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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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Vilmos Zsigmond
Age: 85 †
Born: 1930
Born: June 16
Died: 2016
Died: January 1
Cinematographer
Film Producer
Segedo
Love
Mostly
Impressionists
Think
Photographer
Rembrandt
Thinking
Photograph
Dutch
Fact
Photographers
House
Robert
Facts
Astonishing
Light
Photographs
Vermeer
Able
Hanging
Hungarians

More quotes by Vilmos Zsigmond

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It's all about special effects and explosions now. It leaves me just cold when I walk out of the theater. There's no heart there's no soul. Movies used to be about people. It's as though we don't tell stories any more. The studios have to make money, and if you want to make $20 million, you have to spend $200 million.
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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I was really fortunate from the time I arrived in Hollywood to work with some of the greatest directors from the beginning. I worked with Robert Altman, John Boorman, and of course Steven Spielberg, Michael Cimino, Brian De Palma ... I couldn't pick one of them they were all different, but they are all so talented.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I hope that film is going to stay as an artform and that people won't forget that there are good movies also to be made.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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A good [film] director is talented, imaginative, and does his homework.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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In fact, I probably learned more about photography from studying black-and-white photography in those magazines [Look Magazine and LIFE Magazine] than I did from watching movies here. That's the truth.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I am actually retired - yes, I am retired. But I like to work. So I'm retired until someone calls me up to work.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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When I was in Hungary in December I was looking at student films and I could not tell which ones were shot on film and which ones were shot digitally. I think that is because the filmmakers in Europe go to four years of film school and learn the techniques.
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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Telling the story with only a few shots, I love that style. It makes you feel like you're part of the action, part of the story. It reminds me of the theater, where one act is basically like one long shot. It almost makes you forget that you're seeing a movie.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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What I would suggest to the young people is to not forget this and don't try to get assimilated into today's Hollywood style of movies because I don't think it's going to last long.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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I look at a picture like Scarecrow and think, 'Jesus, how could they have let us make that?' I mean, if you used technology that old nowadays, it would look like old Hollywood.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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There is a difference between creating something and just capturing something. And when we were using film, it was not that fast, and it was expensive, so there was incentive to make sure the shot was exactly right before we rolled. With digital, it's fast and its cheap, and it's easy to bypass the rest.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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There are a lot of directors out there that don't like to deal with actors, I think. Many of them have said something like, in the future they will actually manipulate the actors on their computers. But don't believe all this.
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 always try to tell the story the best possible way. I create the mood for each scene in a way that the audience feels that they are right there with me and they feel actually in the mood that was right for the scene.
Vilmos Zsigmond
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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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There is something missing in a lot of digital filmmaking, something I call poetic reality. That's something you see played out in film noir, where the technique establishes the mood.
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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I love Woody Allen. He's very clever, always thinking, and he's great with actors. He lets actors do what they want to do and occasionally he'll give them a specific kind of direction.
Vilmos Zsigmond