Academy Awards Week: Best Cinematography

One of my favorite parts of a film is the cinematography.  Many people do not know what cinematography is, or how it is one of the most essential parts to a film.  Cinematography is the creation of film images.  The cinematographer will of use a movie camera with film or digital imagery to capture what they want to show the audience.

The American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) define cinematography as "a creative and interpretive process that culminates in the authorship of an original work of art rather than the simple recording of a physical event. Cinematography is not a subcategory of photography. Rather, photography is but one craft that the cinematographer uses in addition to other physical, organizational, managerial, interpretive and image-manipulating techniques to effect one coherent process."


At the advent of film history the cinematographer was the director, but as technology advanced these two roles became different.  The director was no longer the camera operator.  New technologies like color, and wide screen necessitated someone who was a specialist and their sole task was to capture the images and operate the camera.


As film has evolved from the silent era to present day the cinematographers continue to create visually beautiful images for the audiences to see.  During the silent era cinematographers had to work extra hard to make sure that without sound the visual created a cohesive element to the story.  As newer technologies present them self (or return) like 3D cinematographers have to work hard attain an image that captures the genuine emotional experience of the scene.


This year there were several films that did a fantastic job utilizing the brilliance of their cinematographer, here are my personal favorites.

1-The Tree of Life-Emmanual Lubezsi (director of photography)

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2-Drive-Newton Thomas Sigel (director of photography)

3-Hugo-Robert Richardson

4-Shame-Sean Bobbitt

5-Melancholia-Manuel Alberto Claro

6-The Artist-Guillame Schiffman

7-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2-Eduardo Serra

8-The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo-Jeffrey Cronenwerth

9-Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy-Hoyte Van Hoytema

10-Take Shelter-Adam Stone

These are just merely the top ten on my list there are many other films like Moneyball, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Martha Marcy May Marlene, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol and many more that could be included amongst this wonderful work.  The cinematographer is one of the hardest working film professionals today.  They have the responsibility to make the film's visual look and feel connect to the emotional aspects of the film.  No, they do not just have to make things look pretty, but in a sense they need to make things look as though each image tells a story.

So who made the cut for the Academy Awards:

The Artist
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Hugo
The Tree of Life 
War Horse 

This is a tough category to predict.  The ASC Guild Award went the the best cinematography of the year, The Tree of Life, but will this line-up at the Academy Awards?  I hope so, but I am not confident.  I think any of these five films could win, but I am pretty sure with little to no passion behind it War Horse is out.  I was a little surprised it made the Best Picture category.  While Dragon Tattoo has some beautiful cinematography it does not have a Best Picture nomination, do the two go hand in hand, not always, but I think the film will go home empty handed.  This leave three films open to three different scenarios come Oscar night.

1) The Artist has a clean sweep.  I do not think it will have a clean sweep, especially since the Academy is catching some flack for rubber stamping this film.  While I do agree the cinematography is one of the best parts of this film because it captures the silence so well, I do not think this film will capture this trophy on Oscar night.

2) Hugo sweeps the technical categories.  Hugo has 11 nominations and a lot of across the board support in the technical categories.  This is a beautiful film, and I would not begrudge the win.  At the moment I am torn between this and The Tree of Life.


3) Justice-The Tree of Life wins because, well it's the best cinematography of the year.  Even those people who did not love, or did not get this film still state the cinematography was amazing.

Will and Should Win: The Tree of Life
Very Close Second: Hugo
Spoiler: The Artist

The Director's Guild Narrows Things Down a Little Bit

Today the Director's Guild of America (DGA) announced their five nominees, and their was one shock, David Fincher for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was nominated in every one of the major guild awards, the PGA, WGA, and the DGA.  What does this mean?  Tattoo is on solid ground and will most likely be one of the 5-9 Best Picture nominee.  Fincher is a well respected director, but I did not see this nomination coming.  I thought we would see Tate Taylor for The Help, Steven Spielberg for War Horse or Bennett Miller for Moneyball before Fincher made this list.

