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Best '00s Bond Cinematographer


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Poll: Cinematography of the 2000s

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Best cinematography in Bond films of the 2000s?

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#1 glidrose

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Posted 03 May 2014 - 08:55 PM

Your choices:

 

David Tattersall "Die Another Day"

Phil Meheux "Casino Royale"

Roberto Schaefer "Quantum of Solace"

 

No Skyfall (Roger Deakins) as it's part of the '10 decade. But since it's the only film thus far this decade, you may briefly mention it if you wish.

 

Best of the '00s lot? Probably Tattersall, if we don't include Deakins' work on SF.

 

Tattersall's work on DAD is colorful. But the PTS looks plastic and appears to have bad post-production smoothing of the image. Hong Kong and Cuba look lovely. The Iceland sequence looks perhaps too over-produced.

 

Meheux's work on CR looks so grungy and grimy. Lighting leaves a lot to be desired. Would never know he also shot GE. This is a film that should have looked exactly like TND. Instead it's like somebody left the negative in the sun for a week. It was our own Tim Partridge who pointed out how little color co-ordination there was in the casino sequences between the lighting, set and costume departments. The only time the film's visual style is appropriate is during the Venetian sequence, a nice tip-off that the film's not going to end well for Bond and Vesper. All in all, it's a shame because I now think this is the series' best film.

 

Roberto Schaefer's work on QOS is okay if unspectacular. It is however one of the most polished-looking films. It has a richness in lighting that the other films lack.

 

However if we include SF, then that is the best shot of the 21st century films. The Chinese and Scottish sequences are stunning. One crucial flaw: it's painfully obvious this film was not shot on celluloid. The dark interiors at Bond's estate don't look good. In case you didn't know, video has a major problem photographing dark-lit scenes. These should have been shot on celluloid. I also remember some really ungainly use of wide angle lenses when doing close-ups on Daniel Craig. The rest of the film's visuals are good if unspectacular.


Edited by Vauxhall, 17 August 2015 - 10:58 AM.
Poll added by moderator


#2 The Krynoid man

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Posted 03 May 2014 - 09:06 PM

I'm going to say Phil Meheux. I've always kind of liked Casino Royale's grubby and grainy look, particularly the black and white PTS.

#3 tdalton

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Posted 03 May 2014 - 11:47 PM

Hands down, for me, it's Roberto Schaefer's work on Quantum of Solace.  I don't much care for how Casino Royale looks for the vast majority of the film.



#4 jmarks4life

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Posted 23 May 2014 - 05:44 AM

Robert Schaefer all the way.

#5 Satorious

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Posted 23 May 2014 - 03:12 PM

Another +1 for Robert Schaefer here.



#6 Grard Bond

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Posted 23 May 2014 - 05:58 PM

Hum... in QoS a couple of times I think the colours are very sharp and not beautifull, like for example at the boatchase.

 

CR is very  grainy looking, so I choose Tattersall. This kind of thing happens, when you don't have much greatness to choose from....

 

If you also count Skyfall than the choice is obvious!


Edited by Grard Bond, 23 May 2014 - 06:01 PM.


#7 Double-Oh Agent

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Posted 24 May 2014 - 07:33 AM

It's between David Tattersall and Phil Meheux for me but in the end I go with...

 

Phil Meheux

 

Casino Royale looks great.



#8 SecretAgentFan

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Posted 24 May 2014 - 02:19 PM

Schaefer, definitely.



#9 dtuba

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Posted 21 September 2014 - 01:33 AM

Schaefer. Infact I will go so far to say that I enjoyed his work more than Deakin's on SF.

QOS is a beautiful film ( lighting, composition, set design, costumes) that was IMO totally ruined by the awful editing.

They spent $220USD on this film and you can barely see it.



#10 trevanian

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Posted 21 September 2014 - 02:23 AM

Schaefer, by a country mile, over everybody. I was not won over by all of Deakins' stuff (though in part that is because I hate pretty much everything in SKYFALL - even the nice-looking blue skyscraper scene is marred with suspense music  when it should have only been sound effects.) I was very puzzled by how SF's Turkey sequence just looked so wrong, something that never happens with Deakins.

 

You have to freeze frame QoS to see just how rich and wonderful it looks, because of the ADD cutting, but his work was gorgeous.

