Tag: Tech Support

TECH SUPPORT: Best Cinematography – Volume I

LIGHTS…CAMERA…you were probably waiting for the word “action,” no? Action is, after all, what many individuals go to a film to see. But the “lights” and the “camera” in this classic phrase bring a film beyond a book or a radio show…and capture the “action.”

The individuals who paint the images of cinema with light and composition are rewarded in the Oscar category of Best Cinematography. Cinematographers are pivotal in the making of any film and it is thus unsurprising that directors often continuously work with the similar camera heads.

Like many cinephiles, I must say this is my favorite of the so-called “technical” categories and I eagerly anticipate the race every year. This year is no exception.

Australian D.P. Dion Beebe might seem to be leading this year’s lenser race with his third collaboration with Rob Marshall, the musical adaptation “Nine.” Despite not being cited by the Academy for some of his more innovative work (see Michael Mann’s “Collateral”), Beebe has been previously nominated for 2002’s “Chicago” and won the Oscar in 2005 for “Memoirs of a Geisha.” “Nine” will give him the opportunity to pay homage to Federico Fellini while also capturing sprawling musical numbers, a feat this category tends to reward.

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July 16, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: Kicking the tires on a new season

Today marks the beginning of a fourth year of Tech Support here at In Contention. Over the past four years, we’ve sought to bring the otherwise under-reported crafts categories and crafts artists the attention they seldom receive, despite their enormous contributions to the art of cinema.

This year, we plan on looking at nine of the categories – Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Makeup, Original Score, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing and Visual Effects – twice thoroughly between now and the morning the nominations are announced. Best Original Song will be previewed once, when we have a better idea of eligible contenders.

I will be offering the analysis of these categories but Kris will also be joining me for the first time this year with Tech Support features and interview pieces throughout.

Last year, a contemporary film – “Slumdog Millionaire” – managed to triumph in five of the 10 categories, a truly remarkable achievement, while “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” unsurprisingly took three others. (Meanwhile, the year’s blockbuster “The Dark Knight” managed one.) It will be interesting to see whether this year will be seen as having tech sweepers like “Millionaire” and “Button” or a greater spreading of the wealth, as we saw in 2007, when eight different films shared the 10 crafts awards!

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July 11, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: Postmortem

What can I say? It was a big night for “Slumdog Millionaire” at the 81st Annual Academy Awards on Sunday.

While I do like the film a great deal, I found its dominance this awards season unnecessarily monotonous. For instance, I preferred Thomas Newman’s work in both music categories this year, but I was nonetheless very happy with A.R. Rahman’s triumphs. The music branch needs to be seriously rewired, though. Their choices in recent years have often been bizarre and at times terrible.

Anthony Dod Mantle’s deserved victory in the cinematography feield means that Roger Deakins is still waiting for that first statuette. (Though, might I add, as effective as the work is in “The Reader,” I would have found it slightly disappointing if Deakins had finally won this year, considering Chris Menges shot most of the movie.) I would also like to think that Wally Pfister will eventually triumph in this category, considering Pfister has received three nominations in the last four years (all on Christopher Nolan projects).

Chris Dickens winning Best Film Editing was probably the easiest call of all the tech categories. Though I would say Angus Wall, Kirk Baxter, Elliot Graham and especially Lee Smith have built up good will with their fellow editors, while Mike Hill and Daniel P. Hanley must be considered in contention whenever they make a prestigious film with Ron Howard.

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February 27, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: Final predictions

After six months of Tech Support previews and interviews, the films have arrived, the nominations have been announced and the guilds, the critics and BAFTA have all announced their preferences. Today we take a final look at the races before the envelopes are opened on Sunday.

BEST ART DIRECTION
After guild and BAFTA wins, I would say “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” has cemented its frontrunner status in this category. Spanning decades of the 20th Century, Donald Graham Burt’s production design was impossible not to notice and gave us gorgeous backdrops for its character’s predicaments.

