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ISSUE 45 SUMMER 2009 

TREVOR FORREST 

ONE NIGHT IN EMERGENCY 

THE SUMMER HOUSE 

THE DESCENT PART 2 

DENIS CROSSAN BSC 

THE KID 

FISH TANK 

NATASHA BRAIER 

ONDINE 

AWAY WE GO 

KASABIAN 

TONY 

THE UNLOVED 

YEAH YEAH YEAHS 

THE SCOUTING BOOK FOR BOYS 

NANNY McPHEE AND THE BIG BANG 

SEX & DRUGS & ROCK & ROLL 

NEWS, FESTIVAL & EVENTS

C O N T E N T S 

NANNY McPHEE AND THE BIG BANG - SNEAK PREVIEW 3 

FISH TANK - GRIT AND DETERMINATION 4 

THE SCOUTING BOOK FOR BOYS - FEATURE IN FOCUS 6 

TREVOR FORREST - BEHIND THE LAUGHTER 8 

CROSSAN ON LOCATION - COMMERCIAL BREAK 11 

ONE NIGHT IN EMERGENCY - WHERE DOES IT HURT? 12 

THE KID - A CHILD OF OUR TIME 14 

SEX & DRUGS & ROCK & ROLL - THE RHYTHM STICKS 16 

ONDINE - A FISH OUT OF WATER 18 

AWAY WE GO - ON THE ROAD AGAIN 20 

THE DESCENT PART 2 - FEATURE IN FOCUS 22 

NATASHA BRAIER - THEMES OF IDENTITY 24 

THE SUMMER HOUSE - DAISY GILI’S DIRECTING DEBUT 27 

KASABIAN AND YEAH YEAH YEAHS - MUSIC PROMOS 28 

TONY - ONLY THE LONELY 30 

THE UNLOVED - SAMANTHA MORTON’S CHANNEL 4 FILM 32 

NEWS, FESTIVAL & EVENTS 35 

MANAGING EDITOR MILLIE MORROW 

DESIGN, EDITORIAL & PRODUCTION GRAFFITI EDITIONS LIMITED EDITED BY QUENTIN FALK 

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EXPOSURE © 2009 FUJIFILM UK LTD ALL RIGHTS RESERVED COVER PHOTO: COLIN FARRELL AND ALICJA BACHLEDA-CURUS IN ONDINE 

RACHEL BAKER 

MILLIE MORROW 

COLIN RICARDO 

STEVE JONES 

BOB QUINN 

SIMON BAXTER 

JERRY DEENEY 

DAVID HONEY

exposure 

ISSUE 45 SUMMER 2009 

Since making her directing debut a little over a 

decade ago, Kent-born Andrea Arnold, 48, 

has, with just four shorts and two features, 

accumulated more awards than most 

filmmakers would expect to snare in several 

lifetimes including an Oscar and three BAFTAs. 

Clearly key to her critical success has been a very 

fruitful collaboration with cinematographer Robbie 

Ryan BSC, most recently on her Cannes awardwinning 

second full-length film, Fish Tank, which 

opens in the UK in September. In a fascinating 

interview about this provocative tale of a troubled 

teenager (played by newcomer Katie Jarvis, who 

picked up her own acting award at this year’s 

Edinburgh International Film Festival), Ryan offers a 

revealing insight into his working relationship with a 

director who demands naturalism. 

Ryan, who elsewhere in this issue adds an 

interesting technical note about the filming of Tom 

Harper’s debut feature, The Scouting Book For Boys, 

is one of the busiest cameraman around having also 

just completed Patagonia, a road movie set in Wales 

and Argentina for director Marc Evans. Staying 

Behind the Camera, we meet two more talented DPs 

for our long-running series of career profiles. Hailing 

originally from Argentina, Natasha Braier, who lit 

this year’s Golden Bear winning Peruvian film The 

Milk Of Sorrow, has been on the UK beat recently 

shooting a cross-cultural comedy, The Infidel, 

scripted by David Baddiel and starring popular 

comedian Omid Djalili and former West Wing actor 

Richard Schiff. Trevor Forrest is just as peripatetic 

and his CV as cosmopolitan, featuring as it does 

work spanning India to Cuba. Like Braier, he’s also 

been involved lately in some domestic comedy 

stylings, courtesy of actor-turned-director Ben 

Miller, making his feature debut with Huge. 

A pair of even more experienced 

cinematographers give us their first-hand accounts 

of working on new projects. Chris Doyle HKSC says 

he re-discovered Irish roots working for the 

first-time with writer-director Neil Jordan on the 

romantic fantasy Ondine, starring Colin Farrell, 

much of which was shot at sea. David Higgs BSC, 

who divides his time between film and television, 

teamed up with first-time feature writer-director 

Gerard Johnson on the blackly comic, low budget, 

Tony, filmed in London and subsequently invited to 

this year’s Edinburgh International Film Festival. 

From the current surge in British-based production, 

look out in due course for a couple of intriguing new 

biopics. Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, shot by Chris 

Ross for director Mat Whitecross, tells the turbulent 

tale of the late, great Ian Dury, while The Kid, 

re-teaming Telstar’s DP Peter Wignall and helmer 

Nick Moran recreates the rough, 

tough early life of abused South 

London youngster-turnedbestselling 

author, Kevin Lewis. 

We also take a retrospective look at 

debutant director Samantha 

Morton’s acclaimed Channel 4 film, 

The Unloved, likely to be a big 

winner at awards season next year, 

and behind the scenes of BBC 

Scotland’s hospital drama One 

Night In Emergency. 

All this plus sneak previews of 

Nanny McPhee And The Big Bang 

and The Descent: Part 2, as well as reports on the 

filming of Sam Mendes’s latest film Away We Go, on 

which he collaborated for the first time with veteran 

American DP Ellen Kuras ASC, the latest music 

promo work of Norwegian cinematographer Erik 

Wilson, and The Summer House, the short directing 

debut of London Film Academy joint principal Daisy 

Gili. Not to mention a round-up of the latest Fujifilm 

news in Festivals & Events. 

JERRY DEENEY MARKETING MANAGER 

www.fujifilm.co.uk/motion 

Photo from top: 

Katie Jarvis in Fish Tank; Andy Serkis as 

Ian Dury in Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll; 

Carmen Ejogo and Maya Rudolph 

in Away We Go 

FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE THE MAGAZINE EXPOSURE 1

Designed with DI in mind 

Eterna RDI used on THE DESCENT: PART 2 

“Fujifilm RDI gives a greater colour gamut, delivering more 

saturated colours and rich detailed blacks. The image on RDI has 

more detail than other negative stocks; this crisper image keeps 

the bulk prints looking like they were struck straight from the 

original colour negative and not from dupes.” 

Asa Shoul – Digital Lab Colourist, Framestore 

Eterna RDI used on ARRILASER 

"We are delighted that the Fujifilm RDI stock has 

been designed with the ARRILASER in mind. The 

extraordinary research and work that has gone 

into developing this stock has resulted in a 

perfect integration of digital and traditional film 

technologies. Fujifilm RDI, combined with the 

ARRILASER, contributes to a DI workflow that 

delivers the best possible image quality for 

modern cinema audiences.” 

Henning Rädlein 

Head of Digital Film, ARRI Munich 

Eterna RDI used on THE GOLDEN COMPASS 

“Fujifilm RDI offers finer detail, low grain, expanded 

latitude and more accurate colour reproduction from 

digital intermediate files. A first generation print from 

Fujifilm RDI is a gorgeous thing.” 

Peter Doyle – Independent Digital Colourist 

Eterna RDI used on HUNGER 

“Fujifilm RDI has been designed specifically for ‘Digital 

Intermediate’ film recording technology, producing digital 

negatives which have less flare, less cross talk and an overall 

increase in sharpness – The result speaks for itself, a truly 

impressive image on the big screen!” 

Paul J Wright - Director of Technology, 

Dragon Digital Intermediate Ltd 

Fujifilm Motion Picture, 56 Poland Street, London W1F 7NN 

Tel: 020 3040 0400 Email: movingimage@fuji.co.uk Web: www.fujifilm.co.uk/motion

Photo main: Emma Thompson 

with Producer Lindsay Doran; 

above top to bottom: 

Director Susanna White; 

DP Mike Eley; 

Emma Thompson as 

Nanny McPhee both from the 

original Nanny McPhee 

Four years after she first cast a spell 

at the box-office, magical Nanny 

McPhee, who has a distinctly 

un-Mary Poppins-like way with 

small children, is on her way back 

in a second big screen adventure. 

Based on the ‘Nurse Matilda’ books, 

written between 1964 and 1974 by 

Christianna Brand, Nanny McPhee And 

The Big Bang has once again been 

scripted by Emma Thompson, who also 

stars in the title role and serves as 

executive producer alongside regular 

collaborator, producer Lindsay Doran. 

Joining her this time round in the 

Working Title/Universal Pictures 

production are Maggie Gyllenhaal, Rhys 

Ifans, Asa Butterfield, Dame Maggie Smith 

and Ralph Fiennes in a cameo in the film. 

In the latest instalment, Nanny 

McPhee jumps forward in time and 

IN PRODUCTION UPDATE 

SNEAK PREVIEW 

NANNY McPHEE 

AND THE BIG BANG 

appears at the door of a harried young 

mother (Gyllenhaal) who is trying to run 

the family farm while her husband is 

away at war. But once she’s arrived, 

Nanny McPhee discovers that Mrs. 

Green’s children are fighting a war of 

their own against two nasty, snobby 

cousins who have just moved in and 

refuse to leave. 

From flying motorcycles and statues 

that come to life to a tree-climbing piglet 

and a baby elephant that turns up in the 

oddest places, Nanny McPhee uses her 

magic to teach her mischievous charges 

five new lessons. 

The family comedy, shooting around 

London and at Shepperton Studios, is 

directed by BAFTA winner Susanna White 

(Bleak House), making her feature debut, 

and she’s gathered round her some of 

her regular crew including production 

FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE THE MAGAZINE EXPOSURE 3 

designer Simon Elliott and cinematographer 

Mike Eley. 

Eley (Bleak House, Touching The 

Void, He Knew He Was Right), also an 

accomplished documentarist, will be 

following in the footsteps of Henry 

Braham BSC, who also used Fujifilm on 

the first Nanny McPhee film in 2005. 

Nanny McPhee And The Big Bang, 

which will be released in Spring 2010, 

is being originated on 35mm Fujicolor 

ETERNA 250T 8553, ETERNA 250D 8563 

and ETERNA 500T 8573

FEATURE IN FOCUS 

4 EXPOSURE THE MAGAZINE FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE

GRIT AND DETERMINATION 

CANNES WINNER FISH TANK RE-UNITES ANDREA ARNOLD 

AND ROBBIE RYAN BSC FOR THE THIRD TIME 

An award winner at Cannes, 

where it was nominated for 

the Palme D’Or and won its 

director a share of the Special 

Jury Prize, Fish Tank is the 

latest film from Andrea Arnold and 

DP Robbie Ryan BSC. 

Having previously collaborated 

on the Oscar-winning short Wasp 

and Arnold’s Carl Foreman Awardwinning 

feature debut Red Road, the 

pair have developed a track record 

that is as gilded as the subject 

matter is frequently gritty. 

Fish Tank is certainly that, the 

story of 15 year old Mia (Katie Jarvis) 

whose life is changed when her 

mother (Kierston Wareing) brings 

home a new boyfriend. Before long 

Connor (Michael Fassbender) is 

taking a far from paternalistic interest 

in the pretty but volatile teenager. 

Using the Mardyke Estate in 

Essex as the backdrop to this tale of 

familial discord Ryan shot on 35mm 

ETERNA Vivid 160T, ETERNA 400T 

and Reala 500D, and was aiming for a 

very cinematic look from the outset. 

“I was looking for an estate that 

felt like an island and the Mardyke 

fitted that description,” says Ryan. 

