AFC films in festivals

Tom Erisman, NSC, is a Dutch cinematographer who received his cinema training during his work as a gaffer between 1976 and 1987. After his shift to filming, he was behind the photography on a number of television series and films in the Netherlands. Amongst the directors with whom he has worked is Alex Van Warmerdam, with whom he worked in the past on The Northerners in 1992 (2^nd unit) and more recently on The Last Days of Emma Blank in 2009. Borgman is his latest film. (FR).

The three-time Oscar nominee (Amélie Poulain,A Very Long Engagement and the sixth Harry Potter movie), Bruno Delbonnel, AFC, ASC, recently filmed Dark Shadows, by Tim Burton and Faust by Alexander Skouras. Joel et Ethan Coen called on him to visually recreate 1960’s New York for the set of Inside Llewyn Davis

Above all, the AFC is represented at the 66^th Cannes Film Festival by the films in the Official Selection and the parallel selections that were filmed by its members. Our associate members are represented by the various ways that they have each individually contributed to the making of these films.

Less than a month before the beginning of the festivities, the Cannes Film Festival has announced the 66^th Official Selection through its President, Gilles Jacob, and Thierry Frémaux, Managing Director, at the usual press conference. Before the release of the announcement of the films chosen by the parallel sections, there are already 11 AFC member directors of photography who were responsible for the cinematography of 12 films in the selection.

Although the Cannes Film Festival’s Official Selection included not less than 12 films whose directors of photography are AFC members (11 exactly), the parallel sections, meaning the Directors’ Fortnight and the International Critics’ Week, have been, a s far as we can tell, less generous towards our members...

Caroline Champetier, AFC, has worked alongside Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Lanzmann, Benoît Jacquot, Jacques Doillon, Amos Gitai, Arnaud Desplechin and Xavier Beauvois, to name a few. It was thanks to the success of Of Gods and Men (Des hommes et des dieux) that she won the César award for Best Cinematography in 2001. Her work has been frequently selected for competition in the Cannes Film Festival (The Sentinel, Don’t Forget You’re Going to Die, The School of Flesh, H Story, Tokyo, Of Gods and Men), she is back this year with Holy Motors, the first new feature-length film by Léos Carax in eleven years. This film reprises ten characters, including the character invented during their 2008 collaboration on the Merde segment from the skit-based film Tokyo, also directed by Michel Gondry and Bong Joon Ho).

Since his beginnings as a director of photography in the early 1990’s alongside Jean-Pierre Jeunet and FJ Hossang, Darius Khondji, AFC, ASC, has developed an international reputation through his work on films by some of the greatest directors on both sides of the Atlantic. His impressive filmography includes David Fincher’s Seven, Roman Polanski’s The Ninth Gate, Wong Kar-wai’s My Blueberry Nights, or Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen. Today, he is competing in the 65^th Cannes Film Festival with his film Love, directed by Michael Haneke.
This is his second film with this great director, following Funny Games in 2007.

Jean François Hensgens SBC, who joined the AFC in 2010, began his career as First AC on the Dardenne’s brothers movies La Promesse, Rosetta and Le Fils. He was then assisting Alain Marcoen SBC, long time cinematographer of the famous directors.
He photographed his first movie in 2004: Fratricide a film by Yelmas Arslan and then started his collaboration with Olivier Van Hoofstad on the 2 movies: Dikkenek and Go Fast.
Later he shot Banlieue 13-Ultimatum by Patrick Alessandrin, Tête de Turc by Pascal Elbé, Cat Run and Darktide by John Stockwell.
Joachim Lafosse’s last script is based on a real tragic story: a mother of five, killed her children by cutting their throat. This horrible story shocked whole Belgium five years ago.
For this drama, Emilie Dequenne ( Rosetta in the Dardenne’s film) and the partners from Le Prophète , Jacques Audiard’s actors , Niels Arestrup and Tahar Rahim joined the casting.

