Black Widow, the twenty-fourth entry in the Marvel feature-film franchise, moves forward into Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe by looking backward – to a time after Captain America: Civil War and before Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame. Natasha Romanoff/ Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) embarks on a mission that has her face personal demons in the form of her ersatz family from the Eastern Bloc. They include a pair of other Black Widow assassins (Rachel Weisz and Florence Pugh) and the Russian super-soldier Red Guardian (David Harbour). 50
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While delivering all the requisite thrills of the Marvel canon, Black Widow’s aim is often intimate and personal. That’s why Marvel President Kevin Feige sought out a director, Cate Shortland, whose résumé was unrelated to superheroes and fantasy. By way of contrast, director of photography Gabriel Beristain, ASC, BSC, AMC, had, in addition to amassing notable feature credits like Blade II and The Spanish Prisoner, handled additional photography on more than a halfdozen Marvel features and acted as cinematographer for eight episodes of its Agent Carter series. For this July Interview Issue, ICG contributor Kevin Martin conducted a virtual Q&A with the film’s creative principals, including Shortland, Beristain, Visual Effects Supervisor Geoffrey Baumann, 1st AC Danny Ming, DIT Natalie Carr, and Camera Operator Abby Linne (SOC), and Senior finishing artist/supervising colorist Jill Bogdanowicz. How did you get involved with the project, and how did the visual aesthetic evolve? Director Cate Shortland: Marvel seemed to like a German film I made called Lore, both for how we shot it and the rawness of the lead character’s emotional journey. I think they brought me in to make sure Natasha’s epic path felt truthful with how it revealed her suffering and vulnerability. This is a person who doesn’t have superpowers, and, in any case, I wanted to look at her first as a woman. You often didn’t see her off by herself in the other films, since she was operating in relation to men. We get away from that a little this time, and