“I loved the colours on the blocks 

there, too; colour was very 

important to me. I also loved the 

wasteland behind the estate. It was 

really overgrown and full of wild 

flowers and birds and foxes and with 

a really big sky. I wanted to film 

there but we couldn’t get permission, 

which was a massive 

disappointment.” 

This environment, so unlike the 

classic view of a film with a London 

setting, nevertheless informed 

Ryan’s lighting and camerawork. 

“I loved filming on the estates,” he 

explains, “that’s why we shot it in 

4:3 as well. It’s very suited to 

portraiture and obviously tower 

blocks fit into that frame nicely 

because they’re not very high but 

they have a sort of square format to 

them. London is so regimented and 

organised but as soon as you get 

down the A13, it gets a bit more 

rough and ready - and really 

beautiful, actually.” 

It’s no surprise that, with their 

history together, Arnold and Ryan 

have developed a bond of mutual 

trust as well as a useful shorthand 

when shooting. 

“We just had a rhythm when we 

were on set that works for the film,” 

Ryan confirms. “It’s quite organic for 

Andrea. She’s brilliant and lets you 

do what you want. She’s just got one 

rule, which is never to be ahead of 

the action visually. 

“Unfortunately, there were two 

occasions on this film where the 

camera is in a room and the actor 

walks into it. She hates that; she 

thinks that’s the worst possible 

thing and she fights to cut any of 

that out because, for her, the films 

are about honesty, reality and truth.” 

The air of naturalism that 

dictates this method also affects the 

performances of the actors, who 

were not given the full script prior to 

the start of production. 

For more established performers 

like Wareing and Fassbender, this 

necessitated an adaptation of their 

normal working processes. For 

newcomer Jarvis, an award-winner 

herself at the Edinburgh Film 

Festival, it was perhaps more 

beneficial, not least because Arnold 

also shot the film in story order. “It 

kind of dawned on me halfway 

through that it was going to be quite 

difficult from a shooting perspective,” 

Ryan chuckles, “because you 

get tired as you shoot and a lot of 

times you schedule the bigger stuff 

early on or, at least, not totally right 

at the end. 

“But if you think about it, most 

films have the most dramatic bits 

near the end. We had quite a 

dramatic end to Fish Tank and 

everybody was wrecked by the end 

of it, but it was a very interesting 

way to approach a film.” 

At least the family Arnold 

assembled behind the camera found 

life together more harmonious than 

the fictional one in front of it, but 

with the successes they have 

enjoyed together in the past there is 

no reason to think they should part 

company now. 

“Wasp was a massive success 

for me,” Ryan adds, “and because 

Andrea is always very much into 

keeping a family, she stays with the 

same production designer and the 

same editor, for example. She’s got a 

lot of trust in us and it’s fantastic 

that she really wants you on board. 

“Andrea is quite capable of 

going and getting a big script with a 

studio, but she prefers to make the 

films that she knows, and they reap 

dividends as Red Road did and as 

Fish Tank already has. “She’s still 

finding her way and the more she 

does it the more she wants to do it 

her way. The success of these films 

means she can, which is fantastic.” 

ANWAR BRETT 


THE DP VIEW 

ROBBIE RYAN BSC 

“ 

If any cameraman reads a 

script and it says ‘evening’, 

beware. What’s ‘evening’ anyway 

when you’re in an interior flat? 

We were filming right in the 

middle of summer and the script 

was written for Christmas, so there 

were a lot of night scenes in the 

winter script, but then because of 

casting or whatever, it moved to 

become a summer film instead. 

Andrea’s other thing was she 

wanted no curtains on any windows, 

so all the windows were always 

exposed. Gels didn’t work. That was 

the one time I was a bit stuck but 

there the digital intermediate 

” 

really helped us because we 

could grade it a bit more and 

darken it. 

Fish Tank, which is released in 

the UK on September 11, and was 

originated on 35mm Fujicolor 

ETERNA Vivid 160T 8543, ETERNA 

400T 8583 and Reala 500D 8592 

Photo main left: Katie Jarvis and below, 

l-r: Kierston Wareing and scenes from Fish Tank

T 

his Is England’s Thomas 

Turgoose stars alongside 

Holliday Grainger, Rafe Spall, 

Susan Lynch and Steven 

Mackintosh in the first feature 

from director Tom Harper and Skins 

writer Jack Thorne. 

The Scouting Book For Boys 

follows young David (Turgoose) who 

lives with his friend Emily (Grainger) 

on a caravan park on the Norfolk 

coast. Rocked by the news that she 

has to move away with her father, 

David helps Emily to hide out in a 

remote seaside cave. But as their 

secret becomes more complicated, 

David’s world begins to transform in 

ways he never imagined. 

Harper, 29, who previously 

directed the acclaimed shorts Cubs 

and Cherries, read the first draft of 

Thorne’s script and fell in love with 

it straight away. 

“From page one it pulled me in, 

and kept me guessing right through 

to the very end. There are surprises 

round about every corner, and the 

surprises get bigger and bigger. It’s 

essentially a love story with two 

incredibly endearing central 

characters - but then I think it turns 

into something that is darker and 

perhaps more interesting, a slightly 

unconventional thriller. 

“I hope that it’s a British film 

that does things slightly differently, 

and therefore it’s unlike a lot of the 

films that are currently around in the 

marketplace. It has a degree of 

magic and of beauty to it that is 

appealing, at the same time as 

having a really strong emotional 

centre that is ultimately 

heartbreaking. Although the story is 

set in a world that in one sense 

could be really bleak, it’s not, 

because even though some of the 

characters are a bit rubbish, or crap, 

or do bad things, there’s always a 

human quality and a human warmth 

to them that I find really appealing, 

and that keeps me interested.” 


“WE DID STOCK TESTS FOR THE INTERIOR 

CAVE [BUILT IN A STUDIO] AND WE ENDED UP 

MIXING ETERNA 250D FOR DAYTIME INTERIORS 

AND NIGHT FIRELIGHT SCENES FOR AN EXTRA 

RICH LOOK, THEN WE USED 

ETERNA 400T FOR MOONLIGHT SCENES.” 

DP VIEW 

THE 

ROBBIE RYAN BSC 

“ 

We did stock tests for the 

interior cave [built in a studio] 

and we ended up mixing 

ETERNA 250D for daytime interiors 

and night firelight scenes for an 

extra rich look, then we used 

ETERNA 400T for moonlight scenes. 

There was a big pool of water 

that David (Turgoose) had to crawl 

through to get into the main cave 

so I used that as a reflective source 

to create light refractions on the 

cave walls. 

Also the tricky bit was matching 

the exterior entrance of the cave in 

Hunstanton beach in Norfolk with the 

interior cave in the studio. This was a 

mix of overexposure for exterior light 

” 

and good production design on 

the cave textures. I hope you 

don’t notice the difference! 

The Scouting Book For Boys 

was originated on Fujicolor 

35mm ETERNA Vivid 160T 8543, 

ETERNA 400T 8583, Super-F 125T 

8532, and Super-F 250D 8562 

THE SCOUTIN 


G BOOK FOR BOYS 

Photos main: Thomas Turgoose and Steven Mackintosh in a scene from The Scouting Book For Boys; 

left: Holliday Grainger and Thomas Turgoose; on location; Turgoose and Rafe Spall 


BEHIND THE CAMERA 

BEHIND THE 

LAUGHTER 

AN INTERVIEW WITH 


When your formative childhood memories are of 

life on the West Atlantic Island of Grand Bahama, 

you might expect everything else to be a 

disappointment, but Trevor Forrest doesn’t see it 

that way. Moving from Manchester to live this 

Caribbean idyll until the start of his teenage years, he still 

recalls the excitement with which trips home were met. 

“We’d come back for a holiday once every two years,” 

he explains, “generally around my birthday in November 

so obviously it was grey skies and rain. But it was the 

most fun I ever had as a kid, going to Manchester and 

Norfolk, running around in the snow and rain. It was so 

different to a place that was always sunny. Its something 

I have always been excited by, the way extreme and 

different weather and environment effect people ” 

Interesting and, as it turns out, quite useful in the 

career path he has chosen for himself. Having got his first 

lighting job in 2003, Forrest has wasted no time in 

broadening his experience shooting commercials and five 

features, the latest of which is entitled Huge. 

Photo main: Trevor Forrest on set 

➤ 



➤ 

It marks the directorial debut of 

comedy genius and star Ben Miller 

and was shot in a dizzying 18 days in 

and around London using 35mm 

ETERNA 400T stock. 

“Huge is about the love affair of 

a double act and its about comedy,” 

Forrest explains, “As a film about 

comedy, Jez, Simon and Ben had 

created this world in the script, 

where you feel like you’ve gone back 

10 or 15 years - or it could be 10 

minutes. It has a real timelessness to 

it all, I think. 

“What’s really lovely about the 

ETERNA 400T is its low contrast 

character provided us with the retro 

and dreamlike world that our 

comedians live in.” 

“It has an enormous extensive 

range; we were using it for its low 

contrast and pastel look, which in 

turn is quite dreamy. 

“I went on a hunch right from 

the beginning, sometimes you have 

three or four stocks and use all of 

them, but this one has become 

about the one stock really.” 

Trevor Forrest’s next lighting 

job was a Chivas Regal commercial 

in Los Angeles shot in a more 

leisurely 10 days. He takes these 

contrasting pressures in his stride. 

Forrest came into the business 

via art school and the world of stills 

photography, and is quick to 

acknowledge the practical 

encouragement that enabled his 

career to progress so swiftly. 

“I was clapper loading and 

focus pulling with two really cool 

people, Andrew Douglas and Klaus 

Obermeyer, who gave me a lot of 

opportunities to shoot other stuff on 

set,” he says. “They were the sort of 

people who would allow you to set 

up shots in their absence. I suppose 


“WHAT’S REALLY LOVELY ABOUT THE ETERNA 400T IS ITS LOW CONTRAST CHARACTER 

WHICH PROVIDED US WITH THE RETRO AND DREAMLIKE WORLD THAT OUR COMEDIANS LIVE IN.” 

that and a being photographer 

helped me become the head of 

department as swiftly as I have.” 

A major break came in 2003, 

when Forrest gained his first 

experience shooting on 35mm stock 

on a series of high profile 

commercials for Indian 

telecommunications and Tourism. 

“John Mathieson introduced me 

to a director he used to work with, 

Bharat Bala, who was doing 

commercials for Reliance, the 

biggest Telecommunications 

Company in India. They were laying 

fibre optic cable the length and 

breadth of India so we travelled 

through the country telling the story 

of their progress. 

“I shot so much in India and 

became so comfortable with the 

crews, speaking to them in bits of 

Hindi. Then Angus Hudson gave me 

the opportunity to shoot second 

unit on a film he was shooting, Hari 

Om, in Rajasthan. I got my team back 

together and off we went.” 

To hear him describe it now it 

all seems so simple, as feature work 

of his own has duly followed. His 

debut was Someone Else in 2006, the 

romance Bombil And Beatrice came a 

year later, followed by the school set 

horror flick Tormented, (distributed 

by Warner Brothers across 250 

screens on Fujifilm print stock after 

shooting on the RED Camera), and 

Cuban escape story Una Noche. 

“I got Someone Else largely 

through my stills photography,” he 

adds. “I showed Col Spector 25 stills 

that I thought were applicable to the 

look of the film. We shot it in a very 

static way, the camera tracks back 

but it holds almost the same still 

frame. “There’s a few zoom shots 

but it’s a film that’s almost entirely 

made up of very objective and photographic 

images. Whenever I’ve 

gone back to my stills I’ve thought 

‘that’s a great still, I just need it to 

move now.’ 

“Once I came out of the subway 

in winter in New York. I looked 

across to see to this image of a blind 

man wandering through the mist, I’m 

always collecting these moments 

and trying to plug them back into 

the films that I get the opportunity 

to shoot. 

“Striving all the time to create 

moments that serve the story. 

