never Had a Director Give Me a GIF as a Reference Before”: DP Cristina Dunlap on American Fiction
Music videos have been good to Cristina Dunlap. As a photography-obsessed high schooler, a chance meeting landed the L.A. native a gig shooting stills on a music video. It happened to be for Death Cab for Cutie, leading to a run of jobs with influential directors like Hiro Murai and Ace Norton. After working her way up to the role of cinematographer, a Coldplay video collaboration with Dakota Johnson led to Dunlap shooting a pair of features starring the actress, Am I OK? and Cha Cha Real Smooth, both of which premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. A music […]
by Matt Mulcahey on Jan 18, 2024 -
“We Wanted to Keep the Film Grounded”: DP Cristina Dunlap on Am I Ok?
In Am I Ok?, the directorial debut of Tig Notaro and Stephanie Allynne, a pair of best friends have their lifelong friendship suddenly confused by one taking a job offer in London and the other coming out of the closet to confess her romantic feelings. Below, cinematographer Cristina Dunlap discusses how she avoided the stereotypical overlit comedy without making the film too serious and burying the jokes in the process. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Dunlap: The script […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 24, 2022 -
“The Movie’s Beauty Comes From What Reminds People of Their Own Life”: DP Cristina Dunlap on Cha Cha Real Smooth
Cha Cha Real Smooth taps into generational angst with its story of Andrew, a recent university alum who finds himself moving in with his parents due to a lack of job prospects. Andrew catches a break when he finds work as a party-starter for bar and bat mitzvahs, where he finds himself yearning for a future that might not be his own. Cinematographer Cristina Dunlap discusses how she varied the look of each of the seven bar and bat mitzvahs and making an abandoned Pittsburgh mall stand-in for so many different locations. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 23, 2022
