One Category at a Time: Cinematography

Many a critic agree that cinematography is experiencing a new golden age, and this year's Oscar lineup is strangely both indicative, and yet not indicative of that truth. One the one hand, the enormous spectrum of tools and technologies lensers have these days to craft breathtaking images is well represented in the potpourri of formats nominated for Best Cinematography, ranging from 16mm to 70mm celluloid to digital and even thermal imaging.

But on the other hand, the equally wide array of fresh and invigorating voices behind the cameras (think Masanobu Takeyanagi, Maryse Alberti, Hoyte van Hoytema, etc.) remains steadfastly locked out of this branch's insular preferences. Perhaps that's why this was one of two categories I anticipated with perfect accuracy pre-nominations; They have their favourites. All five men have been nominated before, three of them have won before, two of those three have won multiple times, and one of them is on the verge of making Oscar history.

Early Oscar Predictions: Cinematography

The thespians aren't the only ones who have to “perform” on set. Camera operators and directors of photography have their own marks to hit and creative decisions to make, working closely alongside the director to capture images that will compose the final product. Since I'm so crazy about cinematography in general, I determined that this category needed its own post.

One Category at a Time: Cinematography

With only 24 days until the Oscars, it's time to run down the categories and make some official predictions. I'll start off with some of the categories I consider fairly settled, and among them is Best Cinematography.

My Award nominations: Cinematography

This is perennially my favourite category, and as it is every year, there was an abundance of excellent work to choose from. The Academy and I match up 3/5 this year. Find out which three they are, and what other two films I included as having the Best Cinematography of 2012 after the cut (complete with my fav shot from each nominee):

Sunday Top Ten: Oscar noms that'll make me smile

Poles officially closed on Friday for Academy Award nominations. While the accountants at Price Waterhouse Coopers crunch the numbers, we're left to ponder and anticipate. My predictions are likely to shift and slide during the next few days. What will stay consistent are my personal rooting interests. There are certain contenders in several categories who feel like they're on the cusp of a nomination -- contenders who I'd love to see make good on that possibility -- but who could just as easily miss the cut. Here you go, Academy; you have ten chances to make me smile on Thursday morning.

Review - Django Unchained

In Quentin Tarantino's latest revenge fantasy Django Unchained, Jamie Foxx plays the titular slave who is freed from bondage by the eccentric Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) to become his partner in bounty hunting. As much as Django likes his new job of “killing white folks for money”, his bigger yen is to rescue his wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) from the plantation where she serves the childlike but intangibly dangerous Calvin Candi (Leonardo DiCaprio).

While a great deal of Django Unchained is very enjoyable, it is self-indulgent to a fault. I understand that criticizing a Tarantino film for being indulgent is like criticizing the sky for being blue, but the excesses of this movie really makes you feel the length of it. At 165 minutes, it's a picture as badly in need of a trim as our unshackled, unshaven ex-slave is at the beginning of it.

One Category at a Time: Cinematography

If you're no stranger to the blog you probably already know that Best Cinematography is always my favourite category at the Oscars. Not only because of my personal fascination with the craft, but because it always proves so devilishly tricky to predict. It's an area where the precursors tend to be deceptively offtrack, and ideologies on how the whole Academy votes shift from year to year. This year's slate (the only one I correctly predicted 5/5) houses five contenders which are equally plausible winners for completely different reasons. My rationales, accompanied by my favourite shot from each nominee, are outlined after the cut.

Review - Hugo

A lonely orphan who winds the clocks from within the walls of a Parisian train station attempts to decipher the mystery of a mechanical man in Hugo, Martin Scorsese's courageous foray into 3D family entertainment.

Hugo Cabret (Asa Butterfield), for that is his name, used to love fixing things with his clockmaker father before his untimely death. A rusty old automaton designed to write on paper is all he has to member his dad, and repairing the robot has become a project on which the boy has become dependent. He often pilfers parts from a sad old toymaker, Papa George (Ben Kingsley), who seems somehow connected to the machine, but reluctant to divulge. Hugo finds an ally in the toymaker's goddaughter (Chloe Moretz), an avid reader who yearns for adventure beyond her leather-bound tomes. Together, they attempt to discover the secret concealed within the automaton's intricate clockwork and seek a window into Papa George's past.

