feature He knew television so he liked the whole idea that I could move fast. I was young, uninhibited by the whole studio system. He wanted a different point of view. He got it from me. FIORE: My big break was probably the first chance I had to take that job in Hollywood. It sounds like it’s one phone call and then all of a sudden, you’re at the top of the world. But the amount of hours you spend not having much money, or looking for work, or wondering what you’re going to do next … It’s a really long process. As soon as I graduated film school, I didn’t quite have the conviction Janusz did as far as becoming a cinematographer right away. I needed to experience other things, physically working on the set. And big breaks happen all along the way, but it was a good amount of work. Throughout the 1990s, Kaminski worked on a variety of big-budget films, including several with director Steven Spielberg: Schindler’s List (1993), for which he received his first Academy Award; The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997); Amistad (1997), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award; and Saving Private Ryan (1998), for which he received his second Academy Award. Fiore worked on “various little-budget films and independent films,” including Love From Ground Zero, where he met his future wife, costume designer Christine Vollmer. FIORE: Janusz gave me the opportunity to be cinematographer on the movie he directed, Lost Souls. It was a good-size budget, and that put me in another category as far as studios taking me more seriously. KAMINSKI: It’s funny because the networks
Cinematographer:
the head of a camera and lighting crew, who works closely with the director to create the look and feel of a production by managing everything from shot composition to final color correction. Can also be known as director of photography (DP).
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have their little lists. Studios have their lists. You could be on this list for Sony, but you’re not on the list for Warner Brothers. It’s just insane. So, I think Lost Souls permitted Mauro to be on the list—this guy who can do a studio movie of $40 million in ’99. It was a good budget and Mauro’s work was so great that he was able to show his talent in that movie. You have to develop relationships with people who are at the same level and hope that that relationship will pull you up. It’s just a hand pulling a hand, but it’s not really altruistic. It’s total exploitation of your talent—what can I get from you? Hollywood is a little bit about that: “You got nothing for me? I’m going to move on to another person who’s got something for me.” DEMO: What is your own favorite film? FIORE: Training Day was probably the one I’m really most proud of because my vision really came across—every part of that little visual language is on the screen. It’s pretty unbelievable that [director Antoine Fuqua] interpreted things very similarly visually. I really liked the process of sculpting the film, the amount of care that went into it. KAMINSKI: Schindler’s List is probably my favorite movie. Making a movie look like its actuality—that was probably the most interesting part of it because that movie could have looked much more glossy under different circumstances. I really didn’t think the movie had too many false moments in terms of the visual thing. The shot of Liam [Neeson] where he’s sitting with his cigar—an iconic shot—and I take full credit for that shot. That’s a really
beautiful shot—glamorizes him, shows the audience who he is. And, of course, the last shot, when he’s in the car driving away from the concentration camp, is also great. That’s probably the movie I’m the most proud of in terms of having a really good consistency, historically. Fiore’s work as director of photography for Antoine Fuqua’s Tears of the Sun (2002) and Michael Bay’s The Island (2004), particularly the way he showcased the jungle, caught director James Cameron’s attention when he was hiring for the massively complex movie Avatar. Cameron hired Fiore after one interview. Fiore had to reinvent his approach to cinematography using Cameron’s newly developed Fusion 3-D camera system. FIORE: Avatar required a lot of experimentation, and a reinterpretation of how I deal with composition and lighting. It just became an interesting experiment for me. [Cameron] is at the height of technology. He’s a very technical director, probably one of the most technical. Jim’s whole approach is to be so specific about every little detail. There was a sequence, for instance, where all the flying vehicles were in a motion-capture environment. Jim hired helicopter pilots to come in for the day and operate those tiny helicopters, holding them on a stick and making sure that that helicopter did exactly what a helicopter does. You realize how huge a project can be and how much involvement a person can have to really put a vision across. That was a huge lesson. It was a challenging project—an
Talk like a DP: Five cinematography terms to know Grip:
a lighting and rigging technician responsible for building and maintaining camera support equipment.
Gaffer:
an electrician who establishes a production’s lighting plan and manages the grips.