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Some movies are what I would call murky. Just because it's murky doesn't make it artistic. It makes it hard to see.

Vilmos Zsigmond

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Vilmos Zsigmond
Age: 85 †
Born: 1930
Born: June 16
Died: 2016
Died: January 1
Cinematographer
Film Producer
Segedo
Makes
Doesn
Hard
Make
Would
Murky
Artistic
Movies
Call

More quotes by Vilmos Zsigmond

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When we came to America, the movies here needed a new wave. European films looked totally different than American movies, which were these lush, glossy pictures with this elaborate production design.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I'm not really satisfied with the technology today. Using film was so much easier than the digital technology of today. But digital is still at the beginning of what it can be and they'll be fixing all those problems.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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As an actor, Sean [Penn] is brilliant. And he's really an excellent director, as well. We got along really well.
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You can't just stick with what you know, you have to evolve.
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I should mention Vittorio Storaro, who was Bernardo Bertolucci's cinematographer. You watch those films and they are exceptional.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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You used to feed a piece of celluloid into an editor. [Digital] is not expensive and that is an advantage, but I must say that I don't love it.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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These days that wouldn't happen - waiting for the light to be exactly right. Because it takes time and time is money. And with these big productions with expensive actors, you just don't have the time to get every shot exactly right.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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Mexican cinematographers Gabriel Figueroa and Emilio Fernandez were students of both Sergei Eisenstein and Toland. Their exteriors and lighting were gorgeous. And the films Ingmar Bergman did with Sven Nykvist were exceptional.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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Sometimes the shots serve as homages to other movies and other directors, like Hitchcock.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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There is something more to reality than just the tangible. There is also mood, and you cannot skip that.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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You always like to be the collaborator. I don't want to take over the movie, because if I want to do that, I should really become a director because then you have the control of everything, basically. I'm very happy to just be the visual part of it, doing the visual part of the movie.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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In Slumdog Millionaire when you are immersed in the point of view of children in the slum and the bustle of the city, the handheld camerawork is amazing. A handheld camera is perfect for establishing point-of-view and for instilling the feeling that you are there.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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You make a film for a million dollars and then it costs $10 million to sell it. That's the problem at the moment with independent filmmaking: You can make it cheap and then there's no money to market it.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I like to work with talented people, I must say that. That's my weakness. I really like to work with good directors. That doesn't mean I don't like to work with starting up young directors, that's fun also.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I like to say that lighting is about taking the light away. I often like to use the shadows more than the light.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I love the Dutch impressionists - Vermeer, Rembrandt. What they were able to do with light was astonishing. As for photographers, I think mostly of the Hungarians: Robert Capa, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Jozsef Pesci. In fact, I have one of his photographs hanging in my house.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I don't think there is any advantage to digital unless it's in a case like Slumdog Millionaire, where you have to get a shot and a big bulky film camera is out of the question.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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Technology has a great deal to do with it. The Panaflex camera was a big breakthrough when it came along it changed everything, because now you could shoot from the perspective of a person riding in the backseat of a car.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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The studios are never going to make $200 million a picture with those types of movies. It's not familiar to them, and it's not a model that can necessarily be sustained. Now, if they go back to making movies about people ... well, I hope they do that.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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There are many, many different kinds of movies and directors and styles. I don't mind that a movie looks like a movie.
Vilmos Zsigmond