Daily Highlights from Camerimage : November 15 & 16

Where Madelyn Most reports at Camerimage "whats goin on" in the film business today for the AFC (French Assiociation of Cinematographers).

Saturday November 15th
Saturday is a blur : after many long hours travelling from Paris by plane, bus, train, and foot, I arrive late and exhausted to Bydgoszcz’s Opera House, sneak into the screening of The Imitation Game, then skip out of the long ceremony of speeches to arrive back refreshed for Alejandro Inarritu’s magnificent Birdman, The Unexpected Virture of Ignorance masterly visualized by Emmanuel Lubezki, with outstanding performances by Michael Keaton and Edward Norton, “un petit bijou” - a rare cinematic experience that knocks you out of your comfort zone.


Sunday November 16th
Sunday started off with a few (less than enthralling) seminars that had overly- technical titles, but the day brightened when Stephen Daldry interviewed his own Brazilian cinematographer, Adriano Goldman about coping with the absolute chaos that prevailed on the shoot of Trash. Huge crowds cheered Alan Rickman’s solid, second directorial venture, A Little Chaos, sensitively photographed by Ellen Kuras, that brought us into the intrigues of Louis XIV’s Versailles court while constructing some of it’s extravagant gardens. Alan Rickman is honored with Camerimage’s Krzysztof Kieslowki Award this year, which recognizes what is best and most valuable in the acting profession.

I managed to sit in on most of Unforgiven : Rwanda screening in the Documentary Films Competition, which gave a short but much needed dose of reality about 20 years after the tragic genocide.

Without a doubt, “Get On Up” was the big event Sunday evening, rocking the audience with the original music and actual voice of soul, funk, R&B legend James Brown in this bio pic that took 13 years in gestation due to legal entanglements.
The film was photographed by Camerimage’s Life Achievement veteran and honoree Stephen Goldblatt, ASC, who revealed during the press conference that the story released by the studio is only pale version of the story he and director Tate Taylor filmed.