Painting Cinema: An artistic expression in Cinematography
- Sagnik Das
- Jun 4, 2020
- 3 min read
Profound works of art have always influenced each other, one way or another. In 1946 Robert Siodmak transposed Edward Hopper’s painting Nighthawks into a film set in the opening sequence of his film The Killers which is based on a short story by Ernest Hemmingway. Hopper’s picture further influenced future works such as Rear Window (Alfred Hitchcock) and Paris (Wim Wenders). This article is my attempt to lionize some of the inspiring movies I've watched over the years, that I perceived as a painting itself.
Black Narcissus (1947)
Black Narcissus is a British psychological drama by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger starring Deborah Kerr and Kathleen Byron. The film won the Academy award for best production design, owing to Jack Cardiff’s cinematography. Jack Cardiff was a former painter who went on to achieve great things in film. But Cardiff didn't excel in front of the camera; he mastered the camera itself, using his painting background to perfect the art of lighting in cinema. His genius is seen in movies like Black Narcissus, where vivid surrealistic visuals create mounting suspense as the plot advances.
Red Desert (1964)
Next in the list is Michelangelo Antonioni's Red Desert. A pioneering modernist and lifelong critic of the urban civilization, Antonioni made his first color film that is the aforesaid Red Desert, with Carlo Di Palma (who would later become Woody Allen's favorite). The movie comes off as a critique of industrialization, but Antonioni believes it’s more sophisticated than that “My intention ... was to translate the poetry of the world, in which even factories can be beautiful. The line and curves of factories and their chimneys can be more beautiful than the outline of trees, which we are already too accustomed to seeing”.
Suspiria (1977)
Based on Thomas De Quincey's 1845 essay Suspiria de Profundis, this is the first movie in Dario Argento’s Three Mothers Trilogy. The three mothers are a metaphor. They are the three aspects of the dark goddess. They are Lilith, Persephone, and Hecate which are the maiden, mother, and crone respectively. The movie is a treat to the eyes with aesthetically pleasing-scenes and generous use of neon colors, which is remarkable considering it’s a horror movie!
Paul Schrader best known for the acclaimed Taxi Driver(1976), made this film which is a fictionalized account in four chapters of the life of celebrated Japanese writer Yukio Mishima.
One of the things with auteurs is that their movies entail certain personal expectations. It is one of the reasons why it’s so difficult to describe them. Wes Anderson and his favorite Robert Yoeman bring to the table another meticulously stylish and deadpan cinematic experience. With trademark Wes Anderson aesthetics, Grand Budapest Hotel is probably the most scrumptious and Wes Anderson-esque movies of them all. It bagged the Academy award for production design which is not surprising considering they used miniature models (as shown in the picture) to represent the hotel exteriors.
Thirty years after Ridley Scott’s 1982 ‘Blade Runner’, Denis Villeneuve honors the dystopian classic by giving new life to it through his visionary aesthetics and inspired use of camera techniques, staying loyal to the noir sci-fi genre. An interesting fact about this movie is that cinematographer Roger Deakins, after thirteen Oscar nominations for outstanding work in movies like Shawshank Redemption, Fargo, and No Country for Old Men finally won in 2018 for Blade Runner.
Roma (2018)
The last one in the list is Roma, a deep impactful story set in 1970s Mexico in midst of its unkempt political turmoil.”Gravity” Oscar winner Alfonso Cuarón, marks a major milestone as a filmmaker since this Spanish-language drama gave him his first cinematography credit on a feature film. Cuaron also won the academy awards for best director for this outstanding effectual movie.
If it bothers you, the movies are arranged in ascending order of their released dates.
Comments