American Cinematographer - April 2016 - 50

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Carrying Cinema's Flag
he was always ready to belly laugh
whichever way it went, and move on.
None of the strains of shooting a movie
carried past wrap, so you started the next
day right back in your collaborative
friendship.
The actors felt very free [on set],
and Jack Nicholson loved him. He's what
Jack called 'the fastest of the best.' When
you showed Vilmos the choreography of
the scene, by the time he took that visual
photograph in his head - boom - he
could get his gaffer working. He could
see the movie before the movie, like a
painter looking at a canvas. And he had
quite a tuned machine with his guys.

Top: Zsigmond and director Irwin Winkler (gesturing) on the set of Life as a House.
Bottom: Fellow ASC member Frederic Goodich and Zsigmond.

Zsigmond and Laszlo Kovacs, and at
first I would get them confused. Vilmos
started wearing a T-shirt that said 'I am
not Laszlo,' and Laszlo wore one that
said 'I am not Vilmos.' They would play
tricks on me - I was shooting with
Vilmos, and he snuck Laszlo in, in front
of me, looking through the camera! I
had no idea how he got there.
Vilmos brought things to life like
nobody ever did. And when Friday came
around, it was very, very depressing,
because it meant I wasn't going to have
the weekend with him. He was such a
delight and a pleasure. Nothing with
Vilmos was ever a challenge; no matter
what you threw at him, he would just
look at you, rub his chin, and say, 'Give
me a minute.' It was a privilege to work
with him, and aside from the pleasure of
the experience, the end result was always
50

April 2016

as unique as it could be. He was the
greatest, not only as a filmmaker, but as a
human being.
Sean Penn (director on The
Crossing Guard): I was inspired by
Vilmos. [I learned from him] that when
you think you're paying attention, there's
more attention to be paid. I think partly
because of how the guy grew up and how
he ended up coming to the United
States, he saw 360 degrees. Watching
him look at the set - where he was
going to kick light and where he was not
going to kick light - was a portrait of
concentration that I thought I had, until
I saw him.
He was very warm, with a great
sense of humor. We were both right and
both wrong on several occasions, as it
turned out when we saw the footage, and
American Cinematographer

Gershman: As an assistant, you
had to be on your game all the time.
Because he expected you to be working
as hard as he was working - and there
was nobody on the set that worked
harder than he did. He challenged everybody around him to perform as well as
he performed. He challenged me, and
that was one of the great things I enjoyed
about working with him.
I also liked the fact that when you
went out to dinner with him at night,
you had a great time. You sat, you drank
wine, he talked about his history coming
from Hungary, and he talked about other
films he had worked on and people that
he knew. You couldn't ask for a better guy
to have dinner with. He was just delightful to be around.
Irwin Winkler (director on Life
as a House): Vilmos made me laugh,
made me cry, made me better.

Bottom photo courtesy of Frederic Goodich, ASC.

Urbanczyk: I always cite an
instance when we were shooting Playing
by Heart. We had a difference of opinion
on how to execute a certain shot, and I
came up with a small compromise of
what he had in mind. Without missing a
beat, he turned to me and said, 'Hey,
Joseph, there is no compromise for
perfection.' I loved it. That's the way
Vilmos thought, and that's the way he
brought out the very best in everyone
who worked with him.
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - April 2016