 

Hated the over-graded timeramped DAD immensely, and was horrified by CR's 'dial up the overexposure in post' look (Bond's poisoning) and lots of other excesses that distracted rather than enriched. Then again, I dislike almost everything about CR except Solange and Leiter (which sez a lot given how impressed I am with Mads in all his other work.)

 

Have VERY high hopes for the Hoyte and shooting on film with the next one ... unfortunately I can't imagine seeing another Bond movie again, because of my massive dislike of SF and the neverending problem of Craig (his appearance on camera and his influence behind it.)



#11 New Digs

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 06:17 PM

Schaefer's work is the best out of the three. I agree with the previous two posts that his work is far better than that of SF. The look of QoS is superb; cinematic but real at the same time, and captures all the locations perfectly. Some great shots include Bond returning to shore after the boat chase, the aerial shot of MI6 and all the Tosca scenes. 


Edited by New Digs, 22 September 2014 - 06:18 PM.


#12 Pierceuhhh

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Posted 16 August 2015 - 06:08 AM

Even when you include SF, the look of QOS is the most impressive of the millennium so far. The only part of that movie that really impresses me, in fact. All the horrible-looking moments (falling thru the skylight, for instance) are FX shots dictated by the Broccolis.

SF is clean, crisp and in the best Bond tradition thankfully not show-offy, but too blue and orange and generic. Give us something different!

DAD is again not show-offy, and the colours and scope were appreciated after the dreary claustrophobic disaster if TWINE!

CR is the worst of the 00s for me. There's a sickly greenish gray tinge to a lot of scenes, and the photography doesn't mask the sets. It's the cheapest-looking since LTK. GE looked great though so I have no idea what happened to Meheux!

#13 Odd Jobbies

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Posted 16 August 2015 - 11:58 AM

Even when you include SF, the look of QOS is the most impressive of the millennium so far. The only part of that movie that really impresses me, in fact. All the horrible-looking moments (falling thru the skylight, for instance) are FX shots dictated by the Broccolis.

SF is clean, crisp and in the best Bond tradition thankfully not show-offy, but too blue and orange and generic. Give us something different!

DAD is again not show-offy, and the colours and scope were appreciated after the dreary claustrophobic disaster if TWINE!

CR is the worst of the 00s for me. There's a sickly greenish gray tinge to a lot of scenes, and the photography doesn't mask the sets. It's the cheapest-looking since LTK. GE looked great though so I have no idea what happened to Meheux!

Well put.

 

I'd definitely agree that QoS has a wonderful look; slick when it needs to be, as in the film's stand out set piece, the opera scene.

 

But more impressively it's QoS' often gritty look in a way Bond has never been (and perhaps never could've been until Craig); eg. the final in car farewell between Bond and Camille, in which the the slightly blown-out and a grainy photography marry's perfectly with Craig's post battle beaten and cut face. The photography and make-up of this film understand's Craig's presence as well as, if not better than SF.

 

However, the nighttime finale moor chase in SF is in a league of it's own. Deakin's is not afraid of under-lighting (as in using only a minimum of stage lighting), unique in big-budget tentpole action movies - he brings true artistry to the masses. His use of natural light in films like No Country for Old Men brings a sense of realism hitherto lost in contemporary Hollywood.

 

In SF's finale on the moor he accentuates the natural orange a red glows of the fire so that we feel this is a real location, and not a pinewood set, which a imagine it eventually is. The colours and their atmos. reminded me of the night shoots of Apocalypse Now.

 

Beautiful work and adding to that the Bladerunner-esque atmos of his reflecting neon masterpiece that is Bond's confrontation with Patrice in Shanghai and imho these scenes are the best photography of the franchise. 



#14 SecretAgentFan

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 05:03 AM

Opinions are fine.  But this is just wrong on so many levels:

 

All the horrible-looking moments (falling thru the skylight, for instance) are FX shots dictated by the Broccolis.

SF is generic.

DAD is not show-offy!

CR is the cheapest-looking since LTK.



#15 tdalton

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 05:10 AM

Agreed, SecretAgentFan. 100%

CASINO ROYALE as the cheapest-looking since LICENCE TO KILL? No way. GOLDENEYE looks much cheaper than any of the Craig films.