After working on Wilde Salome directed by Al Pacino, which was screened at the last Venice Film Festival, Benoît Delhomme, AFC, continues his career in the USA by filming Lawless. Following The Proposition in 2005, this is his second collaboration with Australian director John Hillcoat and his fellow countryman Nick Cave, singer and screenwriter.
This film has one of the most prestigious casts of any presented at the 65^th Cannes Film Festival (Guy Pearce, Shia LaBeouf, Tom Hardy, Jessica Chastain, Mia Wasikowska et Gary Oldman). (F. R.)

As is the case every year, the AFC will be present at the Cannes Film Festival first and foremost by the films that have been chosen for the Official Selection (In Competition and Un certain regard), the Directors’ Fortnight and the Critics’ Week, that were filmed by some of its member directors of photography. Ten “AFC” films will be screened this year in these selections. An eleventh film will also be added with a restored classic to be screened at Cannes Classics (see the detail of the “AFC” films in the Official Selection and in the Parallel Selections).

Yves Cape studied at the INSAS film school in Brussels. After having started out as an assistant he made his debut as DoP on short films in the 90’s. His encounter with Alain Berliner on the short film Rose (1993) led to the signing for the photography of the successful feature Ma vie en rose.
Since then his filmography has included films in France (Persécution by Patrice Chéreau, White material by Claire Denis) and abroad (Le Gardien des buffles in Vietnam, L’amore inperfetto in Italy or In Gods Hands in the US). A close collaborator of director Bruno Dumont he is at his side for the fourth time at this years Cannes Film Festival with the film Hors Satan.

Alain Marcoen, SBC, studied at the IAD Brussels, but not being very attracted to the pressures a camera assistant has to face, he preferred to start out as a lighting technician. Getting some work on documentaries and drama, he met Jean-Claude Riga for whom he started to operate.
Being from Liège, he quickly got accustomed to shooting films that deal with the social problems of large steel city. In collaboration with operator Benoît Dervaux, another long time crew member of the Dardenne brothers, they signed for the photography of all their films since La Promesse.

After having worked his way up as a lighting technician, Glynn Speeckaert divided his career as a DoP on feature films and numerous international commercials. Based for some time now in the US , he has a filmography of English, German or French films. After having replaced Yorick Le Saux to shoot A l’origine for Xavier Giannoli, it is Radu Mihaileanu who calls upon his talents this time to shoot La Source des femmes (The Source), his second film in the official competition at Cannes.

For the past twenty years, Christophe Beaucarne has been working on features steadily, collaborating with many directors, including Bruno Podalydès, Cedric Klapish, Arnaud and Jean-Marie Larrieu, Jaco Van Dormael... So it was fitting to see his cinematography credit on not one but two films at Cannes this year: Outside the Law, by Rachid Bouchareb and On Tour, by Mathieu Amalric.

Laurent Brunet, who has photographed all of Raphael Nadjari’s films (including Tehilim, selected at Cannes in 2007), has a lot of experience filming abroad. But he didn’t know Africa, which he discovered while collaborating for the first time with Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, the only African to compete at Cannes 2010, with his fourth feature film, A Screaming Man. The original title was A Screaming Man is not a Dancing Bear a quote from The Notebook, Returning Home by the poet Aimé Césaire.

Presided by director Tim Burton, the jury of the 63^rd Cannes Film Festival awarded the Palme d’Or to the Thai film Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, with cinematography by Sayombhu Mukdeeprom, Yukontorn Mingmongkon and Charin Pengpanich.

During the last Cannes Film Festival, the AFC published on its website a series of interviews with directors of photography, some members of the association some not, who had a film in one of the selections.
On the occasion of the film’s release in theaters, we offer an interview with Guillaume Deffontaines about his work on The Voyage aux Pyrenees by Arnaud and Jean-Marie Larrieu.
With Sabine Azema, Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Arly Jover, Gurgon Kyap

In a playful homage to the fantastic genre, The Border of Dawn reunites a young photographer who falls in love with a star who commits suicide, and then reappears in the life of the young man. This second film with Philippe Garrel confirms an effective and serene collaboration. Garrel’s working method and William Lubtchansky’s vast experience (a hundred feature films in forty years) combine to create a free and efficient mise en scène. Their association allows for artistic expression without artifice or showiness.