American Cinematographer - September 2013 - K7

Diffusion fi lters were another variable
Dunn used to draw in audiences. “For
our storytelling purpose, we want
to make the audience feel part of
it, like a voyeur, without becoming
self-conscious and noticing that we’re
doing it,” says Dunn. “If they notice then
they withdraw. It’s a fi ne line. We’re
telling a story as seen through the
human eye, which is full of fl ares and
defects. I try to make the camera lens
deal with those human aspects. That’s
the thinking behind the fi ltration, and
fi lm also helps with that. With digital
formats, the trick is somehow giving it
that human aspect, whereas fi lm has a
natural sensuality about it.”
Dunn used a range of stocks, including
KODAK VISION3 50D Color Negative
Film 5203. “That stock is fabulous,” he
says. “I had used it a couple of years
ago on Crazy, Stupid, Love in the hard, high-contrast light of Los
Angeles. Talk about high defi nition! Digital isn’t high defi nition
— it’s just higher def than the last high def. But that 50 ASA
stock is actually high defi nition, in the detail and texture, holding
highlights and what hides deep in the shadows. It’s a really
beautiful stock. I’d love to shoot a whole movie on it.”
Dunn says the project was a great opportunity for a
cinematographer, partly because of the wide range of situations
and eras, from Dwight Eisenhower sending troops to the south
to a less-than-sober Richard Nixon, played by John Cusack,
scheming to evade Watergate in the dark shadows of the White
House at night.
Dunn describes his lighting style as intuitive. He notes that
Gaines is often somewhat forgotten at the periphery of the
room as powerful world leaders are focused on the decisions of
the day. A delicate balance had to be struck to depict Gaines’
unobtrusive presence, even as the story is about him, and his
unique perspective on the history of the 20th century.
“These people generally ignore him,” says Dunn. “In a way,
he doesn’t exist. But he is a witness to world events like the
Cuban Missile Crisis, and Johnson and the civil rights era. One
of our references was The Remains of the Day (1993, shot by
Tony Pierce-Roberts, BSC). Anthony Hopkins’ character, the
butler, was present, but as far as the others were concerned,
he wasn’t really there. We composed in a more formal, careful
way, and that kept us on the straight and narrow stylistically.”
Dunn also studied fi lms like Mississippi Burning (1988,
OSCAR®-winning cinematography by Peter Biziou, BSC) and
still photography from the era of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the
Black Panthers. Lee Daniels’ The Butler also makes extensive use
of library and stock footage.
“We’re telling a story as
seen through the human eye,
which is full of flares and
defects. I try to make the
camera lens deal with those
human aspects.”
“The television is like a Greek chorus throughout the fi lm,”
says Dunn. “The years of the presidents we didn’t fi lm as
characters — Presidents Ford and Carter for example — are
seen 90% on television. We also matched in some characters
to this library footage. Gaines’ son gets involved quite heavily
in the civil rights movement, for example. One sequence begins
with old footage that we then meshed with footage of our own,
and it’s seamless. We shot [KODAK VISION3 250D Color
Negative Film] 5207 and manipulated it in the DI to match,
muting the colors.
“Making that work can be pretty tricky,” he says. “Part of it
is having a very good editor like we did with Joe Klotz. There is
some slight-of-hand camerawork, panning across to fi nd the
character. With good operators, you give them the feeling and
idea, and let them use their skills and talent. The dailies timer
in New Orleans read the script, and understood the texture
and tone we were after. The great thing about what we do
is the teamwork and collaboration of all these people joined
together in pursuit of the same goal.”
Dunn says it was a great privilege to
be involved on Lee Daniels’ The Butler. “As
cinematographers, we learn all these skills
and tools, but basically we are storytellers,”
he says. “In a way, it’s like telling a child a
story at bedtime. We all want to be told tales
and our perception of the story changes with
each telling, depending on our mood. I’ve
been a cinematographer for a long time, and I
think that’s what it comes down to at its most
essential.”
Photos: Top left: Forest Whitaker. Bottom left: Forest Whitaker and
Cuba Gooding Jr. Top right: Andrew Dunn, BSC. Bottom right: Oprah
Winfrey and Forest Whitaker. (Photos by Annie Marie Fox. © 2013
The Weinstein Company. All rights reserved.)
American Cinematographer - September 2013

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