American Cinematographer - November 2007 - (Page 49)

in the late Sixties and early Seventies with slower and more contrasty stocks.” We first meet Woody, the 11year-old African-American boy, as he is riding boxcars like a Depression-era vagabond, although his story is set in the 1950s. Actually, Woody sounds more like someone living through the Depression — such as folk singer Woody Guthrie — than a child of the Fifties. Woody is briefly cared for by a rural southern black family. “We wanted that story to have a traditional pastoral style,” says Lachman, who adds that Bound for Glory, Hal Ashby’s film about Guthrie (shot by Haskell Wexler, ASC), was a reference. This time he put Cooke S4 prime lenses on his Moviecam and used three Kodak emulsions: 5205 and Vision 200T 5274 and 500T 5279. “I wanted a warm look against the green vegetation, so I was looking for filters that would bring out the verdant quality of the landscape. I settled on Tiffen Straw in Half and Full gradations. That warmed up flesh tones and gave the yellows and greens the look I was going for.” Another home Woody is taken into looks like something out of a Look magazine spread. There, he relays his hopes and dreams to the family in their living room, a scene that gave Haynes and Lachman a chance to revisit the pristine domesticity of Far From Heaven. “We didn’t have to do much set dressing at all,” notes Lachman. “We shot the house almost as we found it. You can find locations outside of Montreal that look as though they haven’t been touched since the Fifties!” He enhanced the colortemperature difference between the cool exterior light and the warm interior practicals by lighting through the windows with 12K HMI Pars gelled with Lee HT063 Pale Blue. The exterior units were aimed through real tree branches outside the windows to create sharp patterns on the wall. The warm interior lighting was provided by 150- and 300-watt mushroom bulbs on dimmers. The story of Robbie (Ledger) and Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg) tracks their relationship from their early-1960s courtship, when Robbie is a rising young actor, to the dissolution of their marriage a decade later, after he has become a movie star. The excitement of their early romance in the streets and cafés of New York is presented as something of an homage to the French New Wave, specifically Godard. The filmmakers made use of real locations and available light and used unmotivated camera movement and unbalanced framing to create a feeling of randomness that Godard explored in films such as Masculine-Feminine (shot by Willy Kurant, ASC, AFC). “Godard’s compositions in that film are not always motivated by the characters’ actions,” notes Lachman. “The compositions create a logic of their own, based on Godard’s ideology and storytelling.” Lachman shot Robbie’s story on Kodak’s older Vision stocks (5279 and 5274), mixing tungsten light, fluorescent light and daylight to create a naturalistic feel. He used Canon K4 lenses, still-photography lenses Canon adapted for cine use in the 1980s. “They have a special quality,” says the cinematographer, who recalls using them on Desperately Seeking Susan. “They aren’t as multicoated as modern lenses and tend to flare in strong highlights, and the glass is colder in feeling.” This, he adds, gives the scenes a look reminiscent of many French color films from the ’60s, which often have a cooler visual tone. For a scene showing young Robbie and Claire in a New York diner, Lachman framed the two so that they didn’t always seem to be the subject of their own shots; he accomplished this effect by using a mirror behind the actors, deliberately disorienting the viewer and introducing Getting the perfect shot is always a tricky job! But the Cine 30 HD and its new sideload mechanism are the trick to that perfect shot! www.sachtler.com 49 http://www.sachtler.com http://www.sachtler.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - November 2007

American Cinematographer - November 2007 Contents Editor’s Note Global Village DVD Playback Production Slate Deconstructing Bob Dylan Honoring a Lost Friend Night Terrors Losing Control TV’s Top-Rated Short Takes Post Focus New Products & Services Points East International Marketplace Classified Ads Ad Index Clubhouse News ASC Close-Up

American Cinematographer - November 2007

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