The other nominees all have the odds stacked against them, whether similar work has been seen before (Michael Carlin’s “The Duchess” and Kristi Zea’s “Revolutionary Road”), is just not showy enough (Nathan Crowley’s “The Dark Knight”) or the nominee is otherwise along for the ride (James Murakami’s “Changeling”).

Will win: “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
Could win: “The Duchess”
Should win: “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

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February 18, 2009
TECH SUPPORT INTERVIEW: The crafts of ‘Benjamin Button,’ part two

Yesterday was the first of our two-part look at the crafts artists behind “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” Today, I feature conversations with cinematographer Claudio Miranda, visual effects supervisor Eric Barba and film editors Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall, who have all received Oscar nominations for their work on the film.

When asked about the enormity of the project, Wall rhetorically asks, “‘How do you eat a whale? One bite at a time. The metaphor we always used is that we always look not at the peak but our feet. It was a two-year process and you have to be sure of every decision you make every day because it affects the end project.”

Miranda admits he was intimidated by the task of breaking down the script. “I had to just try to imagine how this would be realized on screen,” he says, “going through each task at hand, devising a plan for all the different looks, especially with some things on blue screen.”

Barba was especially scared that the main character would have to be created by visual effects for the first 50 minutes. “We had to make it work or else it wouldn’t be believable,” he says. “I had to think of the enormity of having to do what up until now hasn’t been done.”

As regards the man at the helm, Baxter agrees with his colleagues who were featured yesterday that David Fincher is “extremely helpful and very very clear. He knows when to be loose and when to be a lot more specific. He’s got great intuition on what his crew needs from him.”

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February 17, 2009
TECH SUPPORT INTERVIEW: The crafts of ‘Benjamin Button,’ part one

Thirteen Oscar Nominations.

Very few films in Academy history have achieved that status and, prior to this year, no film had secured that many nods since “Chicago” in 2002. But “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” has managed it this year, largely because of the incredible work going on below-the-line.

Last week, I featured composer Alexandre Desplat and his role as film music composer on David Fincher’s film. In the past week, I have spoken to cinematographer Claudio Miranda, production designer Don Burt, set decorator Victor Zolfo, costume designer Jacqueline West, film editors Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall, visual effects supervisor Eric Barba and makeup artist Greg Cannom, a healthy lot, all of them cited for their work on the film by the Academy this year.

Today, I concentrate on my talks with Burt, Zolfo, West and Cannom. Tomorrow, Miranda, Baxter, Wall and Barba will be featured.

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is, without any doubt, a film extraordinarily reliant on visual attributes to be effectively told. The crafts artists acknowledge the intimidation poised by such a project.

“‘Hmmmm…’ is what went through my mind when David [Fincher] first asked me to do this,” says Burt. “How in the world are we going to do this? Then I started going through the different periods in my mind and started building a plan, thinking maybe – just maybe – we could pull it off.”

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February 16, 2009
TECH SUPPORT INTERVIEW: Alexandre Desplat

Over the last several years, Alexandre Desplat has gone from being a relatively unknown (in the United States anyway) French composer to emerging as one of the most acclaimed and sought after commodities in the business today. Receiving his second Oscar nomination this year for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” Desplat has continued to cement his place at the top of his field.

Despite the acclaim, however, he remains very close to his home in European cinema. “I have tried to keep as much of a relationship as I can with my French directors,” he says. “I always try to go to do two or three French movies a year. That’s a lot but I don’t want to lose that.”

While there are certainly exceptions, there is definitely a difference in the manner that French and American filmmakers approach their work, Desplat says. Being forced to think differently because of different filmmaking styles helps his creative resources. “It feeds me,” he says.

David Fincher’s “Button” posed unique challenges for Desplat. “It doesn’t have a linear storytelling,” he says. “It’s a complex puzzle and I’d ask myself, ‘How do you deal with this in music and deal with the main character when he is a passive character?’ It’s not easy to capture in music.”