Travel and recording the life you see 

is such an amazing resource. I don’t 

think I will ever lose that excitement 

when you have captured a split second 

that can make people feel 

strongly about the content. It’s still a 

bit magic to me. 

“Inspiration, even now, is often 

sought in the world of stills 

photography. From the World’s 

press photographers to the pics that 

you find folded up in old book. They 

are great reminders and stimulators 

of the imagination and how you can 

approach a scene or film. 

“A lot of the time the scripts 

that I’ve done have dictated the 

movement of the camera through 

the story. Tormented was a teenage 

horror film, and in addition to 

wanting to tell a horror film story we 

wanted it to be personal, we wanted 

you to care about those people. 

“There are a couple of 

photographers, Bill Henson and 

Todd Hido who do very personal 

work. With Henson you feel you are 

viewing intimate moments of the 

subject’s private life, and with Hido 

you feel you are seeing his most private 

thoughts through his eyes and 

in turn, the camera. All good clues to 

Photos left to right: scenes from Tormented; Director Ben Miller (centre) on the set of Huge at work with Trevor Forrest 

(photos courtesy Adam Lawrence) 

10 EXPOSURE THE MAGAZINE FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE 

projecting intimacy into a teenage 

horror film. “When I shot Bombil And 

Beatrice, this was my first solo step 

into World cinema, which is fast becoming 

a really important part of my 

work and interest. An interest only 

made more prominent by Una 

Noche, which I shot in Havana. It 

makes me think what if we treated 

London as part of the world rather 

than the city we that know and live 

in. What other side of London can 

we show if we approach it like that.” 

Given all that has gone before it 

is perhaps surprising that Huge is 

only Forrest’s third English movie. 

But his incredible ability to look at 

familiar locations with a fresh eye 

ensure that it remains visually 

interesting, complementing Ben 

Miller’s tale of the showbiz travails 

of a comedy double act – with Noel 

Clarke and Johnny Harris as the unlikely 

comic pairing. 

“Ben brings a lot of his own 

personal experience to it,” Forrest 

adds. “So when we get into a scene 

which is familiar to Ben he can 

connect to that situation with his 

own experiences to help me see the 

moments through his eyes. 

“This relationship with Ben has 

been really exciting because I got to 

see into this world that I otherwise 

never would. When you’re a 

cameraman and you’re thrust into a 

new world, it’s the very best thing. 

Through the director you can get a 

first hand journey through a strange 

world with a first class guide and 

working on Huge has really been like 

entering another world.” ANWAR BRETT 

Huge was originated on 

35mm Fujicolor ETERNA 400T 8583

“I REALLY LIKE 

THE ETERNA 250D 

AS A STOCK.” 

COMMERCIAL BREAK 

CROSSAN ON LOCATION 

SHOOTING A SERIES OF BOWIE 

WANNABES AND BASE-JUMPING OFF TALL 

BUILDINGS IN BERLIN. IT’S ALL IN A DAY’S 

WORK FOR DP DENIS CROSSAN BSC, AS 

HE TOLD ANWAR BRETT 

“ 

The Vodafone commercial 

was shot in Berlin. It 

features lots of different 

people singing the David 

Bowie track ‘Heroes’ as they 

do different things. It’s basically a 

series of vignettes such as two guys 

dressed as spacemen suspended 

from wires in their living room, an 

old lady surfing the internet, a guy 

who’s built himself a rocket, and a 

kid who stacks dice and then swipes 

them away really quickly. 

One of the elements in there 

was this guy doing a base jump off a 

building the size of Centre Point. He 

did it four times. We had to build a 

platform and use a crane, because 

when he jumped we wanted to crane 

out with him so that you saw all the 

way down the building. We had a 

couple of cameras on that; I had a 

remote Technocrane above him so 

that as he took his leap off the 

building you could see it all, and as 

his parachute opened you looked 

down on it. 

I was operating, and I was also 

intent on keeping the side of the 

building in shot so you actually see 

where he jumps from instead of just 

having him come into space. In his 

first jump he almost took me by 

surprise because he took a couple of 

steps and then did this amazing leap 

off the building. I had another 

camera on the ground filming some 

closer stuff on him, so we did 

various sizes on that. 

I pretty much stuck to the same 

stock for him, the Super F-64 D, but I 

used a super enhancer a few times 

to bring up the colour. Occasionally I 

would either slightly over expose or 

under expose the stocks. A lot of the 

stuff I was doing with flares; I was 

using mirrors when we were outside 

so I would always get the heaviest 

flare that I could in the lens. 

I really like the ETERNA 250D as 

a stock. If I’m doing a lot of 

variations on stuff I’ll usually stick 

with that and ND it down, but 

because these were all little 

Photos left to right above: Denis Crossan BSC; stills from the shoot courtesy of Vodafone on flikr.com 


individual vignettes you could treat 

each one differently. 

That’s why I decided to use 

more than one stock, not necessarily 

because I thought there was any 

difference but I didn’t really want to 

put lots of NDs in front of the lens. I 

wanted to use other things, like enhancers 

or grads because there were 

some great skies out there. 

Above all I wanted to keep a 

really good punchy image 

throughout the whole of the 

commercial. 

The Vodafone commercial was 

originated on 35mm Fujicolor Super 

F-64D 8522, ETERNA 250D 8563 

and ETERNA 500T 8573 

Director: Vaughan Arnell 

Production Company: Serious 

Pictures, Embassy of Dreams 

”

TV FEATURE 

WHERE DOES IT HURT? 

ONE NIGHT IN EMERGENCY REVEALS THE DARKER SIDE 

OF A HOSPITAL VISIT FROM PLAYWRIGHT GREGORY BURKE 

“THE GREAT THING 

ABOUT THE FUJIFILM 

STOCK IS THAT IT 

REALLY HAS 

GOOD LATITUDE WITH 

MIXED LIGHTS.” 

A 

year after graduating from the 

NFTS with a handful of shorts 

and commercials under his 

belt, Benjamin Kracun has 

made his television break 

lensing new a BBC Scotland drama, 

One Night In Emergency, starring 

Kevin McKidd and Michelle Ryan. 

From the pen of award-winning 

playwright Gregory Burke (also making 

his television drama debut), One 

Night In Emergency is a dark, surreal 

tale of one man’s journey to reach 

his wife in hospital, where all may 

not be as it originally appears. 

“The director, Michael Offer, has 

been very generous in giving me 

this opportunity,” states Kracun 

humbly, “and producer Dan Hine 

also took a chance in me. This was 

his baby.” Aware of Offer’s 

impressive back catalogue, which 

includes The Passion and Moses 

Jones, both shot with Fujifilm stock, 

Kracun came well prepared to their 

pre-production meetings. 

“I put together a whole load of 

references,” recalls Kracun. “We 

wanted to make the world recognisable, 

but give it nightmarish tones. I 

cited Bringing Out The Dead and 

After Hours, two Scorsese films. In 

Bringing Out The Dead, there’s a 

basis in reality for Nicholas Cage’s 

ambulance driver, but angels or 

ghosts surround him. Similarly in 

After Hours, one guy loses his money 

in New York and in trying to get 

home he meets all these different 

characters along the way.” 

Burke had cited Homer’s Odyssey 

as an inspiration for One Night In 

Emergency, a strong mythological 

theme not lost on Kracun and Offer. 

“There is a point in the script 

where reality is no more, which is 

great for the cinematography 

because it gives you free-range of 

how off-kilter you can make the 

world,” says Kracun. “Thankfully, it 

was already decided to shoot on film, 

Michael being a huge Fujifilm fan. In 

tests I was using the Reala 500D for 

two of the underground scenes because 

with the daylight stock the old 

sodium lighting fixtures were giving a 

strong yellow cast, which I would 

then augment with daylight light on 

the characters’ faces. 

“For the majority of the film, 

though, I used ETERNA 500T. In 

hospitals you have a lot of those 

fluorescent strip lights and we 

played with the cast those gave with 

the tungsten balanced stock.” 

With Offer an admirer of the 

‘Asian extreme’ look, characterised 

by films such as Old Boy, careful 

location selection became an 

integral part of pre-production. 

“When I first arrived in Glasgow, 

Michael took me to the bar scene 

location in Mitchell Lane, which 

opens the film.” recalls Kracun. “The 

bar was a sort of city-boy haunt, in 

some sense ugly but perfect for the 

story, with these garish neon lights 

inside and a big car park in the 

background when you come out. 

“I was using a Canon D10 and old 

Yashica lenses to take a lot of 

reference images on all the locations 

during prepping, even framing and 

putting the stop on so that I could see 

what was going on, and from these 

stills I could see there were a lot of 

the green and blue casts we were 

seeking. The great thing about the 

Fujifilm stock is that it really has good 

latitude with those mixed lights.” 

With locations in the Glasgow 

Royal Infirmary, a Victorian 

megalith of labyrinthine 

proportions and the Western 

General, a dour seventies concrete 

box, a truly surreal parallel world 

for the hospital could be created. 

“The Royal Infirmary is a really 


fascinating building,” reveals Kracun. 

“All the underground scenes were 

shot there. They have this one 

corridor that is surreally long, 

going right under the hospital. It’s 

pretty dark; there are some places 

that people probably haven’t been 

for years. Anna Benbow was the 

focus puller; I didn’t give her an 

easy time, most of the time we were 

wide open!” 

Shooting all night for 15 nights in 

working hospitals gave the 

filmmakers an unusual insight into 

this world. 

“We were shooting a scene once 

where the mortician is wheeling a 

body to the morgue,” recalls 

Kracun, “and we actually had to 

stop filming because there was a 

real body to come down. Then one 

night there were six stabbings 

which, according to hospital staff, is 

just a normal Thursday night in 

Glasgow! It was extreme.” 

Under these taxing conditions, 

having a method to work from 

proved invaluable. 

“The essential theme for One 

Night In Emergency is that it’s one 

man’s journey towards death, so I 

used the concept of him travelling 

towards the light to influence me,” 

states Kracun. 

“Wherever he was, to a lesser or 

greater degree there would be a light 

at the end of the tunnel. Having a 

concept that ties in specifically with 

the script is really important; it gives 

you a grounding and actually frees 

you up a bit.” NATASHA BLOCK 

One Night In Emergency, 

originated on 16mm Fujicolor Reala 

500D 8692 and ETERNA 500T 8673, is 

scheduled to transmit via BBC 

Scotland later this year

Photo main: Michelle Ryan and Kevin McKidd in One Night In Emergency; 

inset top left: DP Benjamin Kracun on set; below l-r: Focus Puller Anna 

Benbow, Director Michael Offer, Grip David Morrison, DP Benjamin Kracun, 

Gaffer Stever Arthur; scenes from the TV drama (courtesy BBC Scotland) 


“THE ETERNA 500T 

IS FANTASTIC - 

IT CAN HANDLE 

ANYTHING.” 


Photo main: Fist to fist in The Kid; 

above l-r: scenes from The Kid; 

above right: Director Nick Moran on set with DP Peter Wignall 

(photos courtesy John Rogers) 

A CHILD OF 

OUR TIME 

HOW THEY RECREATED A TOUGH 

SOUTH LONDON UPBRINGING IN THE KID 

They say that truth is stranger 

than fiction, and judging by the 

sales of his two volumes of 

autobiography, the public has 

clearly lapped up the often harrowing 

real-life story of Kevin Lewis. 

Kevin who, you might ask? The 

39-year-old from South London is 

author of The Kid and The Kid 

Moves On, which told graphically 

about Lewis’s early years after 

surviving an abusive Seventies’ and 

Eighties’ childhood in and around a 

rough council house estate. 

Lewis, who after flirting with 

crime and bare-knuckle fighting, has 

since gone on to become a 

successful novelist. He has most 

recently been witness to the filming, 

by the company he launched, of his 

own well-documented life in a new 

British feature he’s also scripted 

called, unsurprisingly, The Kid. 

