American Cinematographer - April 2016 - 44

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Carrying Cinema's Flag
That's what I remember about him:
that intensity. And that was the same kind
of intensity I had and [director] Steven
Spielberg had, and it was great to know
that the crew shared that. He was as much
a creative partner on Close Encounters as
anyone involved. And he was really a great
guy.

Top: Zsigmond on
the set of The
River. Bottom,
from left: William
Barber, B-camera
1st AC; Zsigmond;
John Connor,
B-camera
operator; Joseph
Urbanczyk, AFI
Intern; Michael
Gershman,
A-camera
operator; Kenneth
Nishino, A-camera
1st AC; and
James Shepard,
A-camera dolly
grip on location
for The River.

And he said yes. My first day on
a motion picture as a grown-up cinematographer was the evacuation scene
in Close Encounters. It was out of his
generosity - and need - that he actually said, 'You can do it.'
He always had that generous
sense. He was as interested in the work
I was doing as he was in his own. He
just had that beautiful enthusiasm about
him that allowed him to get excited
about every aspect of the work. I learned
from him to just put your head down
and go forward at all costs. He always
had dogged perseverance toward his art
and his principles.
44

April 2016

Richard Dreyfuss (actor on
Close Encounters of the Third Kind): I'm
a person who never dreams of his
current life. But when we were shooting
Close Encounters, Vilmos got into an
argument with [a member of his lighting crew]. I don't know what the
content was, but I know that it was furious - something both he and the other
guy felt really strongly about. It was so
real and strong that in the middle of the
movie I had a dream about it, and in the
dream, this argument was holding up
shooting. Now, in fact, it didn't hold us
up at all, but I felt the incident so
intensely that in the dream it did.
American Cinematographer

Michael Gershman (Tyler Mount
assistant on Cinderella Liberty and The
Sugarland Express; camera assistant on
The Deer Hunter, The Rose, Heaven's
Gate and Blow Out; operator on Jinxed!,
Table for Five, The River and Fat Man
and Little Boy): [Heaven's Gate] was
intense, but I had a great time. The work
was hard; it was full of dust and smoke
and long, long hours because the locations
were so far away from where we stayed.
We crossed the million-feet-of-film mark
- I'd never gone through that much film
on a picture before. But I had confidence
in [director] Michael Cimino and Vilmos
that it was going to be a wonderful
picture. I could see what we were doing,
and I knew it was beautiful.
I think Vilmos realized that the
film may have been somewhat out of
control. But he was getting to do what he
loved to do, which was to create beautiful
images. And Michael gave him a huge
amount of freedom to do that. And we
were shooting in such great locations.
Each day was beautiful. The light was
beautiful. I think Vilmos enjoyed himself
tremendously.
Joseph D. Urbanczyk (camera
intern on The River and No Small Affair;
camera assistant on The Two Jakes; operator on Maverick, The Crossing Guard,
The Ghost and the Darkness, Playing by

Bottom photo courtesy of Joseph Urbanczyk.

Kenneth Nishino (camera assistant on Heaven's Gate, Blow Out, Jinxed!,
Table for Five, The River, No Small
Affair, Real Genius, The Witches of
Eastwick, Maverick, Assassins and The
Crossing Guard): Vilmos was my mentor
and hero. I first met him on Heaven's Gate.
What a tremendous journey and incredible experience I had working with him
and for him - he was a master!
American Cinematographer - April 2016

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - April 2016
