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Light and life
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Legendary cinematographers talk about their art
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Lyrical expressionFrom Visions of Light
Sheer poetry — when cinematographer Sven Nykvist illuminated Ingmar Bergman’s greatest films with his lyrical use of light. He pioneered the use of naturalistic light in filmmaking and won two Academy awards. Best cinematography for Bergm
an’s Cries and Whispers and Fanny and Alexander.
For Vittorio Storaro, a living legend in cinematography, Italian filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Conformist was an exercise in shadow and light. To convey the sense of claustrophobia, he used light to show consciousness and darkness to portray unconsciousness. His photography attained lyrical heights and won him the Oscars for Apocalypse Now, Reds and The Last Emperor. Closer home, Subrata Mitra worked magic in Satyajit Ray’s films starting with Pather Panchali.
Cinematographers are considered the director’s second pair of eyes. It is they who interpret and capture his vision. And, to illustrate the importance of lighting in cinema, Konangal screened ‘Light and shadow’, a film on the making of The Conformist, and ‘Visions of Light’, a film about cinematography, that had great shots and sequences and comments by those who photographed them.
Masters speak
Great cinematographers speak of their relationships with directors. They talk of shots, and the light; from photography in the black and white era to the colour and, dramatic and expressionistic lighting techniques.
“It’s like a book for us,” say the cinematographers referring to the influence of Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane, photographed by Gregg Toland. “They broke all the rules and tried different things, in texture and contrasts,” they say about the magnitude of photographic innovations in the film.
Ace cinematographer Gordon Willis talks about the Godfather films, which earned him the nickname ‘Prince of Darkness.’ Willis says he was criticised for the use of deep shadows when lighting Marlon Brando, but many contemporaries also felt he had mastered the art of underexposure.
Gone with the Wind set the trend for colour films. Clippings from movies such as Annie Hall, Jaws, Blue Velvet, and Goodfellas detailed various techniques use
In Cold Blood, photographed by Conrad Hall, a sad scene finds actor Robert Blake’s character talking to a priest about his father. Hall discovered that the light through the window caught the shadows of raindrops as they trickled down the glass. He projected them against Blake’s face, creating the illusion of ghostly tears. “The visuals were crying for him….it was truly a visual accident…” the cinematographer says.
William Fraker, cinematographer of Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, says that in the scene in which the character played by Ruth Gordon is on the telephone, Polanski wanted him not to show the face of the actress. He didn’t, but when that shot played, everyone in the theatre unconsciously shifted to one side, trying to see around that door. As Fraker simply says, ‘That’s Roman Polanski!’
K.JESHI
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