Now as an Oscar forecaster I can safely predict The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has a much better shot at (if not locked down) at being a Best Picture nominee.  I also think think this means we will see Rooney Mara's name announced as a nominee for Best Actress. The biggest problem with predicting the Best Picture category is that no one knows the number of nominees in the Best Picture category so predicted the actual nominees is going to be more difficult.  The Help will  still score a Best Picture nomination, but will probably not get a director nomination (as previously thought).  I think Moneyball is in the same category as The Help, a Best Picture nomination without a Director nomination.  I think War Horse could be a causality here, while Spielberg garnered a DGA nomination for Munich, but not for this and with this  films diminishing box office, and the fact that no one is pushing it as their favorite film proves to be a huge barrier for this film.

I am saddened that brilliant directors like Terrence Malick-The Tree of Life, and Nicolas Winding Refn-Drive are being ignored.  These two men created two brilliant films, and their direction is the best of the year.  The Director's branch of the Academy does not always agree with these five nominees.  Last year Christopher Nolan-Inception was nominated for the DGA but the Coen Brothers earned a nomination in his place at the Oscars for True Grit (huge mistake). 2009 the nominees matched up exactly.  In 2008 Christopher Nolan received a DGA nomination for The Dark Knight, and Stephen Daldry received his spot as an Oscar nominee for The Reader (another big mistake).  In 2007 the DGA picked Sean Penn for Into the Wild as a nominee while the Academy replace him with Jason Reitman for Juno.  I would have picked Penn, but Juno was a well liked film.  In 2006 the DGA and the Academy disagreed on two nominations.  The DGA nominated Jonathon Dayton and Valerie Ferris for Little Miss Sunshine and Bill Condon for Dreamgirls.  The Academy Awards nominated Clint Eastwood for Letters from Iwo Jima and Paul Greengrass for United 93. Over the last few years the DGA and Academy have only completely agreed one year, and from 2000-2010 the DGA and Academy have only lined up three times (2002, 2005, and 2009).

So who will stay and who will be replaced (if anyone)?  I think Fincher is the most vulnerable, but at this moment it is hard to predict that any of these five men listed below will not get a nomination.  The next question is who would be the replacement nominee, will the Academy play it safe with Miller, Spielberg, or Taylor or will they take a risk and go with Malick or Refn.  When replacing someone in a group like this this the Academy will typically go with Malick or Refn.  The Academy has typically only messed up when replacing Christopher Nolan (they sure hate him for some reason.  At the moment I think Malick will replace Fincher, but that is not a set in stone prediction.

Here are the nominees:

WOODY ALLEN
Midnight in Paris
(Sony Pictures Classics)

DAVID FINCHER
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
(Columbia Pictures, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures)

MICHEL HAZANAVICIUS
The Artist
(The Weinstein Company)

ALEXANDER PAYNE
The Descendants
(Fox Searchlight Pictures)

MARTIN SCORSESE
Hugo
(Paramount Pictures)

The Producers Guild Forecasts a Bland Outlook at the Oscars

Today the Producer's Guild of America (PGA) helped narrow down the potential list of Best Picture nominees.  Sometimes this group throws in some commercial success stories, i.e. Bridesmaids this year.  Bridesmaids making this list shows that it is gaining more and more momentum towards a Best Picture nomination.  People have compared this film to The Hangover, but Bridesmaids has already done much better than that laugher, and this film is a serious threat.  The other surprise nominee that needs to be taken a little more seriously today is The Ides of March.  March has four Golden Globe nominations and could be a serious contender.  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo's nomination is less surprising because the producer is genius Scott Rudin, but this could help propel the film to more major nominations.

One film that is most likely out of the running is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.  If Potter could not get a nomination from this guild then the odds of a Best Picture nomination are pretty much dead in the water.  Two smaller films Drive and The Tree of Life were noticeably left off this list as well.  If this trend continues look for this to be one of the most generic celebrations of film. 