It’s the second project for 

actor-turned-director Nick Moran 

following his acclaimed debut with 

Telstar, another, slightly earlier, slice 

of post-war British history, which 

traced the colourful and ultimately 

tragic career of pop entrepreneur 

Joe Meek. 

The Kid, now in post-production, 

gathers together a glittering cast 

including Rupert Friend, Augustus 

Prew and William Finn Miller, as the 

three ages of Kevin along with 

Natascha McElhone, Jodie Whittaker, 

Ioann Gruffudd, Bernard Hill, James 

Fox, Tom Burke and Con O’Neill. 

As well as O’Neill and Burke, 

who played, respectively, Meek and 

songwriter Geoff Goddard, in Telstar, 

Moran has also been re-united on 

the latest film with two of his main 

heads of department, designer 

Russell De Rozario and cameraman 

Peter Wignall. The ever-versatile 

Wignall moves seamlessly between 

Steadicam, operating, lighting and, 

on occasion, notably with The Kid, a 

mixture of all three. He’s also a dab 

hand at storyboarding, most 

recently required to ply, in addition 

to shooting second unit, that 

particular trade on Matthew 

Vaughn’s latest feature, the comicbook 

adventure Kick-Ass. 

Says Wignall: “Nick first came to 

me with this nearly a year ago but I 

was in prep on Kick-Ass at the time. 

So they then had another 

cameraman and he stayed with it 

until the end of March when still 

nothing had happened. They got 

hold of me again about five weeks 

before shooting was due to start but 

I then had an enormous two-week 

Virgin commercial, which I just 

couldn’t afford to turn down. 

“In all, I ended up with about 

two and a half weeks of ‘prep’ on 

The Kid. The Casting was up to the 

wire too. I didn’t even know what 

lights they had, or what they could 

actually afford, until about two days 

before shooting.” 

According to Wignall, who also 

shot second unit on The Descent Part 

2, “we had basically six weeks to 

shoot 300 scenes. We were doing on 

average 25-27 legitimate set-ups a day 

as well as, on average, one or two unit 

moves daily. It was beyond hectic.” 

Shooting was entirely on 

location – in Lewis’s old stamping 

ground of Croydon, but also using a 

stand-ins at South Oxhey and 

Bushey near Watford. The 

production was also the beneficiary 

of one of North London’s newer 

favourite filming haunts – the old 

BFPO Inglis Barracks at Mill Hill. 


IN PRODUCTION 

Wignall was also re-united with 

Fujfilm, which he used most 

enthusiastically on two earlier stints 

as DP – Telstar and Freebird – as well 

as on The Descent Part 2 and another 

second unit, Eden Lake. 

“It’s a question of going with 

what I know. The ETERNA 500T is 

fantastic - it can handle anything. In 

the end we got the lights we 

wanted but probably could have 

done with more because we were 

leapfrogging sets. 

“We started out using the Super 

F-64D inside. We then used the 

ETERNA 500T with an 85, and had an 

antique suede in there as well. At 

least I had 200 ASA. You know, you 

can’t really tell the difference in 

grain between the 500T and the 64D, 

so I got it down to just two stocks. 

“On 16mm you’ve got to be ever so 

careful about grain because if you 

underexpose it at all you can have 

all sorts of serious problems. So I 

had to make sure I was overexposing 

everything. You can always drag it 

down but you can’t pull it back up. 

“Mind you, it’s nice to have a bit 

of grain so you know it’s not video. 

It’s also a question of speed. We 

simply couldn’t have done this on 

HD. With film, you can just put a 

dolly or tripod down and you’re off. 

No cabling, no hard drives, no 

downloads, no checking to see if the 

shot’s corrupted or not. It’s film – 

pure and simple, and so portable.” 

QUENTIN FALK 

The Kid, due for release 

next year, was originated on 16mm 

Fujicolor ETERNA 500T 8673 and 

Super 64-D 8622

Despite the pressure, long hours 

and occasionally unpleasant 

conditions experienced by 

anyone choosing a career in 

the motion picture industry, 

the benefits are often very sweet. 

For Christopher Ross, lensing 

the new Ian Dury biopic Sex & Drugs 

& Rock & Roll at the right hand of 

director Mat Whitecross (Spooks: 

Code 9, The Road To Guantanamo), 

the time spent filming live gigs was 

the high point. 

“Who wouldn’t want to sit 

through a three-day performance by 

Ian Dury and the Blockheads,” he 

muses. Since the real Dury passed 

away in March 2000, these 

renditions were the product of Andy 

Serkis’, big screen incarnation of the 

legendary British rock musician. 

Dury was a unique character on 

the rock ‘n’ roll scene, his music 

diverse and his lyrics often 

flavoured with dry humour. Then 

there was his well-accounted 

childhood battle with polio and resulting 

time being ‘toughened up’ at 

Chailey Heritage, a children’s school 

for the disabled. 

This left Dury with a 

determination to succeed which saw 

him become one of the defining 

figureheads of the British ‘New 

Wave’ rock movement of the 

seventies, despite the diagnosis of 

permanent disability. 

“The film opens with Ian 

introducing his life story in a series 

of flashbacks,” reveals Ross, “and 

then the dominant drama is the 

‘New Boots and Panties’ era. 

“I didn’t have a great deal of prep 

on the film but Mat and I spent a fair 

amount of time talking about the 

private Ian Dury: his life, family and 

work. It was clear to me that Mat 

wanted the film to mirror Ian’s state of 

mind at each stage of his life and that 

this should lead our visual approach. 

“He also wanted to allow the 

actors as much freedom as 

possible, and with that in mind 

we adopted a quasi-documentary 

approach: broad light sources 

and zoom lenses. I felt that these 

were essential tools for Mat’s 

aesthetic of discovering and 

responding to performances 

during a take.” 

IN PRODUCTION 

Ross is no stranger to Fujifilm 

stocks: the five-part ITV drama 

Collision, the biopic feature Cass and 

the gritty Eden Lake were all shot on 

Fujifilm thanks to Ross’s influence as 

the projects’ DP. 

On Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, 

choosing from the Fujifilm Super 

16mm range for a drama destined 

for theatrical release was a 

conscious, creative decision. 

“From Mat’s perspective we 

needed a camera format that would 

be small and discreet, allow us to 

react quickly to performance, deal 

with varied lighting conditions and 

help to create a sense of period and 

place,” Ross states. “Super 16mm 

was the perfect choice when faced 

with these dilemmas. I used Fujifilm 

ETERNA 500T for almost everything, 

including the live performances and 

only switched to ETERNA 250D for 

day exteriors. 

“I felt the subject matter would 

benefit from the more organic feel of 

the higher speed film stock and 

hope to push this further in the DI. 

We used an Arri 416 and zoom 

lenses predominantly, with a set of 

Zeiss Ultra 16 lenses for low light, 

close focus or deep 2-shots, 

anything that would show up the 

faults of a zoom lens really.” 

Plenty of archive material of 

Dury exists, handy when recreating 

the finer details. 

“There are some great 

photographs of Ian that really show 

his quirky personality and I used 

these as a reference when shooting 

close-ups of Andy Serkis,” says Ross. 

“Generally, in reacting to the 

performances I felt that a connected 

approach was called for, so I used 

longer focal lengths and dirtier 

frames with tight eyelines to pull the 

characters together. 

“As on many of my productions 

I operated the ‘A’ camera myself and 

called in Rodrigo Gutierrez for help 

with the two-camera days and live 

performances. My focus puller Tim 

Battersby, a regular collaborator of 

mine, coped with the long 

lens/handheld/no-marks scenario 

with quiet brilliance as always.” 

So how did Ross cope with the 

varied lighting conditions required 

to tell Dury’s story, who through the 

THE RHYTHM 

course of a single day might have 

moved from daylight to streetlight 

to spotlight? 

“I had my usual selection of 

medium sized HMIs, a fair amount of 

Kino-flo units and a small tungsten 

package for night interior and 

exteriors,” Ross explains “For speed 

reasons one set was pre-rigged with 

Vistabeam units, a fantastic light 

that creates a soft yet punchy 

source with almost none of the extra 

grip requirements of frames, cutters 

and flags.” There was also an opportunity 

to utilise some real concert 

lighting. “We had a four-day 

sequence in a theatre in Watford 

where I used the existing rig with 

the addition of two Robert Juliat 


Spotlights and a smattering of pars 

and floor cans,” recalls Ross. 

“There is quite a bit of archive 

footage of Ian from that period in the 

mid-seventies to eighties, so we 

used it as reference for the live gigs 

and for some of our recreations of 

actual events.” With so much to 

consider, Ross once again 

commends the support of a good 

crew. “The brilliantly laid-back Julian 

White gaffered the film for me,” he 

says, “his quiet calmness helped me 

cope!” NATASHA BLOCK 

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll 

was originated on 16mm Fujicolor 

ETERNA 500T 8673 and 

ETERNA 250D 8663

STICKS 

“I USED FUJIFILM ETERNA 500T FOR ALMOST 

EVERYTHING, INCLUDING THE LIVE PERFORMANCES.” 

Photo main: Andy Serkis as Ian Dury; and above l-r: onset locations with DP Christopher Ross and director Mat Whitecross; 

above centre: the real Ian Dury in action 

RECREATING THE MUSICAL 

WORLD OF THE LATE, GREAT IAN DURY 

IN SEX & DRUGS & ROCK & ROLL 


A FISH OUT 

WORKING WITH WRITER-DIRECTOR NEIL JORDAN ON THE E 

MAY HAVE LANDED A MERMAID, BROUGHT DP CHRIS DOYLE 

“I FELT THE 

ETERNA 400T HAD 

THE RIGHT TONE FOR 

THE IRISH LIGHT AND 

OUR PALETTE.” “ 

Photo main: stars Colin Farrell and 

Alicja Bachleda-Curus; above and below right: Director 

Neil Jordan with DP Chris Doyle HKSC 

(photos courtesy LW Film Productions) 

For Ondine, I stuck with the 

film stock I know best, the 

ETERNA 400T. I felt it had 

the right tone for the Irish 

light and our palette. I 

mostly pull processed it (except 

when we couldn’t get the aperture 

needed) to make the mostly day-fornight 

scenes more luminous and, I 

hope, ethereal. 

In terms of our visual references 

going into it, the south of Ireland 

was more than enough: the nuances 

of verdure, the low-hanging clouds 

and shifting light, the rugged 

coastline, and the sea. 

Neil asked me at the beginning 

of our collaboration, ‘ how come all 

your films have a different look?’ 

The films look the way they do 

because of where they’re shot more 

than how they’re shot. Ondine is the 

proof of that. 

I was touched by Neil’s acuity 

and wryness - and pleased by the 

continuity of space and time that 

shooting such a story in such a 

contained space suggested. Having 

some Irish blood also made me 

wonder what I could make of Ireland 

from the inside looking out. 

The two main challenges on this 

film were photographing the fishing 

boat and the summer sky. About 40% 

of screen time is spent on the boat of 

the character played by Colin Farrell. 

It’s only about six metres long and 

built for one man to operate. So I was 

shooting hand held on a rough sea, 

being covered in fish most of the time, 

and trying to find angles to articulate 

the story and celebrate the emotional 

curve the two main characters pursue. 

That was a great challenge. 


Then there were the summer 

nights. It was light until nearly 11pm, 

but Irish child employment laws 

meant that we couldn’t work after 

midnight. The trouble was there 

were at least 20 minutes of scripted 

night work, so I decided to shoot it 

day for night. 

Many of the crew hadn’t done 

that much before, and Neil was 

hesitant but then he embraced the

OF WATER 

FIRST PERSON 

LEGIAC ONDINE, A TALE OF A FISHERMAN WHO THINKS HE 

HKSC BACK IN TOUCH WITH THE SEA AND HIS IRISH ROOTS 

idea. The cloudy, moist climate and a 

reasonably flexible shooting 

schedule, with a small cast, and concentration 

of locations, helped. I also 

feel it best articulates the superficially 

laid-back mood of village life. 

