Festivals, Screenings and Awards

A 65mm film camera used by Quentin Tarantino on his last film proudly lords over the Panavision stand at the Camerimage festival… An anachronistic sight in a world where digital cinematography is taking over… Still waiting for the release of its new wide-format digital camera, Panavision is showing off its long experience in cinematography this year, and of course, its now-legendary range of lenses…

In a filmed interview, cinematographer Sturla Brandth Grøvlen, DFF, discusses his work on the film Hrútar (Rams), by Grímur Hákonarson, presented in Camerimage’s Main Competition.

Jean-Marie Dreujou, AFC, will participate in this year’s Camerimage festival as a member of the jury. He will also be the only French – and AFC – representative in the international competition for the Golden Frog with Wolf Totem, a film by Jean-Jacques Annaud. This interview was conducted with him just before he left for Poland. (FR)

Join Arri seminars and workshops at the 2015 Camerimage International Film Festival of the Art of Cinematography, and don’t hesitate to visit their booth at Camerimage Market in Opera Nova!

• 13:15 Ladygrey, a film by Alain Choquart, cinematography by Nigel Bluck, screening at the Multikino Room 6
• 17:00 Closing Ceremony, Opéra Grand Nova Theatre
• 18:15 The Magician, a film by Ingmar Bergman - Gunnar Fisches Retrospective, screening at the Multikino Room 10.

Eden, screened out of competition at Camerimage 2014, is one of the first cinematographic attempts at capturing the “rave party” scene and the birth of the French Touch musical movement in the 1990s and its ensuing international success. This conversation with Denis Lenoir, AFC, ASC, focuses on this sociologically very “French” biopic whose main character was mostly inspired by director Mia Hansen-Løve’s own brother. (FR)

During the closing ceremony of the 63^rd annual San Sebastián Film Festival, which took place on Saturday, 26 September 2015, the jury, presided by Scandinavian actress Paprika Steen, awarded the Golden Conch award for Best Film to Sparrows, directed by Rúnar Rúnarsson, cinematography by Sophia Olsson. The Silver Conch award for Best Director was awarded to Joachim Lafosse for his film Les Chevaliers blancs (The White Knights), cinematography by Jean-François Hensgens, AFC, SBC. The Jury’s Prize for Best Cinematography went to Manuel Dacosse, SBC, for his work on Evolution, by Lucile Harzihalilovich.

Because Volker Schlöndorff’s Diplomacy, cinematography by Michel Amathieu, was recently selected to compete in the “European Panorama” section of the 22^nd Camerimage Festival, we are publishing below an interview in which the director of photography discusses his work on the film, which was released in cinemas on 5 March 2014.

During the traditional presentation of the program for the coming season at the Cinémathèque Française on Thursday, 25 June 2015, Serge Toubiana detailed the long list of events, exhibitions, retrospective-commemorations and other activities that will highlight many great figures of the cinema whose films are often shown on the screens of this venerable institution.

In February, the Cinémathèque Française launched its online illustrated catalogue of cinema equipment held by Cinémathèque Française and the Centre national du cinéma et de l’image animée (CNC).

During the 20^th annual Prix Lumière awards, whose awards ceremony took place on Monday, 2 February 2015 in the Espace Pierre Cardin in Paris, the film Timbuktu, by Abderrahmane Sissako, cinematography by Sofiane El Fani, won the awards for best film and for best director. Cinematographer Rémy Chevrin, AFC, was awarded the CST’s Special Award for A la vie, by Jean-Jacques Zilberman.

Organized by the “Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences,” the 87^th award dinner for the Scientific and Technical Academy Awards was held on Saturday, 7 February 2015 at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills (California). In total, twenty-one awards were given out to fifty-eight different personalities from the cinema industry. Leica and Sony, associate mmbers of the AFC, were amongst those recognized.

During the closing ceremony of the 22^nd Camerimage Festival, which took place on Saturday, 22 December 2014 at the Auditorium of the Opera Nova of Bygdoszcz (Poland), the international jury awarded the Golden Frog to the film Leviathan, by Andrey Zvyagintsev, cinematography by Mikhail Krichman, RGC. The award for Best 3D Fiction Film was awarded to The Young and Prodigious T.S. Spivet, by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, cinematography by Thomas Hardmeier, AFC.

After working on a gangster movie written by Nick Cave, a biblical movie based on a story by Oscar Wilde, and a spy movie based on a story by John le Carré, Benoît Delhomme, AFC, just filmed the biopic dedicated to the life of Stephen Hawking and his romance with his first wife, Jane. A film by James Marsh, a British director of documentaries who received an Oscar in 2007 for Man on Wire. (F.R.)

Both of the last two productions that Steven Poster participated in were filmed in very different conditions. They are both about to be released in the United States. The first is Amityville: the Awakening, by Franck Khalfoun, the twelfth film of the series to be dedicated to America’s most famous haunted house. A horror film in the most pure tradition of the genre, alternating interiors and exteriors, with most of it shot at nighttime, of course.

Looking back at the beginnings of his career and his education, Phedon Papamichael admits that he didn’t attend a cinema school. “I was originally a photographer, and I learned to make movies on the job, by filming lots of short films using the Éclair 16 camera that I owned at the time.” Bit by bit, he went from short films to feature-length films under the guidance of Roger Corman of Concorde Pictures, for whom, beginning in 1989, he signed off on a number of low-budget B series films produced in a fortnight. At that time, he began to work with a number of his future colleagues, Raphel Sanchez, who was a key grip and later became a gaffer, Wally Pfister, who is one of his sparks, and Janusz Kaminski, who was also working as a gaffer at that time.

In a filmed interview, cinematographer Michael Seresin, BSC, discusses his philosophy and his passion for lighting, he mentions the advantages of Cameraimage’s diversity, continues with his experiences on shooting a film in digital. He misses film…, the most important thing is to tell a story.

In a filmed interview, cinematographer Nancy Schreiber discusses her experience at Cameraimage, her concerns regarding the increased accessibility of the profession and the loss of craftsmanship that this has engendered. She ends the interview with her fears regarding the loss of control over the integrity of the image from its production to the final version.