Describing the film as a “sound epic,” Desplat notes that the music had to be strong without being overly dramatic or imposing. It was a crucial demand from Fincher that Desplat says he had to struggle with.

The composer has worked with some of the world’s top directors in recent years – Ang Lee, Stephen Frears, Jacques Audiard — but despite Fincher’s unique perspective in the wake of those talent helmers, Desplat says certain professional similarities smoothed the journey.

“He has an amazing quality as a collaborator,” Desplat says. “He’s very demanding but so am I so that’s fine. He’s very detailed but so am I, so that’s also fine. He wants his people to bring their own world, talents and colors into the film. I think that’s the sign of a great director. All the great directors I’ve worked with know that it is crucial that your creative energy is opened and not just restrained.”

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February 5, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: The aftermath

So the nominations have descended upon us. “The Dark Knight,” “Slumdog Millionaire” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” as expected, all did phenomenally well, garnering seven crafts nominations each. The only absolute shock, in my opinion, was “Wanted” managing to show up in the sound fields.

Allow me a few comments on each category…

Best Art Direction
As expected, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” “Changeling” and “The Dark Knight” all managed to score nominations.

My “Frost/Nixon” hunch and “Slumdog Millionaire” gamble, however, were incorrect. Rather, Michael Carlin’s lavish sets for “The Duchess” and Kristi Zea’s recreation of 1950s suburbia on “Revolutionary Road” managed to overcome guild snubs and find a home here.

Best Cinematography
My hunch that the guild and the AMPAS branch would not match 5/5 was right on as Tom Stern managed to prevent a second consecutive double nomination for Roger Deakins. Stern’s work on “Changeling” was his sixth collaboration with Clint Eastwood this decade; a nomination seemed inevitable eventually.

Joining him, as expected, are Chris Menges and Roger Deakins for “The Reader,” Claudio Miranda for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” Wally Pfister for “The Dark Knight” and Anthony Dod Mantle for “Slumdog Millionaire.”

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January 23, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: Final preview special, part two

This is part two of my last glance at the year’s tech category contenders. For part one, click here.

Best Music (Original Score)
Now here is a category where there are no locks. Nonetheless, considering the success of their films and scores in awards season to date, A.R. Rahmen (for “Slumdog Millionaire”) and Alexandre Desplat (for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”) seem solid bets.

Thomas Newman, despite only having a BAFTA nomination to his credit so far in the awards season, often scores when the precursors don’t coming calling so I think he’s in for “WALL-E.” Alternatively, he could get in for “Revolutionary Road.”

The rest of the Golden Globe nominees strike me as facing challenges. Clint Eastwood has performed well this season with “Changeling” but I am doubtful he will ever be embraced by the music branch. James Newton Howard’s compositions for “Defiance” may be lost with his film while Hans Zimmer’s Globe citation for “Frost/Nixon” seems more like a tribute to the composer, a Globe favorite.

I would actually wager that Zimmer and Howard have a better opportunity with their fantastic “The Dark Knight” collaboration. Zimmer has been campaigning hard. Even so, I’m skeptical the duo will score. Co-composers receiving Oscar nominations is extremely rare. (Though, in all fairness, so is co-composing.)

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January 21, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: Final preview special, part one

Five months of Tech Support reach their climax on Thursday morning.

This Canuck is, like the rest of the world, celebrating a new American President today. The fact remains, however, that a new set of Oscar nominees will greet us tomorrow and I can’t help but share my final thoughts on the categories.

This is the first part of my review, including the categories of best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Film Editing and best Makeup. We’ll chart the final five fields later today, so be sure to check back.

Best Art Direction
Starting with the most difficult category, there is only one film I would give the title “lock,” and it’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” I’d be stunned if Donald Graham Burt’s exquisite sets failed to make the cut.