The not so surprising nominations were The Artist, The Descendants, The Help,Hugo, Midnight in Paris, Moneyball, and War Horse.  These are the films that are out front for nominations, and to win the Best Picture honor.  Looking at this list of seven films makes me feel as though the the Academy (for the most part) like this Guild, will play it safe this year.  Films like Shame, Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy, Martha Marcy May Marlene, and many other will be ignored. While I am excited for films like The Artist, Midnight in Paris and Hugo, I can't help but hope the Academy will take more risks.  The upcoming Guild awards will help paint a clearer picture, but I predict a very bland year at the Oscars  

THE ARTIST-Producer: Thomas Langmann

BRIDESMAIDS-Producers: Judd Apatow, Barry Mendel, Clayton Townsend

THE DESCENDANTS-Producers: Jim Burke, Alexander Payne, Jim Taylor

THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO-Producers: Ceán Chaffin, Scott Rudin

THE HELP-Producers: Michael Barnathan, Chris Columbus, Brunson Green

HUGO-Producers: Graham King, Martin Scorsese

THE IDES OF MARCH-Producers: George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Brian Oliver

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS-Producers: Letty Aronson, Stephen Tenenbaum

MONEYBALL-Producers: Michael De Luca, Rachael Horovitz, Brad Pitt

WAR HORSE-Producers: Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spielberg

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is an Edgy Tale with Rooney Mara stealing the film

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (3 1/2 out 5 Stars)

Directed by David Fincher (The Social Network, Fight Club, Se7en)

Written by Steve Zallian (Moneyball, Gangs of New York, Schindler's List)

Starring Daniel Craig, Rooney Mara, and Christopher Plummer

I can hear the groans already, another book being made into a movie. Wait, what?  Stieg Larson's book The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was already made into a movie?  There was a Sweedish version?  I can hear even more groans from people stating "Hollywood is going to take another foreign film and remake it for American audiences."  This is a double whammy that could have proved disastrous.  I think the opposite happened.  While I did not love the book, and the Swedish film was solid, but this may be the best version of this story.

The film starts with Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) walking out of court after he loses a libelist case against a major business tycoon.  Blomkvist works for an independent magazine called Millennium; he tells his business partner and love Erika Berge (Robin Wright) he is going to be stepping away from the magazine.  While this is happening Blomkvist is being investigated by a third party named Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara) because Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer) wants him to help him solve a murder mystery.  Blomkvest takes the the case and finds himself surrounded by despicable people on a dark and twisted path to find a killer of women.

Fincher was the right man to tackle this film.  I can think of no other director who could handle the subject matter better; he knows how to construct films centered around dark subject matters.  Fincher has found found musical soul mates in Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross.  Reznor and Ross composed one of the best original scores for The Social Network and their score creates an eerie wonderful composition for this film.  The score sets the mood perfectly for this film and is one of the best elements of this film.  Fincher knows how to construct stories, and enjoyed the work he did here.

The interesting part of this film was knowing the book and the differences from the book to film.  The subject matter of this book is deft, there are 465 pages worth of material.  Most adaptations need to trim the fat, and change things for the screen.  This film version did both.  There are moments in the film where I was glad they cut things, or changed things up a bit.  The biggest change is the ending.  Many fans complain when the ending of a book is changed, it works here, but I also think it works because it makes things less complicated.  Zallian's screenplay while not amazing makes the material sharper and concise for the silver screen.  In the book Lisbeth is a major character, but the main focus seems to be Mikael.  This film uses one of the darkest heroines well, and integrates her story into the film seamlessly.

Lisbeth's portrayer Rooney Mara is fantastic in this role; she plays a girl with no emotions perfectly.  As Lisbeth is still a ward of the state at 24 she has been seen as a menace, but she refuses to be a victim to societal norms.  Mara plays this role with great ease and conviction as though it comes natural to her; she has not had many starring roles, but I would imagine her strong performance in this film will catapult her into stardom.

This dark tale is not fun holiday material it is a solid piece of work. This film proves that even with a second coming there can be a worthwhile vantage point for new audiences.  While there are moments when this film feels a bit impersonal, where the secondary characters seem out of the loop the the Vanger family whom this film is somewhat about.  People will also question the connection that builds between Lisbeth and Mikhael, how does it form, where does it come from?  There are some holes that screenplay does not cover up.  These flaws in screenplay come because adapting this sometimes off putting book into something better is a chore.  I give the team behind this film props for making me like a film about a book I did not care for.