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MOTION PICTURE • CINEMATOGRAPHY • DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY
In a world of sequels, prequels and, most success- fully during this past year, ‘threequels’, the film franchise is king. The latest to lay down its considerable marker for the forseeable future is THE GOLDEN COMPASS, first in a hoped for trio of movies based on Philip Pullman’s bestselling trilogy His Dark Materials. Our Cover Story
naturally centres on the biggest British film of the year, and possibly of all time, which initiates 12-year-old orphan Lyra Belacqua (newcomer Dakota Blue Richards) on a dangerous quest made even more perilous by the machinations of beautiful-but-evil Mrs Coulter, played by Nicole Kidman. Henry Braham BSC guides us round the making of this megadollar epic set in a parallel
universe to our own.
There are more views from Behind The Camera by
a pair of cinematographers at very different stages of their respective careers. David Odd BSC has over the past 15 years become one of the most respected and pro- lific cameramen working in television. Five new drama productions in just this past 12 months ably demonstrate his skill and versatility – THE MAN WHO LOST HIS HEAD, HALF-BROKEN THINGS, MY BOY JACK, FILTH: THE MARY WHITEHOUSE STORY and, most recently, HE KILLS COPPERS. Schooled in News and Documentary in the heyday of Granada TV, Manchester-born Odd, who reveals the secret of “the Magic Stop”, disarmingly believes he has the “luckiest” job in the world. Born in Hungary but raised since the age of 10 in the UK, Balazs Bolygo has been building up a considerable CV in shorts and drama, notably MISTRESSES, a new BBC series with Sarah Parish and Sharon Small, which will be aired next year.
We also get a view from the lens in two First Person focuses. Peter Ellmore, whose work includes commer- cials, music promos and a couple of features, talks about his latest short TREE, co-starring Kate Winslet’s younger sister Beth, which was recently an entry at the annual Encounters Festival in Bristol. Ciro Candia, also experi- enced across the board, explains the challenge of making his latest music video OFELIA, based on The Earlies’ ‘Bad Is As Bad Does’, and a new short, DANCE FOR ETERNITY,
a two-hander filmed on the North Cornwall coast.
THE MAGAZINE • ISSUE 40 • AUTUMN 2007
We journey into the recent past for two Making Of reports. Though punctuated by flashbacks to a Bangladeshi childhood, BRICK LANE, lit by Robbie Ryan for director Sarah Gavron, is principally set in 2001 before and after the events of 9/11. Based on Monica Ali’s bestseller, one of the challenges was, says Ryan, to find some beauty in the contrast between heroine Nazneen’s idyllic past and her grim present in an arranged marriage. Further back to December 1980
for Andrew Piddington’s THE KILLING OF JOHN LENNON, a recreation, filmed by Roger Eaton across four years, on actual locations of one of the most notorious assassinations in history. “I was nobody”, deeply troubled Mark David Chapman said later, “until I killed the biggest somebody on Earth.”
Recreating a much more distant past is BBC One’s new episodic adaptation of Dickens’ much-loved Victorian classic OLIVER TWIST, which is getting a new twist with the decision to swap the rooftops of the original novel for a darker, subterranean world of catacombs and sewers. Directed by Coky Giedroyc and lit by Matt Gray, the all-star cast includes
Timothy Spall as Fagin, Sophie Okonedo as Nancy, newcomer William Miller as Oliver and Edward Fox as Mr Brownlow. To the immediate future for a rather different, albeit also dark-hued, tale, THE LAST ENEMY, a BBC One five-parter for next year, a terrifying new take on our so-called surveillance society. DP Nigel Willoughby recalls the shoot in London and Romania.
All this plus Tom Tagholm’s TCM award-winning short A BOUT DE TRUFFE, Adam Frisch filming a new Prince video, the making of ITV’s new dram-com SOLD, The Shammasian Brothers’ latest short, ROMANS 12:20, and sneak previews of FREEBIRD and MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS as well as a round-up of the latest Fujifilm news in Festivals & Events. ■
MILLIE MORROW MANAGING EDITOR www.fujifilm.co.uk/motion
BOB QUINN • SIMON BAXTER • YUJI IGARASHI • DAVID HONEY