I don't care much for the look of CASINO ROYALE, but it's not a cheap-looking film at all.
 

Opinions are fine.  But this is just wrong on so many levels:



All the horrible-looking moments (falling thru the skylight, for instance) are FX shots dictated by the Broccolis.

SF is generic.

DAD is not show-offy!

CR is the cheapest-looking since LTK.



#16 sharpshooter

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 06:29 AM

GOLDENEYE looks much cheaper than any of the Craig films.

I don't care much for the look of CASINO ROYALE, but it's not a cheap-looking film at all.

I think Casino Royale has Goldeneye covered in all areas. 



#17 Pierceuhhh

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 10:29 AM

CR at times looks like a Czech Republic DTV effort - which is actually halfway true! Miami Airport isn't even halfway convincing as being anywhere but a Prague high school gym they rented out.

GoldenEye for me has a burnished look, and the locations feel for the most part like the real thing. If only CR had the $$ to shoot some exteriors in Monte Carlo.

There are nice looking moments in CR, but the overall look of the movie doesn't hang together. It's a sort of visual Frankenstein monster. YOLT is the gold standard for visual unity in a Bond.

#18 Invincible1958

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 10:49 AM

Schaefer

 

Every shot looks beautiful and very sharp, never boring.



#19 Vauxhall

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 10:58 AM

Poll added.

 

Roberto Schaefer for me too.



#20 sharpshooter

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 01:16 PM

And me. I like what he brought to the table. 



#21 Mr_Wint

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 05:06 PM

Phil Meheux, definitely.

QOS looks like a sandbox. It started the trend with heavy (generic) color-correction.

#22 New Digs

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Posted 17 August 2015 - 05:55 PM

Phil Meheux, definitely.

QOS looks like a sandbox. It started the trend with heavy (generic) color-correction.

 

But CR was deliberately colour corrected too, in order to give a different feel to each locale. I don't get that sense with QoS; I think the photography is stunning looking.



#23 trevanian

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Posted 18 August 2015 - 01:50 PM

 

Phil Meheux, definitely.

QOS looks like a sandbox. It started the trend with heavy (generic) color-correction.

 

But CR was deliberately colour corrected too, in order to give a different feel to each locale. I don't get that sense with QoS; I think the photography is stunning looking.

 

Yeah, for me CR at times seems like an attempt to color saturate the thing into resembling an old Bond film after the fact by twisting the knobs around to '11.' I'd say CR very much echoes the DAD trend toward using the digital intermediate the way a little kid abuses a zoom lens or JJ Abrams misuses lens flares.

 

With QUANTUM, I'd say the color correction is a deliberate and measured attempt at creating its own colorspace for that particular movie, not making it look like somebody's idea of a Bond movie. I don't always agree with the choices, but it almost never takes me out of the movie (that is what SOME of the overcutting does.)



#24 dutch_pepper

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Posted 26 August 2015 - 02:20 PM

Definately Schaefer. QOS is beautifully shot. Love the unusual camera-angles in certain shots. It was filmed like an arthouse film. Only the editing messed it up. With a better editor it would have been a very different (much better) film.



#25 tdalton

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Posted 26 August 2015 - 04:42 PM

 

 

Phil Meheux, definitely.

QOS looks like a sandbox. It started the trend with heavy (generic) color-correction.

 

But CR was deliberately colour corrected too, in order to give a different feel to each locale. I don't get that sense with QoS; I think the photography is stunning looking.

 

Yeah, for me CR at times seems like an attempt to color saturate the thing into resembling an old Bond film after the fact by twisting the knobs around to '11.' I'd say CR very much echoes the DAD trend toward using the digital intermediate the way a little kid abuses a zoom lens or JJ Abrams misuses lens flares.

 

Exactly.

 

There are some moments in Casino Royale that look rather good.  Many of the scenes at the casino and hotel in the middle of the film look good, but some of the darker scenes seem most affected, with skin tones appearing rather orange in places.



#26 New Digs

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Posted 01 September 2015 - 05:14 PM

The link below is a superb interview with Schaefer where he talks about photographing QoS. I would love to see him come back and do another Bond.

 

http://www.crafttruc...chaefer-part-2/