I suspect that Michael Corenblith is a solid bet for his detailed and realistic sets for “Frost/Nixon.” If “American Gangster” could get in last year, I would surprised if Corenblith did not score, especially considering his past success when working with Howard. James Murakami also seems a solid bet for “Changeling” for what were detailed and memorable designs of 1920s Los Angeles. His guild and BAFTA nominations suggest people remember the work.

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January 21, 2009
TECH SUPPORT INTERVIEW: The crafts of ‘Doubt’

Those fortunate enough to have caught John Patrick Shanley’s “Doubt” in its original Broadway run were almost unanimous in their praise for it. When Shanley announced his intention to bring the play to the screen — starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Viola Davis, no less — many were skeptical of his ability to transform the very theatrical piece into a cinematic work.

Cinematographer Roger Deakins, production designer David Gropman, costume designer Ann Roth, film editor Dylan Tichenor and music composer Howard Shore all had pivotal roles in making that happen. Shanley, despite his acclaim as a playwright and screenwriter, had only directed one previous feature film. And “Joe Versus the Volcano” is hardly considered a masterpiece of cinema. Deakins nonetheless recalls that the director came to the set with very concrete ideas of what he wanted, and did not come across as inexperienced at all.

“He knew what he wanted to see and turned to me to realize it,” he says. Tichenor adds that, despite having written the play, Shanley was “not overly precious about his work, which was good as we had to cut a lot out.”

Gropman already had a brief history with Shanley, having worked with him on an off-Broadway play in the 1980s. “There was never a moment where experience was an issue,” he says of the director. And while she had not worked with Shanley before, Roth, who also cut her teeth on theatrical productions, acknowledges she could work together easily with him because of their shared background.

“There are some film directors who just use actors as part of visual scenery,” she says, adding that, conversely, theater directors tend to start with the actor and then build the scenery from around him or her.

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January 8, 2009
TECH SUPPORT INTERVIEW: The Crafts of ‘Revolutionary Road’

In less than a decade, filmmaker Sam Mendes has established himself as one of the most intriguing directors of his generation. “Revolutionary Road,” his fourth film to date, hit theaters over last weekend. Regardless of its Oscar fate in the writing, directing and acting categories, the film seems poised to be a major player in the craft arenas, our central focus here at Tech Support.

I recently spoke to cinematographer Roger Deakins, production designer Kristi Zea, costume designer Albert Wolsky and film editor Tariq Anwar about their work on the film, a 1950s period piece featuring the on-screen reunion of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. All four artists are veterans, having had long (Deakins is the youngest at age 59) and successful (each has been nominated for an Oscar at least once, with Wolsky earning two statues to date) careers.

Each of the respective department heads commented on Mendes’s tendency to balance a well-defined vision with the necessity of cooperative discovery on the set. Deakins previously worked with Mendes on “Jarhead,” stepping into the shoes of late legend Conrad L. Hall, who lensed Mendes’s first two efforts. “He’s not happy until he gets what he wants,” he says of the director, “but he has an enormous respect for the collaborative process.”

Zea, meanwhile, says Mendes has a great “willingness and affection for collaboration, but has a precise vision and, because of that, the movie, in its entirety, is very controlled.”

Anwar received an Oscar nomination in 1999 for his work on Mendes’s “American Beauty.” This year marks their own reunion. He agrees with Zea’s reflection of the director’s balance of his own preparation and the input of his collaborators.

“In spite of being so sure-footed in his approach to film production, there is never a feeling of being excluded from the creative process,” he says, “or a sense that his material is too precious not to be rearranged or even deleted.”

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January 2, 2009
TECH SUPPORT: Gleaning the guilds

It’s been three weeks since the last “Tech Support” column. For that, my apologies. In the meantime, we’ve had Thanksgiving, the NBR, the LAFCA, the NYFCC, the BFCA and the Golden Globes to keep us entertained.

The Screen Actors Guild is the first guild to announce its nominees and will do so next week. Between then and the date the Oscar nominations are announced, the various crafts guilds will also announce their nominees.