“Another issue was getting two 

helicopters to the ends of Ireland 

over a rough sea. That took some 

nifty footwork. Setting cranes over 

crags and steep inclines took some 

rigging, while crashing a car through 

the window of a beauty salon 

required some sweet talking. But all 

in all, it was a straightforward, 

unfussy process. The camaraderie 

of the Irish crew and the Guinness 

at the end of the day (for night) 

helped too. 

“Traditionally on a film like 

this, one would look for some kind 

of give and take of colour and 


luminescence, of mood and intent. I 

think in this film these changes are 

manifest in the story and the 

characters’ growth. The climate and 

the sea did their bit, so it was more 

a case of being consistent rather 

than eclectic. Again, this reflects 

the nature of a fishing village where 

all things come and go and not 

much really changes. 

“As I said, looking for the 

simplest, most elegant way to move 

around the boat meant hand-holding 

the camera. Trying to celebrate the 

sea, man’s place in it and the coast 

(and an island and lighthouse or 

two) meant much boat-to-boat work 

with the occasional POV shot that 

required climbing a couple of craggy 

outcrops for half a day to get a feel 

of the film’s geography. 

“I feel the stock helped a great 

deal, together with the pull 

processing. We could roll with minor 

variations of light, in fact I 

incorporated that into the style, 

where we would allow the light to 

change often enough in various 

shots so that it seemed more like 

our intention, not our mistake. 

“There is a great deal of hand 

held-work, not hand-held to look 

hand-held but hand-held to look 

organic, because it was the only 

practical way to get a certain shot. 

” 

There’s also a lot of dolly and 

crane work but I hope they 

are seamless. Overall, I hope 

the camerawork in Ondine 

feels less intended, and more 

found. 

As told to ANWAR BRETT 

Ondine, to be released 

later this year, was originated on 

35mm Fujicolor ETERNA 400T 8583

As well as hooking up for the 

first time with Ellen Kuras, 

for British director Sam 

Mendes, Away We Go also 

marked the first movie he 

has helmed from an original 

screenplay since his Academy 

Award-winning American Beauty. 

He remarks: “I was feeling the need 

to do something writer-led. Dave 

Eggers and Vendela Vida’s script 

was quite delightful, and had a 

lightness of spirit even when 

dealing with serious issues. Most 

of all it made me laugh.” 

In another first, Mendes 

prepared to make, and ultimately 

filmed, Away We Go while still in 

post-production on another movie, 

Revolutionary Road. “I committed 

to making Away We Go faster than 

I’ve ever made another movie. It 

was a way of letting off steam after 

the intensity of filming and editing 

the latter,” he muses. 

“It is kind of a companion piece 

in that there’s a couple who want 

to escape and find themselves; 

only this time, they do.” 

“In their screenplay, Dave and 

Vendela wrote about what happens 

to a couple on the brink of starting 

the next phase of their life with a 

newborn and the hope, fear, and 

excitement of that time. As a 

parent myself, I recognised it all.” 

The director made a point of 

surrounding himself with new 

collaborators behind the scenes 

for Away We Go. He explains, “The 

people I’ve worked with on 

Photo main: John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph in Away We Go; 

inset above: Director Sam Mendes on set 

multiple films before are all 

amazing, but I wanted to challenge 

myself by working with a new crew. 

I felt I needed to change my 

perspective on things, and shock 

myself out of some habits. 

Different speeds and rhythms 

would help me achieve the 

freshness and looseness that I was 

trying for with this movie.” 

For their part, crew members 

rose to the challenge of a movie 

that would shoot across three 

states, with only two sequences 

shot on a soundstage. Many of the 

key locations were “cast” in the 

hills, valleys, and towns of 

Connecticut. 

One of these was, of course, 

the distinguished, award-winning 

cinematographer and regular 

Fujifilm user Ellen Kuras ASC, best 

known for her work with Michel 

Gondry (Eternal Sunshine Of The 

Spotless Mind, Be Kind Rewind), 

Rebecca Miller (Personal Velocity) 

and Spike Lee (Summer Of Sam, 

Bamboozled). 

She said: “Coming after 

[previous Mendes movies’ 

cinematographers] Roger Deakins 

and [the late] Conrad Hall, I feel 

honoured that he would trust me, 

and our working together enabled 

me to be more creative and much 

more daring. 

“The DP and director’s 

relationship is one of confidence 

and security and one of 

exploration. Sam likes to be able to 

rehearse on location with actors 

on the morning of a particular 

scene. He would invite me to watch 

the blocking and the movement, so 

this way I could get a jump on the 

lighting and work with my crew 

and he could have enough time to 

work with the actors to get the 

performances he wants.” 

Mendes notes, “I didn’t go into 

many of these locations with too 

much predetermined. I wanted 

whatever we were getting in any 

location, atmosphere and weather 

to dictate how the scenes would 

be, so I kept them loose. The DP is 


the centre of the crew, and the DP’s 

personality is the overriding 

atmosphere-setter along with the 

director’s. Ellen has great warmth 

and a very easy manner about her, 

which helped greatly to keep 

everyone relaxed and bring out the 

comedy in the scenes.” 

While audiences will take note 

of the actors, the music, the 

direction and the writing, what will 

not be readily apparent is that it 

was made as a “green” production. 

What this entailed during 

filming was that alternative fuels 

were used. 49% of waste from 

landfills was redirected into 

recycling and composting; and 

carbon emissions were 

substantially reduced. These 

guidelines were upheld during a 

location shoot that spanned three 

American states (Connecticut, 

Arizona, and Florida) through the 

spring of 2008. 

All departments complied with 

the guidelines, from camera 

(shooting with three-perf film, 

which uses 25% less stock and 

chemicals in the manufacturing 

and processing) to costumes 

(using low-energy washers and 

dryers in the costume shop, and 

outfitting the characters in vintage 

or borrowed clothing as much as 

possible) to sound (by using 

rechargeable batteries) to the 

photography (production and 

publicity stills were evaluated 

online rather than via contact 

sheets). QUENTIN FALK


ON THE ROAD AGAIN 

BEHIND THE SCENES OF SAM MENDES’ LATEST FILM, AWAY WE GO, HIS FIRST 

COLLABORATION WITH AWARD-WINNING CINEMATOGRAPHER ELLEN KURAS ASC 


“THE DP IS THE 

CENTRE OF THE CREW, 

AND THE DP’S 

PERSONALITY IS THE 

OVERRIDING 

ATMOSPHERE-SETTER 

ALONG WITH 

THE DIRECTOR’S.” 

THE DP VIEW 

ELLEN KURAS ASC 

“ 

It’s almost like this story 

takes place as a series of 

postcards. The characters 

are within the postcard, and 

we’re seeing the backgrounds 

change as they question and 

explore where they want to go 

and who they want to be. This is 

a comedy, but it’s one about the 

human condition.” 

At the beginning, Sam and I 

talked about shaping the vision 

of the movie and what was 

appropriate for the story. The 

Production Designer and I had to 

come up with many ideas about 

creating the varied and different 

looks for the different places. 

I used particular lenses to 

keep the flatness of the postcardfeel 

image, although we were 

shooting widescreen. Flattening 

the image enables me to marry 

the characters into the 

background a little more. 

” 

Away We Go was originated on 

35mm Fujicolor Reala 500D 8592 

and ETERNA Vivid 160T 8543

Photo main: Extreme peril and in trouble again; above l-r: scenes from the film including Director Jon Harris and DP Sam McCurdy on set 


“IT’S VERY DIFFICULT TO MAKE SOMETHING 

LOOK FILMIC IN DIGITAL. FOR ME, WORKING IN 

FILM IS ALWAYS FASTER THAN DIGITAL.” 


THE 

DESCENT 

PART 2 

Chosen to be the Closing Night 

Gala at this year’s prestigious 

FrightFest (August 27-31) in 

London’s West End, The 

Descent: Part 2 will then open 

generally in the UK from December 4. 

The much-awaited sequel to one 

of the UK sleeper hits of 2005 (it 

grossed more than $60m worldwide) 

the Appalachian-set horror story 

continues the perils of caver Sarah 

(Shauna Macdonald) who barely survived 

before with her life after close 

encounters with the deadly 

subterranean Crawlers. 

Co-starring are Natalie Jackson 

Mendoza, Krysten Cummings, Gavan 

O’Herlihy, Douglas Hodge, Anna 

Skellern and Joshua Dallas. 

First time feature director Jon 

Harris, who edited the original (winning 

a BIFA for Technical 

Achievement in the process) is also 

joined by Production Designer 

Simon Boswell, Make-up Effects 

wizard Paul Hyett and 

cinematographer Sam McCurdy, who 

have all returned for well deserved 

second helpings. 

As before, McCurdy shot the 

movie on Fujifilm in locations 

ranging from Bourne Woods, 

Farnham (best known for some of 

the Gladiator exteriors) and 

Scotland to Ealing Studios, using 

35mm ETERNA 500T and 250T. 


Said McCurdy, who recently 

completed Centurion (directed by 

Neil Marshall who originated the 

Descent franchise): “The ETERNA 

range have been the most perfect 

stocks as before. The crucial thing 

for me was being able to go black. 

“We’ve used the 500T as well as 

some 250T for exterior day. I ended 

up filtering the 250T not correcting 

it, leaving it blue and adding the 80 

filters in to saturate the blues even 

more for exterior day stuff. I knew 

that it’d go cold. 

“This one starts with big 

exteriors, then begins to feel much 

more contained before opening out 

again as you go through the story. 

When the girls went down the caves 

the first time, they took a couple of 

torches and some flares and that 

was it. 

“This time round with rescuers 

involved, there’s more emphasis on 

the technical side of lighting 

involving videoing cameras and 

thermal imaging. So it’s been a 

different journey for me.” Albeit, 

McCurdy also confirmed, once again 

involving “gallons of blood”. 

The Descent: Part 2 was originated 

on 35mm Fujicolor ETERNA 500T 

8573 and ETERNA 250T 8553

BEHIND THE CAMERA 


THEMES OF 

IDENTITY 

AN INTERVIEW WITH 


T 

he cross cultural theme of her 

latest film, The Infidel, is an 

apt summary of Natasha 

Braier’s career to date. The 

Argentine-born graduate of 

the National Film & Television 

School in Beaconsfield has 

accumulated wide experience 

working on diverse projects all over 

the world, yet the theme that recurs 

most consistently is that of identity. 

“Totally,” she affirms, “and I 

think what was interesting for me 

when I took this film. But most of the 

films that I’ve done in the past are 

the total opposite to this; they are 

personal, art house films where the 

director is also the writer. They’re 

very personal stories.” 

Those past credits she refers to 

include a slew of shorts, and features 

including XXY, Glue, In The City of 

Sylvia, Shane Meadows’ Somers Town 

and Claudia Llosa’s Berlin Golden 

Bear-winning The Milk of Sorrow. 

By contrast, The Infidel was 

written by David Baddiel for his 

friend and fellow comedian Omid 

Djalili and tells of the cross-cultural 

confusion when a man raised 

Muslim discovers he was born 

Jewish. This is the cue for a 

Photo main: Natasha Braier on set 


retrospective education in his 

previously unsuspected heritage, 

with American born cabbie Lenny 

(Richard Schiff) as his guide. 

Given her more dramatic taste 

in movies, the prospect of working 

with two of British comedy’s 

brightest stars was not an issue for 

Braier; “I don’t have a television,” 

she says, “I didn’t know who they 

were.” The main attraction was 

director Josh Appignanesi. 

“Josh did a film called Song Of 

Songs,” Braier explains, “a very dark, 

art house film about incest in an 

Orthodox Jewish family. It was very 

well received at film festivals and 

totally the opposite of this comedy 

we were doing. When he first 

approached me I wondered why he 

was doing this. 

