We celebrate the movies at this time of year, and in the wild rush to praise directors and actors for all that nifty directing and acting they did over the last 365 days, we all tend to forget that cinema is about more than just two sets of people. Just read Twitter. Who’s naming anyone other than auteurs and stars? How many times has Steven Spielberg’s name come up? How many times has Janusz Kamiński’s? The disparity is as noticeable as a sinkhole swallowing Florida homes two at a time.
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Today, we honor the cinematographers, the people who make cinema possible, who highlight those stars and carry out those directors’ visions, and in 2021, cinematographers shot a gamut of movies worth praising: Torn-from-the-headlines Twitter feed true crime tales that are stranger than fiction, unorthodox biopics made all the better by their unorthodoxy, stories of haunted pasts catching up to their careless presents, glossy sci-fi colossi, heady Welsh mythology, and of course the one where the protagonist makes whoopee with a car. Sure, give filmmakers the credit for planning their shot selections. Give cinematographers more for making it happen. Here’s our list, and in no particular order.
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“Procession”
Cinematography is arguably more integral to the success of Robert Greene’s films than most other documentarians’; whether in “Kate Plays Christine,” “Bisbee ‘17,” or his latest, the Catholic Church abuse picture “Procession,” his work integrates reenactment into investigation, seamlessly blending fact with fiction. Robert Kolodny’s participation in “Procession” is essential for bridging the divide between what’s real and what’s interpreted, and the burden is on him to respect victims’ stories in both modes. He knows when to stay close, when to keep his distance, and most importantly when and how to find closure in any given shot. For a film about grown men confronting their childhood trauma as victims of sexual assault, couched in the impenetrable wall of silence afforded their violators (priests) by the violators’ employers (the church), “Procession” is remarkably gentle, tender, and even funny. Much of that comes down to Kolodny exercising autonomy over his camera and finding grace where it’s least expected, and humor where it’s most needed. – Andrew Crump
“Spencer”
One surprising and semi-popular reaction to Claire Mathon’s work on Pablo Larrain’s Princess Diana movie, “Spencer,” is comparison to horror cinema. Upfront: “Spencer” is not a horror movie. It has ghosts. That’s about it. The film is easily described as “haunting,” though it’s more correct to call it “haunted.” Mathon’s aesthetic is certainly eerie. Each scene stirs the unnerving sense that Diana is watched by unkind eyes at every moment, even when she’s alone or when she’s in good company – say, with her royal dresser – but there is a difference between “horror” and “psychological paranoia.” “Spencer” is the latter, a deeply unsettled movie where suspicion and breathless caution are oxygen. Larrain and Mathon create a suffocating space around Kristen Stewart, Diana herself; there’s room for her to stretch her legs but she’s still hemmed in by Mathon’s visuals. Claustrophobia is ground into Stewart’s performance as a consequence; that claustrophobia enhances the suffocation, which in term enhances the claustrophobia in a feedback loop of unbearable repression. Amazing that one can hold their camera so freely and yet make the film they’re shooting feel so confined. – AC
“The Hand of God”
Even a middle-class slice-of-life film deserves to look like a million bucks, but of course a million bucks in Paolo Sorrentino’s hands tends to look like a few million more. Daria D’Antonio, taking over for Sorrentino’s longtime DP Luca Bigazzi, is responsible for “The Hand of God’s” unfailing refinement. A film ostensibly about the existential concerns of a young Neapolitan (Filippo Scotti) nearing the end of his salad days and staring adulthood in the face, “The Hand of God” takes a few steps down on the ladders of class and society Sorrentino usually hangs on, whether in “Loro,” “The Great Beauty,” or frankly anything he’s made before. But D’Antonio mines depth in her photography that belies its stripped-down settings. She honors them, really: A normal life, a life lived outside the exclusive, forbidding boundaries of excessive wealth and privilege, can be captured with the same elegance, the same exacting care that cinema generally affords to opulent characters living equally as opulent lifestyles. This is Sorrentino’s richest movie. D’Antonio deserves her due credit for that. – AC
“This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection”
Pierre de Villiers, Mosotho filmmaker Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese’s cinematographer on his latest narrative feature, “This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection,” uses stillness as his aesthetic. “This is Not a Burial” stays static. When making movies in a region as lovely as this, Lesotho, there’s arguably not a lot a DP needs to do other than find the shot, set up their camera, and start rolling. (Even more arguably: This is the soul of all good cinematography.) But de Villiers’ calm sensibility adds layers to Mosese’s story that enhance the setting’s natural beauty. “This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection” unfolds over a village built on the bones of the dead, and the ancestors of the dead, and their ancestors’ ancestors; it’s a land defined by suffering and grief. The less that de Villiers looks away, the more that we’re obligated to acknowledge death – of a way of life, of a whole goddamn geographical region, and of countless unfortunates interred beneath the earth Mosese’s characters walk on. – AC
“C’mon C’mon”
Robbie Ryan might be on par with Mike Mills as a storyteller. If Mills’ “C’mon C’mon” isn’t all that concerned with plot, in which a radio journalist agrees to look after his sister’s nine-year-old son while she handles her husband’s mental health issues, Ryan finds his way through the screenplay’s overabundance of story in satiny black-and-white palette; just like a handful of other 2021 releases, “C’mon C’mon” wants nothing to do with color, and unlike those movies understands the effect that decision has on a movie, and why it’s worth making that decision at all. “C’mon C’mon” is stuck on the past but fears the future. It’s compelled by human intimacy but couches that intimacy in cities so large that we can’t help but be reminded of how small we are by comparison. The film is made up of personal testimonies, mostly from kids we meet and bid farewell within a minute of introduction; Ryan’s cinematography makes them part of the movie’s lovely patchwork. – AC