Academy Award winner cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond ("Close Encounters of the Third Kind", "The Deer Hunter" among other films) talks about one of his favorites
films he ever worked for which was "The Long Goodbye" (1973), directed by Robert Altman of whom he collaborated in two other movies and of which Vilmos credits the
great director of being for his future career in Hollywood.
There are so few bonus material out there that revolves around the individuals who give the perfect look for a film and the images captured by our eyes when we're seeing the glory of movies, that is a pleasure to watch this. Too bad this short is way too short. However, Mr. Zsigmond is a fascinating storyteller, talking about his and Altman's composition of shots, the unusual (at the time) and extensive used of apparently zoom shots that back away from the characters on the foreground and revealing much more exciting, curious movements in the background that are essential to the story, a different way to look at movies. Watch this piece with the cinematographer, then rewatch "The Long Goodbye" or many of Altman's subsequent films (that sadly weren't shot by Zsigmond, this was their last collaboration) and you'll get a different view from what the director is telling you to notice, to what the camera is revealing as more important than the actors because after all we can still hear them talk while the action in other parts of the frame are more intriguing to us and for the film's real nature - in this particular case, the reinvention of private-eye Philip Marlowe in the new Hollywood of the 1970's with a clueless character always missing something - eventually, like us, he's always catching things up. A neo-noir film but still a film noir to be appreciated. 8/10
There are so few bonus material out there that revolves around the individuals who give the perfect look for a film and the images captured by our eyes when we're seeing the glory of movies, that is a pleasure to watch this. Too bad this short is way too short. However, Mr. Zsigmond is a fascinating storyteller, talking about his and Altman's composition of shots, the unusual (at the time) and extensive used of apparently zoom shots that back away from the characters on the foreground and revealing much more exciting, curious movements in the background that are essential to the story, a different way to look at movies. Watch this piece with the cinematographer, then rewatch "The Long Goodbye" or many of Altman's subsequent films (that sadly weren't shot by Zsigmond, this was their last collaboration) and you'll get a different view from what the director is telling you to notice, to what the camera is revealing as more important than the actors because after all we can still hear them talk while the action in other parts of the frame are more intriguing to us and for the film's real nature - in this particular case, the reinvention of private-eye Philip Marlowe in the new Hollywood of the 1970's with a clueless character always missing something - eventually, like us, he's always catching things up. A neo-noir film but still a film noir to be appreciated. 8/10