“But we had some really 

interesting conversations about what 

he wanted to do with the 

mise-en-scene and the shooting 

multiple scenes in one shot, in the 

style of Woody Allen’s Manhattan. I 

thought that was really exciting and 

thought I really wanted to make this 

film because I would be playing with 

all these elements with somebody that 

I recognised had a huge talent.” 

➤


“USING THE 16MM FUJIFILM, I COULD DO IT WITH A QUARTER OF THE LIGHTS.” 

“AS BEFORE 

THE ETERNA 

HAVE BEEN 

THE MOST 

PERFECT STOCKS.” 

➤ 

It’s clear from conversations 

with Natasha Braier that she is 

inspired by her directors. One who 

made a big impression was Shane 

Meadows, for whom she shot Somers 

Town in 2008. 

“He’s probably the best director 

I’ve worked with,” she enthuses. 

“With most films schedules are 

dictated by time and money, you’re 

always governed by time and making 

things cheaper. But the thing Shane 

does is shoot chronologically; he 

doesn’t care if he has to move 

locations four times in a day. 

“In filmmaking you don’t 

normally do that; you shoot in one 

location the whole day because you 

don’t want to spend half of your day 

moving from one place to the other. 

But in the end it’s really great for 

everybody because we are all 

experiencing the film and living this 

journey, especially for the actors. For 

me it felt like there was no way back 

after working this way with Shane.” 

Even Somers Town shares with 

The Infidel the theme of tolerance 

for those who might be considered 

different, as does a well regarded, 

BAFTA-nominated short that Braier 

made in 2005, Heavy Metal Drummer. 

That told of a Moroccan boy with a 

hankering for the work of Megadeth 

and Iron Maiden. 

“It’s funny because I was talking 

with Josh about how The Infidel is 

about identity but also performance, 

that we all create this performance 

of our identity. We thought that was 

really interesting, and given that 

Omid is a performer himself, we 

went with this concept through the 

whole film. 

“He either has to perform as a 

Jewish person for the Jewish people, 

or when he has to perform like he’s 

this very good Muslim and even an 

anti-Semite for his fellow Muslims, so 

they don’t realise that he’s actually 

Jewish. Everything is performance in 

a way. That was really interesting.” 

Shooting on a combination of 

16mm Fujicolor ETERNA 250T and 

ETERNA 500T, Braier had strenuously 

to argue her corner to shoot on film 

in the face of a digital alternative. 

“I’ve only used digital formats in 

commercials and a couple of shorts. I 

did my first feature on digital but in 

the last few years I’ve always been 

avoiding HD because I think the look 

is totally different. It’s very difficult to 

make something look filmic in digital. 

To me, you could already see quite 

easily the difference in every shot, in 

every frame. 

“Production-wise I think they 

could also see the difference in 

terms of comparing it with the RED 

Photo top: Omid Djalili in The Infidel; left top to bottom: Scene from Somers Town (photo courtesy Filksi) 

and The Infidel Director Josh Appignanesi (The Infidel photos courtesy Eloi Sanchez Moli) 


camera, which they originally 

wanted to use, in terms of the 

amount of lights for example that I 

had to use. There were fewer lights 

because the RED camera is 

something like 80 ASA, and we were 

using the ETERNA 250T. 

“Using the 16mm Fujifilm I could 

do it with a quarter of the lights. 

The lighting list gets reduced, so do 

the number of sparks we need, the 

tracks are smaller, the lighting 

times are faster. There are a lot of 

advantages. 

“So the 16mm stocks really 

suited the format of the film because 

it was low-budget, we had to do a lot 

of things each day and we had to be 

fast. For me, working in film is 

always faster than digital, because 

digital is always associated with so 

many technical complications and 

tricky things. For me, film is much 

more direct.” ANWAR BRETT 

The Infidel was originated on 

16mm Fujicolor ETERNA 250T 8653 

and ETERNA 500T 8673

SHORT IN FOCUS 

THE SUMMER HOUSE 

DAISY GILI, WHOSE DAY JOB IS JOINT PRINCIPAL OF 

THE LONDON FILM ACADEMY, REPORTS ON HER DIRECTING 

DEBUT, THE SUMMER HOUSE, CO-STARRING 

ROBERT PATTINSON AND TALULAH RILEY 

Our short film is set around the 

time of the moon landing in 

1969. It is produced by Anna 

MacDonald, and is our second 

collaboration. Our first was 

establishing the London Film 

Academy together in 2002. We had 

set out to work on Fujifilm because 

it not only has a luscious, slightly 

magical feel but it also suited the 

romantic, lyrical script. 

The film is about love, a 

subject that has always captivated 

me, and when I read Ian Beck’s 

script I could see the film in my 

head and knew I had to make it. I 

was inspired by Pawel Pawlikowski 

My Summer of Love, a film that 

matched my desire to show the 

unspoken communication between 

two people in the heady madness of 

the summer months. 

I knew I needed a DOP who was 

able to make the film beautiful but 

not sickly sweet, much like Peter 

Suschitzky’s work on The Empire 

Strikes Back. A great deal of Alex 

Ryle’s previous work had been in 

horror films but I could see in them 

and the way he talked about the 

script that his skills could transfer 

easily to this different genre. As a Director, 

it’s good to be imaginative in 

your choice of cast and crew as you 

may attract experienced people by 

offering them a type of work they 

may not normally get. 

Having found a script I wanted 

to work with, I then needed a cast 

and crew who would bring it alive. 

Even though this was a short film I 

felt it was important to work with a 

Casting Director and, indeed, Louise 

Cross recommended all the actors 

we ended up casting except Robert 

(Twilight) Pattinson, who was 

suggested by our Script 

Supervisor/Stills Photographer. 

My worry had been to find young 

actors who had enough 

experience to deliver performances 

that would drive the film. I couldn’t 

have asked more from lead actress 

Talulah Riley. She has a natural 

raw talent that responds well to 

direction and an enthusiastic 

disposition and work ethic, which 

contributed to the fun we had on set. 

Robert needed to do little to 

hold an audience’s attention and 

made the perfect foil to Talulah’s 

character. One of my favourite 

scenes in the film is their encounter 

in the summer house, a scene that 

was particularly difficult to capture 

because of the low light and the 

shallow depth of field. Alex’s 

decision to keep the majority of the 

warm light behind them, so that 

their faces were mostly in shade, 

made the moment appropriately 

intimate and hidden. 

We had great fun working on 

this film. Everyone mucked in: 

actors Anna Calder Marshall and 

David Burke travelled over to France 

with us buried under bags and bags 

of period clothes and Robert shared 

his room with our Boom Operator. 

The joy of collaboration on a film is 

when the work is so much more 

than one individual can imagine. 

The Summer House was 

originated on 16mm Fujicolor 

ETERNA 500T 8673 

Photos above l-r: Anna Calder Marshall and David Burke; Director Daisy Gili; Talulah Riley and Robert Pattinson on poster image; (set photos courtesy Campbell Mitchell) 


THE DP VIEW 

ALEX RYLE 

I’ve always found that 

simplicity is the best 

approach regardless of 

budgetary or time 

constraints. I was keen to 

make the most of the beautiful 

natural light in our chateau location, 

so opted for the ETERNA 500T to 

cover my back and was delighted 

with the results. I could drive it right 

into the dark (and the light, for that 

matter) and what was on the ground 

glass, I got on the film. 

As it turned out that was just as 

well. Many of the days were flat and 

dull and I ended up working at wide 

apertures out of necessity, 

sometimes even ditching the 85, but 

the film held up brilliantly with 

vibrant colours and good contrast. 

In the TK, I thought it looked damn 

near as good as 35mm. 

I like Fujifilm stocks because I 

like film to look like film. With their 

range I can work at low lighting 

levels, as well as late into my 

favourite dusk light, without 

looking like a real berk who 

can’t find the light switch. 

“ 

”

Photo main: DP Erik Wilson on set; right: scenes from 

recent music promos by Kasabian and Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs 


Amoustachioed killer, played by 

Noel Fielding from of The 

Mighty Boosh, walks across the 

English countryside looking 

for victims, the moving image 

scratchy, worn and handheld. 

“It’s called Vlad The Impaler,” 

laughs Norwegian born cinematographer 

Erik Wilson. “It’s a viral. It was 

heavily post-produced afterwards to 

make it look like a horror film shot in 

the Seventies, the only living copy of 

which was just found in Russia.” 

The promo, which is actually a 

music video for the British band 

Kasabian, is one of the fruits of 

Wilson’s profitable creative 

partnership with director Richard 

Ayoade (who starred in Channel 4’s 

acclaimed sitcom The IT Crowd). 

“He only shoots on film,” says 

Wilson, with his Scandanavian twang, 

“and I love film, because it’s very, 

very simple. I learned on film, no 

computers whatsoever. It was fun.” 

The complicated shoot required 

several different Fujifilm stocks. 

“ETERNA Vivid 160T, ETERNA 500T 

and ETERNA 250D, all depending on 

the situation,” he says. “We used a 

Bolex camera, bought a Zoom lens 

and then rented a 10mm with a 

fish-eye adapter.” 

Wilson is particularly 

enamoured of the ETERNA Vivid 

160T. “It’s good that someone still 

develops and releases new stocks 

that have different characteristics 

inherent in them,” he says. 

“The trend for the rest of stocks 

seems to go towards being as clean, 

crisp and neutral as possible so that 

MUSIC PROMOS 

“WITH THE VIVID 160T YOU MAKE A CONSCIOUS CHOICE BEFORE 

SHOOTING THE LOOK, RATHER THAN WAITING UNTIL IT REACHES THE 

COMMITTEE IN THE GRADE.” 

BOOSH AND BEYOND 

INTO THE WORLD OF KASABIAN AND THE 

YEAH YEAH YEAHS WITH DP ERIK WILSON 

you have as many options as 

possible in the Digital Grading suite. 

With the 160T you make a conscious 

choice before shooting the look, 

rather than waiting until it reaches 

the committee in the grade.” 

Wilson’s career has ranged from 

small British films like Shooters (with 

film school director colleague Colin 

Teague) to the upcoming ITV2 series 

Trinity starring Charles Dance (with 

Teague again) via Hollywood, where 

he camera-operated and directed 

second unit on The Hills Have Eyes 

remake and its sequel for helmer 

Alexandre Aja. 

But the humble 33-year-old 

admits his style is still developing 

and he’s loath to be too precious 

about his ‘vision’. 

“The things I’m proud of have a 

personality to them, definitely,” he 

says. “They have some part of my 

thumbprint on them. It’s heightened 

reality, not naturalistic. I like it when 

you can see something has been 

done. Not like Michael Bay, where 

you can see the flares, but I still 

appreciate it when it has a style.” 

“Nevertheless,” he continues, 

“I’m learning more and more not to 

plan too much, to be flexible enough 

to change when you see something 

better than what you’ve lit. You light 

something, then you look around 

where you’re not intending to shoot 

and see something a lot better and 

it’s ‘let’s do that instead’.” 

This dynamism and versatility is 

what draws him to talents like 

Ayoade, who has become something 

of a tyro in the frequently stagnant 


world of music video. The pair have 

also collaborated on Last Shadow 

Puppets’ Sixties-themed Standing 

Next To Me and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ 

Heads Will Roll. 

The latter, “which we shot in the 

vaults underneath London Bridge 

Station”, sees the iconoclastic group 

as the house band in a seedy, gothic 

nightclub. Onto the stage in front of 

them strides a Michael Jacksonesque 

werewolf, who proceeds to 

dance for the punters before 

attacking and killing them all, 

substituting blood for red confetti. 

Singer Karen O chants the last bars 

of the chorus while dismembered on 

the floor. 

“It’s blood and guts,” grins 

Wilson, who’s just finished an ITV 

three-parter Murderland, starring 

Robbie Coltrane, “or at least a 

stylistic version of that. I like the 

darker things a lot.” 

“We used ETERNA 500T 8673 

exclusively, as we needed the speed 

for shooting anamorphic. We had an 

Arri SR3 camera, with Cooke Xtal 

Express lenses. 