The guilds have a knack of shaking up the race, even more so than the Globes. The guilds have crossover membership with the Academy, which is incredibly important in predicting AMPAS nominees. The American Cinematographers Society (ASC), the American Cinema Editors (ACE), the Art Directors Guild (ADG), the Costume Designers Guild (CDG) and the Cinema Audio Society (CAS) all have a tendency to accurately predict the eventual Oscar nominees –- and often, winners –- in their respective categories.

So what to expect from these groups when they announce their nominees in January?

The ASC has what is probably the best correlation of any guild-to-Oscar nominees. Every year, at least three, usually four, of its five nominees tend to be cited by AMPAS. Last year, all five nominees were cited by both groups. This year, I would expect Roger Deakins (a guild favorite) to be nominated for “Revolutionary Road.” The living legend of cinematographers lensed what seems to be a major player among this year’s contenders. Moreover, the work has his customized style and class.

Claudio Miranda (“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”) and Anthony Dod Mantle (“Slumdog Millionaire”) also seem primed for citations from this guild and AMPAS. Though awards have not been common in their careers to date, both are working on films which are leading the Oscar race so far. Moreover, the cinematography on both films is incredibly showy and Mantle has already been awarded by the NYFCC for his efforts. Miranda may face difficulty come Oscar time due to the use of visual effects to brush up his work. But that tends to be less of a problem from the guilds.

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December 14, 2008
TECH SUPPORT: Best Original Score — Volume One

Music is one of few of the “tech” awards cited by the Academy that tends to result in passionate discussions among moviegoers, including non-cinephiles. Awarded in the Best Original Score category, the film music composer has one of the most difficult and lonely jobs in filmmaking. Almost always arriving at the end of the editing stage, and typically the most expendable element of the mixture, he or she has to fashion music appropriate to the mood and, hopefully, serve as a nice commentary for the on-screen goings-on.

AMPAS musicians tend to have their favorites, however. This is notoriously one of the most insular branches (though it has warmed up slightly in recent years). It also tends to award music that features prominently in the films. Subtle scores rarely find a home here.

A cardinal rule of this category is “never bet against John Williams.” The 45-time nominee has been recognized for all but two eligible years since 1976! Having been ineligible for two consecutive years now, Williams would seem a good bet this year for “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” The music was notable and he was nominated for all the predecessors in the series. That having been said, for some reason I’m still not convinced of this. Perhaps that’s because of the strength of other contenders.

Thomas Newman is another favorite – an eight-time nominee — though he is still awaiting this first statuette. He could very well double-dip this year with “Revolutionary Road” and “WALL-E.” The former seems like it could be a big player this year, while music was absolutely pivotal in the latter. Newman was a double nominee for “Little Women” and “The Shawshank Redemption.” (Newman is also credited as a songwriter on “Down to Earth” from “WALL-E,” so he could even be up thrice this year!)

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November 20, 2008
TECH SUPPORT: Best Makeup — Volume One

“Norbit.” “Click.” “The Time Machine.” “Life.” What do all of these dreadful films have in common? They are Oscar nominees because of the category of Best Makeup!

I will give this branch kudos for often willing to think outside the box but they still manage to be quite bizarre in their choice of nominees more often than not.

All things considered, it’s is a difficult category to predict. While the three nominees are chosen from seven pre-announced finalists, the “bake-off” to seven often has shockers in store. Films that would appear slam-dunks are ignored while movies no one was considering end up short-listed.

All that said, I’m still going to do my best to handicap it!

One film that would logically seem to be leading for a nod is David Fincher’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” As I have said before, I suspect this film could be headed to across-the-board nominations in the tech categories. Aging both Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett over 80 years (albeit it different directions) will be enormously visual and integral to the plot. My only concern would be if there is use of visual effects to “brush up” the makeup work. This branch does not like having their territory intruded upon by CGI.

