SUCKER

A film by Mike Heil and 1oh5 Productions

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Master of Photography

This week I was given the task of trying to pick my favorite cinematographer and write a quick summary of why he or she was so great. This proved to be incredibly hard to whittle down, as I love the work of many, many DPs. Thus, after doing more research, I decided my best pick would be a man by the name of Emmanuel Lubezki.

What I love about Lubezki is his diversity of style. His films that resonated most with me are Children of Men, Burn After Reading and Sleepy Hollow. I know, you’re thinking these films have absolutely nothing in common with each other, which is why I love the versitility of Lubezki. Children of Men is a non-stop, dirty, grungy action film famous for having ludicrously long-lasting shots. One particular scene takes place in a car (already difficulty to film in) and is 4 minutes of the same take. In this take, there is laughter, death, explosions, and then they all get out of the car and freak out – without a single cut involved. Another shot features Owen running through the city streets during a battle, and the action is so intense you don’t even realize until 3 or 4 minutes later that the camera hasn’t cut yet. This kind of amazing choreography and planning is the work of a master.

Burn After Reading isn’t nearly as stunning of cinematography, but it shows a dramatic jump in style from dark action to upbeat comedy. He juxtaposes well the comedy of Brad Pitt with the raw anger of John Malkovich, creating an engaging and funny film.

Lubezki’s work in Sleepy Hollow is one of the best examples of visual perfection in cinema. Faced with the challenge of turning a normal town into a horrible nightmare is no easy task. The beautiful way Lubezki accomplishes this is through nature design and silhouetting. The forest scenes are especially gripping around the twisted and deformed tree, which becomes an integral part of the movie. The carpet of swirling leaves around this eery tree gives shivering emotion to an otherwise normal forest. The cemetary scene is also visually fantastic as Lubezki manages to capture all the horror of the horsmen by making him a slihouette against the moonlight. Really creepy stuff, and another example of why Lubezki is a master of photography.

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