“There was tungsten and strobe 

lighting all mixed together and one 

of the reasons I shot on Fujifilm was 

because mixing lights together 

works so well with it.” BEN FALK 

The Kasabian promo was originated 

on 16mm Fujicolor ETERNA 

Vivid 160T 8643, ETERNA 500T 8673 

and ETERNA 250D 8663; the Yeah 

Yeah Yeahs promo was originated on 

ETERNA 500T 8673


Photo main: Tony (Peter Ferdinando), the odd ball loner; DP David Higgs BSC; Gerard Johnson directing a scene from Tony; the crew on set 


ONLY THE LONELY 

After an award-winning short by East London-born filmmaker Gerard Johnson caught 

the attention of BAFTA laden writer-producer Paul Abbott, he set about creating a 

fresh character, which with some friends, his actor and cousin Peter Ferdinando (in 

the title role) and £100 worth of filming over one weekend, he turned it into a new 

short called Tony. On seeing the first cut, Abbott suggested they turn the subject 

into a feature film, which he then wanted to produce through his new talent company, 

Abbott Vision. After an intense six- month casting and rehearsal process, Tony 

- about an oddball loner who also happens to be a serial killer was shot around the 

East End with Abbott Vision and UK Film Council funding. The result was an invited 

entry at the Edinburgh International Film Festival earlier this year. 

“ 

CINEMATOGRAPHER DAVID HIGGS BSC 

REFLECTS ON AN UNUSUAL ASSIGNMENT 

One thing about this 

business is that it loves 

pigeonholes, and putting 

people in them. After 

finishing RocknRolla, a mad 

32-day shoot that was big budget 

but, unbelievably, also a very 

creative experience. I was then 

approached by Dan McCulloch, 

about doing Tony. 

Dan had previously produced a 

short that I’d lit called The Stronger 

(directed by Lia Williams), which 

was BAFTA nominated last year. 

After talking with Gerard, Dan 

and Paul [who exec produced The 

Stronger], it became clear that Tony 

was an opportunity to explore and 

observe a dark, claustrophobic, but 

also darkly comic, environment with 

a visual grammar that wasn’t slick, 

but which held a mirror up to an 

odd character and his mad world. 

Gerard talked about rediscovering 

the power of the image. The 

mesmeric pull of a way of seeing that 

doesn’t automatically advance the 

action by necessarily assigning a 

meaning to each shot. Of course, it 

has to do that at some point, and on 

the way helps add to the atmosphere. 

We looked at a number of films 

that seemed to strip narrative to the 

minimum. Earlier in the year, we had 

covered the same area in 

conversation with Paul about 

workshopping with actors, writers 

and directors to rediscover the 

power of film. 

Interestingly, this ‘stripping 

away’, giving power to the 

filmmakers, resurfaced for me in the 

Channel 4/Revolution Films’ Red Riding 

series when I brought what I’d 

learned from Tony to the 1983 

episode I shot which was directed by 

Anand Tucker. 

Gerard wanted to use film, 

shooting on a Steadicam Flyer. An 

A-Minima and a regular Aaton Extera 

seemed a natural fit. Wonderfully, 

Fujifilm also agreed to help. 

That, for me, seemed to be a 

counter to any digital/big budget 

pigeonhole - shooting out the back 

of a car with minimum crew. The 

only lights I had were some Chinese 

lanterns and some Kino-flos for the 

nightclub sequence. 

The making of Tony was relaxed. 

We had the time, but not always, 

though, to discuss how we were 

approaching a scene. It sometimes 

took a force of will not to fall into the 

conventional grammar of coverage. 

Going guerrilla in London with 

the camera worked wonderfully well, 

particularly with the A-Minima going 

under the radar. It reminds you of 

how the hubris of filmmaking can get 

in the way of telling the story. At the 

same time, not every story can be 

told this way. It works well, however, 

with a singular story thread. 

Tony’s actions aren’t explained 

in the film. We follow him through a 

week of his life, and we worked hard 

on reflecting his skewed perspective. 

He just kills for company. 

Cinematically, we wanted to 

evoke a reality that was more 

inclusive than conventional film 

grammar. This is often driven by the 

execs’ desire for pace, using close 

ups which leave no doubt as to the 

actors’ response. 

Placing Tony into a context 

where the continual influx of 


psychophysical visual images that 

suggest a reality that maybe called a 

life, worked well. Don’t think that 

this deconstructive approach works 

for every project, but sometimes 

when you let the brakes off, the fun 

really starts. 

The more I do, the more I 

believe in my instinct when filming. 

The DI was done at Ascent, with 

the same equipment that I’d graded 

my previous two films. If, with Super 

16mm negative, you hold it up to the 

light, and look at a frame, it seems 

almost physically impossible to be 

able to take this fingernail-sized 

image and blow it up 30ft across. 

The Fujifilm stocks, however, 

held up incredibly well, far better 

than I’d dared hope. The calculated 

risks that I’d taken seemed to pay off. 

There was one shot in particular 

which later became the poster. This 

was of Tony going into a lift using 

just one practical, with the actor 

Peter Ferdinando standing under it. 

Fujifilm mirrored and embraced 

the uncorrected fluorescent in 

wonderful hues and shades. We 

could read the right amount of detail 

to reflect the performance, and 

Fujifilm got it spot on. 

My thanks go to the crew who 

helped out on this and Dale 

McCready who covered the 

last few days when I had to 

go and earn! 

” 

Tony was originated on 

16mm Fujicolor ETERNA 250D 8663, 

ETERNA 500T 8673 and 

REALA 500D 8692

Photo main: Molly Windsor as Lucy; 

above: Director Samantha Morton with Molly Windsor; 

below right: scenes from The Unloved 

THE UNLOVED 

AS AN ACTRESS 

SAMANTHA MORTON HAS BECOME 

USED TO REGULAR CRITICAL 

BOUQUETS, INCLUDING A PAIR 

EACH OF BAFTA AND OSCAR 

NOMINATIONS FOR HER WORK IN 

FILM AND TELEVISION 

Now, at 32, she’s begun to earn a 

whole lot more for her first venture 

behind the camera, as director of 

Channel 4’s acclaimed film, The 

Unloved, which is likely to feature 

strongly in the TV awards season next year. 

According to one critic, it’s an 

“ethereally beautiful, achingly sad, and 

painfully honest look at the life of an 

abused, eleven-year-old girl who has 

recently been taken in to care [which] 

would suggest that the actress’s time 

spent in front of the camera may have 

been merely an apprenticeship, served in 

order to bring us this wonderful, 

sensitive filmmaker with a delicate touch 

to rival Terence Davies - a masterpiece.” 

The Unloved, inspired by Morton’s 

own painful encounters with the care 

system as a child was filmed entirely on 

location in her home town of Nottingham 

and stars newcomer Molly Windsor as 

11-year-old Lucy alongside Robert 

Carlyle and Susan Lynch. 

Although the story was Morton’s, 

she was clear from the beginning that 

she didn’t want it to be an autobiography 

and she didn’t want to write the script. 

Instead, she wanted to work with a 

writer who would be happy to 

collaborate with her, who would listen to 

her ideas and formulate them into a 

script. At the time, producer Kate 

Ogborn and Channel 4’s Head of Drama 

Liza Marshall were working with writer 

Tony Grisoni on Red Riding. 

He seemed the natural choice, 

having collaborated with a number of 

refugees to tell their story in Michael Winterbottom’s 

In This World. Ogborn 

introduced the pair, and Grisoni was 

immediately captivated by Morton’s story. 

To light the film, she chose Tom 

Townend whom she’d first met on 

Morvern Callar, on which he done some 

operating when she was the star. 

Explains Townend, who started on 

The Unloved just 10 days before it was 

due to begin filming: “I didn’t really know 

what to expect working with her as a 

director but as it turned out, she’s very 

confident, clearly drawing on her 

experience of having acted in more than 

20 films.” 

What, for Morton, were her 

directorial and cinematic influences 

when she set out on the project? 

“To be honest,” she reveals, “I am so 

totally immersed in a character when I 

am acting that I didn’t draw directly on 

any one director but what influenced me 

more than anything was what not to do. 

“I have worked with directors who 

were scared of actors and with a film like 

The Unloved with children it was very important 

that the young actors had 100% 

of me and we were very prepared. 

“Films like The American Friend or 

The Man Without A Past inspired me as 

they had such a sense of space and time 

and they don’t force the story too hard. I 

think now we are used to very fast edit- 


ing and narrative-packed stories which 

can be brilliant but in a story about a 

young girl who is bordering on autistic I 

felt that I didn’t want it to feel like an 

adult script or direction had been 

imposed too forcefully – it needed to be 

more natural and believable than that.” 

QUENTIN FALK 

The Unloved, which aired on 

Channel 4 earlier this year, was 

originated on 35mm Fujicolour ETERNA 

400T 8583 and ETERNA 500T 8573


THE DP VIEW 

TOM TOWNEND 

“ 

TV IN FOCUS 

Sam would accept no compromise 

when it came to shooting on 35mm. 

We ended up shooting a lot of stock 

which was probably down to two 

reasons: the unpredictability of the 

young cast, and that Sam liked to cover 

scenes in their entirety. 

Within a week it became fairly 

obvious I wanted to shoot almost everything 

on the ETERNA 400T simply 

because I think it’s the only stock of any 

description on the market which has this 

particularly quiet look and a very 

naturalistic rendition. 

But most appealing of all is that 

it’s a low contrast stock, and one of 

the most filmic I know. 

”

FESTIVALS & EVENTS 

NEW NEGATIVE FILM FROM FUJIFILM 

Fujifilm Motion Picture has 

announced the release of a new, 

high saturation, high speed, 

tungsten film, ETERNA Vivid 

500T. This new addition to 

Fujifilm’s wide range is a high 

contrast film that provides punchy, 

vivid colours under multiple 

challenging shooting conditions 

including night scenes. ETERNA 

Vivid 500T inherits its saturated 

colour, superior sharpness and 

excellent skin tones from the 

acclaimed ETERNA Vivid 160T. The 

new film provides a seamless match 

with the ETERNA Vivid 160T. 

“Our new colour negative film 

expands the parameters for shooting 

sharp, intense colour into the realm 

of night scenes,” says Jerry Deeney 

from Fujifilm Motion Picture. 

“ETERNA Vivid 500T gives 

exceptional image quality even 

during telecine transfer for TV 

work or digital processing of motion 

picture footage. It is important to 

note that the ETERNA Vivid 500T is 

in addition to, and not replacing, 

Fujifilm’s existing ETERNA 500T” 

Fujifilm is launching the new 

Vivid range to achieve a more colour 

saturated and higher contrast look. 

ON RELEASE AUGUST 28 THE HURT LOCKER 


ETERNA Vivid 500T complements 

the different looks available in the 

company’s high speed film range: 

ETERNA 400T - Low Contrast 

ETERNA 500T - Medium Contrast 

ETERNA Vivid 500T - High Contrast 

Among the first features to use the 

new ETERNA Vivid 500T are: 

Chatroom (UK) 

Director: Hideo Nakata, 

DP: Benoit Delhomme. 

It’s A Wonderful Afterlife (UK) 

Director: Gurinder Chadha, 

DP: Dick Pope BSC 

Don’t Be Afraid Of The Dark 

(Australia) Director: Troy Nixey, 

DP: Oliver Stapleton BSC 

ETERNA Vivid 500T is available 

now in 35mm Type 8547 in 400ft and 

1000ft rolls and in 16mm Type 8647 

in 100ft and 400ft rolls. 

Fear,” says director Kathryn 

Bigelow, “has a bad reputation, 

but I think that’s ill-deserved.” 

Her latest film, The Hurt Locker, 

photographed by Barry 

Ackroyd BSC on 16mm Fujicolor 

ETERNA 500T 8673 and ETERNA 

250D 8663, opens in the UK on 

August 28. 

