American Cinematographer - December 2017 - 100

FILMMAKERS' FORUM

Who's Afraid of Red, Green and Blue?
By Vittorio Storaro, ASC, AIC

"I see in colors the effort of matter to become LIGHT."
- Plato, Greek philosopher
"RED also has an Expiatory, Protective function." - Lia
Luzzatto and Renata Pompas, Italian scholars
"GREEN is a Moral color." - J. M. Vincent, American scholar
"BLUE, King of colors, comforts the Heart." - Guillaume de
Machaut, French poet
I think I heard someone say: "Look what those two 'young'
visionaries of the cinematic image, Woody Allen and Vittorio Storaro
- one writing with WORDS, the other writing with LIGHT - are up
to on their second film together, Wonder Wheel! And they've only
just entered the world of digital cinema with their first movie, Café
Society!"
Indeed, we seemed quite happy in our classic world of celluloid, and so familiar with the mysterious image that is revealed after
it has been conceived, as if it were being born. Each film is a specific
creature.
Despite our knowledge and our experiences over time, we
visualized that IMAGE through dreams or nightmares, according to
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December 2017

the various moments and films ... right from the start, as soon as it
was filmed, not only the first night, but during many nights after the
day of shooting ... until it was projected on a screen where, after the
countdown frames, the first image finally appeared ... in motion,
with sound ... and in COLOR.
Despite the research, knowledge and experience that helped
me to "know" how they would turn out, I can honestly say that, like
all cinematographers, I always experienced surprise or, more often,
wonder - and even disappointment, but luckily only a few times -
when I saw on the screen the images that were framed, lit and
filmed on the set.
MATTER - the physical elements of the camera, lenses, film
stock, etc. - was transformed through the language of LIGHT into
visible ENERGY, into an IMAGE.
With that image, all doubts, uncertainties and questions
vanished, and we reveled in the WONDER OF CINEMA. A terrific
thrill that we experienced every time, especially at the first screening
of a new film. By constantly imagining/thinking/dreaming, it had
been possible to materialize the feelings, emotions and filmic intuitions that both the director and the cinematographer, each in his
own "space" and in his own imagination, had in mind and wanted
to see on the screen.
At that time, the reels of film were sent to a lab, the images
were developed, corrected, printed, and then projected a day or
more later in a movie theater, or a specially equipped room during
the shoot. As I recall, the image was viewed with the trepidation that

American Cinematographer

Photos by Jessica Miglio, courtesy of Amazon Studios.

Carolina (Juno
Temple) walks
beneath the
eponymous
Coney Island
attraction in the
1950s-set feature
Wonder Wheel,
which marks the
second
collaboration
between writerdirector Woody
Allen and
cinematographer
Vittorio Storaro,
ASC, AIC.

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - December 2017