One Category at a Time: Best Cinematography

As soon as the Tree of Life trailer hit the Internet, Oscar pundits began proposing that this year's Best Cinematography award may be Emmanuel Lubezki's to lose. The shots featured in the trailer are indeed gorgeous - just the sort of thing they usually go for in this category. Lubezki should already have an Oscar for Children of Men. Can the four-time nominee finally collect his due? Or are we heading for a repeat of this past year's Best Cinematography disaster?

David Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo remains a question mark in many categories. His last two films have been nominated for their cinematography, but they were Academy-friendly Best Picture contenders. If The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo can manage to impress AMPAS on the same level as The Curious Case of Benjamin Button or The Social Network, Jeff Cronenweth may see his second nomination in as many years.

Stephan Goldblatt will bring life to the South of the 1960s in The Help. He's been nominated before for shooting a similar time and place in The Prince of Tides, and hopefully will be able to bring the same magic to this project. But The Help doesn't strike me as a typical nominee in this field (although it's hard to judge without having seen any footage). It'll probably need serious Best Picture heat to make it in here.

I like to assume that the always extraordinary two-time winner Robert Richardson only just missed a nomination this past year for his awesome work on Shutter Island, but he was probably further down the list due to the film's unpopularity. Perhaps Martin Scorsese's Hugo Cabret will be more to the Academy's liking. It'll surely have lots of wonderful sets and costumes to show off. Being one of the top DPs in the business with seven nods to his name, Richardson must always be considered a contender.

Another two-time winner, Janusz Kaminski, has a strong bid this year courtesy of Steven Spielberg's War Horse. Both of Kaminski's Oscars came for shooting Spielberg war pictures (Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan). Come to think of it, all of Spielberg's Oscars came for those two movies as well. I'd say that's a pretty successful collaboration, and good reason to predict Kaminski will pick up his fifth career nomination.

Predicted five:
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Help
Hugo Cabret
The Tree of Life
War Horse

Also consider: Coriolanus, Cowboys and Aliens, Harry Potter 7, Moneyball, Super 8, Water for Elephants.

My Award nominations: Cinematography

Best Cinematography:

The American (Martin Ruhe):

Each frame is composed very much with a photographer's eye. This is one of the most effectively shot films of the year, placing emphasis on soft lighting and delicate focus work to ease us into a state of paranoia.

Biutiful (Rodrigo Prieto):

The underworld of Barcelona comes to life with texture and vibrancy through Prieto's lens, creating a tangible sense of place, but without sacrificing the decidedly depressing mood of the film.

Black Swan (Matthew Lebatique):

Lots of fun with mirrors and reflections in this film, all used to evoke relevant themes such as the duality of human nature and as a metaphor for the destructive capability one's own self-image. Dazzling dance sequences!

Fish Tank (Robbie Ryan):

The gritty composition makes effective use of apparatuses of entrapment (ie: bars and fences) to communicate Mia's feelings of imprisonment. The unsettled hand-held movement fits the tone of the film to a tee.

Shutter Island (Robert Richardson):

Richardson's cinematography is, as always, incredible. The screen is filled with arresting images, all of them displaying the man's mastery of composition, movement, colour, and lighting.

Just missed: Dogtooth, Inception, True Grit, The Way Back

ASC nominees!

The American Society of Cinematographers have chosen

Black Swan (Matthew Libatique)
Inception (Wally Pfister)
The King’s Speech (Danny Cohen)
The Social Network (Jeff Cronenweth)
True Grit (Roger Deakins)

Good for Cohen and Cronenweth, who did fine jobs on their respective films, but I still don`t think I'd count out Robert Richardson of the Oscar lineup just yet. 127 Hours may be in trouble here.