Bigelow goes on: “Fear is 

clarifying. It forces you to put 

important things first and discount 

the trivial. When Mark Boal, the 

writer, came back from a reporting 

trip to Iraq, he told me stories about 

men in the Army who disarm bombs 

in the heat of combat – obviously, an 

elite job with a high mortality rate. 

“When he mentioned that they 

are extremely vulnerable and use 

little more than a pair of pliers to 

disarm a bomb that can kill for 300 

metres, I was shocked. When I 

learned that these men volunteer for 

this dangerous work, and often grow 

so fond of it that they can imagine 

doing nothing else, I knew I had found 

my next film.” 

The Hurt Locker, co-stars Jeremy 

Renner, Anthony Mackie and Brian 

Geraghty with powerful cameos by 

Ralph Fiennes, Guy Pearce and 

David Morse. 

Photos left: DP Barry Ackroyd BSC with cast and crew of 

The Hurt Locker on location in Jordan


THE FANTASTIC MR FOX PRINTS ON FUJIFILM 

Photos above and right: 

Scenes from 2009 Winners of Fujifilm Shorts 'Best 

Film' Outcasts and 'Best Cinematography' Leaving 

The opening film on October 14 

at this year’s Times BFI London 

Film Festival is to be Wes 

Anderson’s adaptation of 

Roald Dahl’s children’s classic 

The Fantastic Mr Fox. 

Anderson’s first animated film, 

which he co-wrote with Noah 

Baumbach, uses classic handmade 

stop motion techniques and features 

the voices of George Clooney, Meryl 

Streep, Jason Schwartzman, Bill 

Murray, Michael Gambon, Willem 

Dafoe, Owen Wilson, Jarvis Cocker 

and Helen McCrory. 

fter the success of Fujifilm 

Shorts 2009 - the brand new 

short film competition from 

Fujifilm. We are pleased to 

announce that the 2010 short 

film competition will open for 

entries in autumn 2009. 

A host of fantastic prizes are on 

offer for the winners of ‘Best Film’ 

and ‘Best Cinematography’. Entry is 

free of charge and filmmakers can 

submit as many short films as they 

wish. All entries must be shot in 

their entirety on Fujifilm Motion 

Picture film stock; films must be less 

than 30 minutes long and completed 

after 1 January 2008. 

To download an entry form and 

to find out more information, please 

visit: www.fujifilmshorts.com 

NEW FUJIFILM CREW T-SHIRTS 

F 

ujifilm Motion Picture has 

designed new t-shirts for film 

crews. The design is based on 

the Fujifilm end credits logo 

and are now available in sizes: 

small, medium, large and extra large. 

Ask the Fujifilm customer service 

team about t-shirts when you place 

a film stock order for your next 

production. 


It was shot at London’s Three 

Mills Studios. According to cinematographer 

Tristan Oliver, an 

Aardman Animations veteran: “We 

shot Mr Fox on digital stills but I am 

outputting the digineg to Fujifilm at 

Technicolor. The Fujifilm 3513DI 

print stock is giving me a much 

richer look in the blacks and the 

overall contrast is better. I do try to 

come home to Fujifilm when I can.” 

A FUJIFILM 

SHORTS 

2010 OPENS SOON

The idea for Occupation, one of 

the most powerful television 

dramas of the past summer, 

was first mooted in 2004, a year 

after the invasion of Iraq. 

But it was the story of its aftermath, 

the reconstruction of the country 

and the sectarian violence that 

finally sparked writer Peter Bowker 

(Blackpool, Desperate Romantics) 

into action. 

Directed by Nick Murphy, the 

three-parter stars James Nesbitt, 

Stephen Graham and Warren Brown 

as former Army colleagues who lives 

are irrevocably changed by the 

conflict. 

According to producer Derek 

Wax: “I felt the glossy mini-series 

approach was wrong for Pete’s 

writing; we didn’t need perfectly 

composed shots with light reflected 

in puddles. We needed something 

truer, rougher and more rooted in 

reality.” 

After persuading Murphy, an 

experienced documentarist, to go 

with film rather than HD, David Odd 

BSC found himself shooting 

Manchester scenes in Belfast - an 

architectural lookalike. Belfast also 

stood in many of the interior Basra 

scenes, while the outskirts of 

Marrakech in Morocco doubled for 

the war-torn streets of the Iraq city. 

Occupation, which aired on 

BBC One earlier this year and is now 

available on DVD, was originated on 

16mm Fujicolor ETERNA 250D 8663 

and ETERNA Vivid 160T 8643 


OCCUPATION NOW ON DVD 

Photo main: James Nesbitt in action, and right, on the set with Director Nick Murphy and 

crew including DP David Odd BSC on the move in his special rickshaw 

COMING SOON NEW MOTION PICTURE WEBSITE 

Fujifilm Motion Picture is 

designing a new website for UK 

filmmakers. The new website 

will include comprehensive 

technical information on all 

Fujifilm Motion Picture stocks, 

a film length calculator, end credits 

logos to download for your next 

production and many features from 

Exposure Magazines will be 

reproduced for the web to reach a 


wider world-wide audience. To find 

out more, visit: 


We have also joined Twitter to 

keep filmmakers up to speed on 

Fujifilm Shorts and the latest 

productions shooting on Fujifilm 

Motion Picture. You can follow us on 

Twitter at: 

www.twitter.com/fujifilmshorts

IN PRODUCTION/POST-PRODUCTION 

FEATURES AND TV DRAMAS 

Clash of the Titans, 

DP: Peter Menzies Jnr 

Director: Louis Leterrier 

Chatroom 

DP: Benoit Delhomme 

Director: Hideo Nakata 

Nanny McPhee And The Big 

Bang 

DP: Mike Eley 

Director: Susanna White 

The Special Relationship 

DP: Barry Ackroyd BSC 

Director: Richard Loncraine 

The Day of the Flowers 

DP: Vernon Leyton BSC 

Here 

DP: Lol Crawley 

Director: Braden King 

FUJIFILM UNVEILS DEAL WITH 

Fujifilm has announced that 

Panavision will be supplying the 

company’s range of motion 

picture film stock. Panavision’s 

customers will now be able to 

stock-up on any film from Fujifilm’s 

range via the online store, 

www.panavision.co.uk/panastore or 

by visiting the Panavision depot in 

Greenford, Middlesex. 

“We’re delighted to welcome 

Panavision to our distribution 

network. They have a great 

reputation within the industry for 

It's A Wonderful Afterlife 

DP: Dick Pope BSC 

Director: Gurinder Chadha 

Glorious 39 

DP: Danny Cohen BSC 

Director: Stephen Poliakoff 

supplying quality products and 

offering excellent customer service. 

Panavision’s customers will benefit 

from having access to the full range 

of Fujifilm’s motion picture stock 

and we look forward to serving 

them,” says Jerry Deeney, Marketing 

Manager for Fujifilm Motion Picture. 

Panavision join a list of UK 

distributors for Fujifilm Motion 

Picture Film. A distribution network 

that includes Island Studios, That’s 

A Wrap and Protape. 

Wild Target 

DP: David Johnson BSC 

Director: Jonathan Lynn 

Blitz 

DP: Rob Hardy 

Director: Elliott Lester 

The Be All And End All 

DP: Zillah Bowes 

Director: Bruce Webb 

Green Zone 

DP: Barry Ackroyd BSC 

Director: Paul Greengrass 

Collision 

DP: Chris Ross 

Director: Marc Evans 

Emma 

DP: Adam Suschitzky 

Dir Jim O'Hanlon 

The Philanthropist 

DP: Joel Ransom 

Director: Duane Clark 

Foyle's War 

DP: James Aspinall 

ARE YOU ON THE LIST? 

Having any problems receiving EXPOSURE? 

Need more copies? Please call 020 3 040 0400 

or email movingimage@fuji.co.uk 

Would you like to receive our monthly e-newsletters? 

Subscribe for free at www.fujifilm.co.uk/motion 

FUJIFILM IN SOHO 


On graduating from Cambridge 

Bob Quinn did various things 

including teaching chemistry, 

developing new A level 

courses for the Nuffield 

Foundation and running a 

small Audio-Visual media company 

before joining Kodak in 1973, working 

in various roles connected with 

the Motion Picture business. It was 

there that he met his future wife 

Kathy, whom he married in 1984. 

Bob joined Fujifilm on November 

2, 1986 following a "shake-out" at 

Kodak. At the time Kathy was 

pregnant with their first child, Lizzie, 

and she was born the following 

March. Stephen followed some thirty 

months years later. 

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY 

TENTATIVE DATES ONLY 

Montreal World Film Festival 

Montreal, Canada 27 Aug- 07 Sep 2009 

FILM4 Frightfest 

London, UK 27 - 31 Aug 2009 

Edinburgh Intl Television Festival 

Edinburgh, UK 28 - 30 Aug 2009 

17th Filmfest Hamburg 

Hamburg, Germany 24 Sep - 03 Oct 2009 

Venice International Film Festival 

Venice, Italy 02 - 12 Sep 2009 

Toronto International Film Festival 

Toronto, Canada 10 - 19 Sep 2009 

Cambridge Film Festival 

Cambridge, UK 17 - 27 Sep 2009 

Helsinki International Film Festival 

Helsinki, Finland 17 - 27 Sep 2009 

San Sebastian Intl Film Festival 

San Sebastián, Spain 18 - 26 Sep 2009 

Manhattan Short Film Festival 

New York, US 20 - 27 Sep 2009 

FUJIFILM UK Ltd, Motion Picture Film, 56 Poland Street, London W1F 7NN T 020 3040 0400 F 020 7494 3425 Email: movingimage@fuji.co.uk 

“SO LONG, 

BOB...” 

During his time with the 

company Bob has contributed to 

virtually every aspect of Fuji's 

Motion Picture business, retiring as 

Technical Support Manager. 

He aims to maintain contact with 

the business through the BSC and 

his work on the 72 Club committee, 

as well as working as a Technical 

Consultant to the industry. "You 

haven't heard the last of me yet," he 

proudly insists. Ultimately Kathy 

and Bob want to retire down to the 

New Forest, but not in the present 

economic climate. 

Bob will be greatly missed by both 

Fujifilm and the multitude of DPs 

whom he has helped and advised. We 

wish him many more happy decades. 

Raindance Film Festival 

London, UK 30 Sep - 11 Oct 2009 

17th Filmfest Hamburg 

Hamburg, Germany 24 Sep - 03 Oct 2009 

MIPCOM 

Cannes, France 05 - 09 Oct 2009 

Ghent International Film Festival 

Ghent, Belgium 6 - 17 October, 2009 

20th Intl Festival of Fantastic Films 

Manchester, UK 16 – 18 Oct 2009 

Showeast 

Orlando, US. 26 - 29 Oct 2009 

American Film Market (AFM) 

Los Angeles, US 04 - 11 Nov 2009 

Leeds International Film Festival 

Leeds, UK 04 - 15 Nov 2009 

Stockholm International Film Festival 

Stockholm, Sweden 18 - 29 Nov 2009 

Plus Camerimage 

Lodz, Poland 28 Nov – 5 Dec 2009 

FUJIFILM WEBSITE 


FEATURING ALL ARTICLES IN EXPOSURE MAGAZINE

LOOKING FOR A NEW HIGH? 

The new Fujifilm ETERNA Vivid 500T is a 

high contrast, high saturation, tungsten film 

stock which offers excellent skin tones, 

crisp deep blacks and intense colour that 

pops right off the screen. 

High Saturation, High Contrast, High Quality. 

• High saturation, high contrast, punchy vivid colours 

• Fantastic skin tones, crisp deep blacks 

• Exceptionally fine grain with increased sharpness 

• A seamless match with Fujifilm ETERNA Vivid 160T 

• Enhanced telecine characteristics 

• Available in 35mm Type 8547 and 16mm 8647 


Tel: 020 3040 0400

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