American Cinematographer - December 2010 - 52

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Up Against It

During prep, co-cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle, BSC, DFF sketched a trajectory for the film’s visuals, a diagram he likens to sheet music. Also pictured are some of the low-res stills he shot for inspiration.

house way, emphasizing how long it takes for the time to pass, but I thought that would be unwatchable,” says Boyle. “So we drove everybody mad, and the scheduling was a nightmare. There was almost no time off for the key people.” This intensity was vital to the director’s overall approach, which was to make the film as experiential as possible. “We wanted to stay trapped with Aron for the whole time, so that when we finally get to the decisive act, you will be able to tolerate it,” says Boyle. “You’re not going to love it, but you will at least appreciate that it has to be done. That’s the whole deal: it’s a first-person film.” Some filming took place at the real location in eastern Utah, but practical considerations made it impossible to shoot the bulk of the film there. Instead, Blue John Canyon was LIDARscanned by the design department (led by production designer Suttirat Anne Larlarb) and re-created as two sets in an old granite factory in Salt Lake City, where the production was based. One set was built for vertical shots looking either down into or up from within the canyon, and the other was optimized for lateral shots looking along its horizontal
52 December 2010

length. “Every crack and curve was as close to the real thing as you could possibly get,” says Dod Mantle. “The sets were actually physically harder to work in than the real canyon because they were slightly smaller and were just as inaccessible.” The logic behind Boyle’s refusal to cheat the sets or make them easier to work in was twofold, he continues. “Danny felt that if the set walls split open and James could get in and out too easily, then that would be reflected in his performance. When you’re shut into that set with the cold and the silence, you really believe you’re in the canyon. It would have been nice to slip out for a cup of tea now and then, but when I look at the film now, I’m pretty sure Danny was right; the content is intense because James, Quique and I were locked in there, and it was really quite difficult. “It was a real challenge for Quique and me on every level, including operating, lighting and communication,” he continues. “Our job was to help Danny find new ways of keeping the story alive in a very limited space.” Boyle’s experiential approach and
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the confines of the set were also the key determining factors in choosing camera systems and formats. Having shot portions of Slumdog with a highly mobile configuration of Silicon Imaging’s SI-2K Mini, Dod Mantle began prepping 127 Hours by investigating how far compact digital systems had advanced since then. Though briefly intrigued by some even smaller digital cameras, he ultimately decided to use SI-2Ks as his primary cameras. (These were supplied by HD Camera Rentals, which also assisted with the preliminary digital-camera build.) He also brought in Stefan Ciupek, a longtime collaborator and digital-imaging expert, to act as the digital-camera supervisor. Together, they chose digitalimaging technician Chris Cavanaugh to work with Chediak’s crew,while Ciupek worked with Dod Mantle’s. “During prep for this movie, there was an evolution going on with the SI-2K,” says Ciupek. “We communicated a lot with Ari Presler [at Silicon Imaging] to get some improvements made to the camera, including latitude and, even more important, sensitivity. On Slumdog, we found that night shoots

American Cinematographer - December 2010

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