Fincher’s movie is no lock. Nothing ever can be in this category. But I do believe it is out in front by a significant margin at this point, especially with veteran Greg Cannom in charge. Beyond that, I have no idea.

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November 13, 2008
TECH SUPPORT: Best Film Editing — Volume One

No matter how good the storyline, plot, acting, photography and other elements of a film may be, any poorly edited film will be difficult to watch, understand and enjoy. An editor has the task of not only finding the appropriate length of a film but also putting together scenes so they flow coherently, both visually and story-wise.

This is a category where I often feel “most” editing is confused with “best.” I wholeheartedly agree that it is challenging to coherently put together a film with lots of action, musical scenes or a non-linear narrative – the sorts of films typically nominated in this category. Though I personally feel that often the most accomplished editing can be seen in the relaxed creation of appropriate pace and tone, stealth editing that goes unnoticed.

This is also, happily, not a field that tends to bring back past nominees at the expense of newbies. Few working editors have more than four career nominations and at least two to three newcomers seem to be nominated every year.

Historically, this category has had an incredible crossover with Best Picture. Though in recent years, that has changed, the last three years having had only a 2/5 crossover with the big category. Last year’s winner, “The Bourne Ultimatum,” is a very rare example of a winner that was not even nominated for Best Picture.

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November 6, 2008
TECH SUPPORT: Best Sound Editing — Volume One

Swoosh. Bang. Grunt. Clink. Crash.

These sorts of sounds can add a lot to a film’s mood and plot even though they are not recorded during filming and have to be created and mixed in later on.

The individuals who create these effects are rewarded for their efforts in the category of Best Sound Editing. The category used to be called Best Sound Effects Editing, which, in my opinion, is a better name. Supervising sound editors and their teams are generally the individuals rewarded here.

This category used to only have three nominees but was expanded to five two years ago. This makes the category somewhat more difficult to predict, though there are five films this year that really strike me as frontrunners.

Ever since “Monsters, Inc.” scored here in 2001, animated films, particularly those of Pixar, have fared very well. I’d be very surprised if Andrew Stanton’s “WALL-E” failed to continue that trend. Sound effects are key to any animated film so many of the sounds have to be created. There is nothing to be captured while filming because, well…there is no filming! For Stanton’s effort in particular, the sound effects were especially pivotal given the minimal dialogue.

Jon Favreau’s “Iron Man” was another summer film where the sound effects were crucial to the film. The explosions, clanks of armour and numerous experiments of Downey all required sound manifestation. A huge hit and critically respected, the film in really depended on its sound editing and it flowed perfectly into the visual sights. I’d be quite surprised if it didn’t get nominated here.

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October 30, 2008
TECH SUPPORT: Best Art Direction — Volume One

The Academy Award for Best Art Direction is somewhat of an odd category in that the art director does not actually receive a nomination or statuette. Rather, the award is given to two individuals with unique roles in the crafting of a film’s sets. The production designer heads up the entire art department, specifically in charge of set creation and design. The award also recognizes the set decorator, responsible for filling in the sets with details and dressing to bring them to life.

Much like he costume designers, this branch tends to favor period and fantasy work, surely because such sets naturally draw attention to themselves. It does tend, however, to be more kind to fantasy than the branch’s costume designing colleagues. It also usually prefers grandiose work and large-scale set pieces.

Just as I believe is the case in Best Costume Design, Catherine Martin might be leading the way for “Australia” here this year. Martin, who won this category for “Moulin Rouge!” in 2001 and was also nominated for “William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet” five years earlier, will have the opportunity to create the interiors – and exteriors – of a rugged Australian outback filled with hubby Baz Lurhmann’s distinct vision.

Donald Graham Burt has fashioned numerous contemporary films, or films set in the relatively recent past, in his career to date. With “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” he has the opportunity to visually wow us through eight decades of 20th century. The film, at the least, should be visually spectacular so I suspect Burt is looking extremely good for a nomination.

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October 23, 2008