OVP: Best Cinematography (2023)
The Nominees Were...
Edward Lachman, El Conde
Rodrigo Prieto, Killers of the Flower Moon
Matthew Libatique, Maestro
Hoyte van Hoytema, Oppenheimer
Robbie Ryan, Poor Things
My Thoughts: One of the easiest and best ways to get a nomination for Best Cinematography at the Oscars is to do some (or all) of your film in black-and-white. For years, this has been the easiest path, and for most of the past 15 years, there's been generally at least one film in black-and-white nominated. That stat exploded in 2023, when four of the five nominated films featured some or all black-and-white scenes in their pictures. This appears to be the first time this has happened since the 1960's, when black-and-white cinematography had its own category at the Oscars. It's a good reminder, though that just because it's in black-and-white does not mean that it gets a free pass as being "great" cinematography.
A good example of that is Poor Things. The films overuse of CGI really gets in the way of a lot of the imagery in the movie. I get what they were trying to do here. Showing a hyper-saturated view of the world in the same way that Bella, who is experiencing it for the first time, is living it makes total sense, but it doesn't work. Much of the movie's CGI is downright ugly, and the black-and-white depth adds very little, even if you get what they're doing (trying to evoke calls to Arthur Edeson's camerawork in Frankenstein). I was not impressed by this-if you're nominated here, you need to either be inventive or pretty...this is neither.
That's definitely not the case with Oppenheimer, another film that alternated between black-and-white and color, here to distinguish the two timelines the film is facing. I loved the depth of the black-and-white cinematography (Kodak apparently had to develop new 65mm film stock to achieve this), and I think that van Hoytema's ability to give us so much light in certain scenes (like the explosions) so as to overwhelm the senses, works in the film's favor. Combined with some bewitching golden hour scenes and the frenetic way he makes the combative scenes feel like you're at the table with Downey & Murphy, Oppenheimer shows the way with a big idea.
Maestro is nominated for its black-and-white cinematography specifically. The film's camera approach seems to age the older that Leonard Bernstein gets, with a sort of washed-out lens in the 1970's but in the 1950's he's very much in youthful, exuberant black-and-white. I didn't love all of this (I think the modern photography lacks the style the earlier scenes do, to the point where I also wonder if the substance is a bit lacking throughout), but it's well-constructed and there are certain scenes (like with Mulligan & Cooper sitting back-to-back) that sing off of the screen.
The only one of these films to be entirely in black-and-white was El Conde, Pablo Larrain's vampire political spoof. The film's cinematography can be beautiful. The way that we see this cavernous look at Augusto Pinochet's mansion, and the contrast of bright clouds against the dark reality of this man's lonely existence is lovely. It's also sandwiched between scenes that aren't very interesting. The movie alternates between practically oil paintings and just standard work, almost as if it's trying to win an Oscar nomination with its flashiest bits. It has to be noted that both Maestro and El Conde I saw at home, in front of a television screen because they're Netflix movies...I always find that when this happens, I tend to feel less connected to the movies visually (thus is the curse that Netflix has wrought upon the Oscars as normally these would have been in a more controlled, immersive environment like a theater).
Killers of the Flower Moon is the only movie that is entirely in color of this quintet, and proof that you can have lovely movies with a full palette too. I think the movie does really well with the outdoor sequences, using Oklahoma's unyielding landscape to the cinematographer's advantage, making it feel like we're back in time which is not easy to do in a world this vast. I also think there's an interiority to the camera-look at how small they make Mollie's world look as she gets further & further into this marriage, seemingly never able to escape it. There's an intelligence to it, and is a good reminder that this is not just about gorgeous imagery, but also about creativity behind-the-camera.
Other Precursor Contenders: The American Society of Cinematographers, generally one of the classiest & most interesting of the precursors, were an exact copy of the Oscar nominations, and they gave their win to Oppenheimer. BAFTA also picked Oppenheimer, and their only distinguishing characteristic was going for The Zone of Interest instead of El Conde. I predicted The Zone of Interest in fifth place over El Conde at sixth, and while I think that this is another place that Saltburn could've shown up (but didn't), I feel relatively confident that I was right with Zone of Interest coming from the back.
Films I Would Have Nominated: The over-dependence on black-and-white cinematography meant that we didn't get to recognize one of the most ravishing films of the year, The Taste of Things, a sumptuous feast for all of the senses as we watch the care and love put into Michelin-star cuisine.
Oscar's Choice: There was no beating Oppenheimer here, and Hoyte van Hoytema finally won an Academy Award after years of fans (including me) cheering him on.
Oscar's Choice: There was no beating Oppenheimer here, and Hoyte van Hoytema finally won an Academy Award after years of fans (including me) cheering him on.
My Choice: And I'm going to echo that, giving Oppenheimer its first Oscar statue, though not at the expense of Barbie so the matchup doesn't get any new points. Behind it (in order) are Killers of the Flower Moon, Maestro, El Conde, and Poor Things.
Those are my thoughts-how about yours? Are we all on the same page with wanting to honor Oppenheimer, or did Oscar & I miss something in one of the other nominees? Do you think Oscar will ever get over his massive crush on black-and-white cinematography? And was it The Zone of Interest or Saltburn in sixth place? Share your thoughts below!
1 comment:
I actually didn't mind the cinematography of Poor Things (I didn't love it either), but my favorite for last year was Barbie. I was amazed how the world look both real and fake at the same time.
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