Ulster's Hollywood picture maker

Friday, March 23, 2007

One of the biggest films you've worked on is World Trade Center, directed by Oliver Stone. Considering its sensitive subject-matter - the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers - did you have apprehensions about the commission?

The only apprehension I had was about working with Oliver Stone - one of my all-time film heroes. He's such an extraordinary director and he's worked with such brilliant cinematographers, such as Bob Richardson - with whom he made films like JFK, Born on the Fourth of July, and Natural Born Killers - that I was worried he would consider me not up to scratch.

In the event, we got on very, very well. He has a keen photographic sensibility and he and I worked out a very precise strategy for how the film would look. And, for a man whose work is defined by a kind of operatic style, what we opted for in World Trade Center was actually quite spare and restrained.

Although the scale of the events in question is massive, the focus of the film is on a tiny group of people, trapped under rubble. So it was this Beckett-like exchange of voices in the darkness. Visually, it was exploring the conversation between light and dark. So it had a philosophical resonance too.

Objectively, it's not a film where you would remark on the cinematography, but because we thought about every single frame and worked out exactly how it should look, I'm very proud of it.

You've worked with many top film directors - which ones made the biggest impression?

I have been so lucky to have worked with such brilliant directors, even though each one has been very different. It's hard to single any one out, but if pushed, I would have to say Oliver Stone for the reasons above; Mike Nicols with whom I worked on Wit; and Stephen Frears, with whom I worked on High Fidelity.

Most recently, I had the joy of working with Joe Wright [who directed the Keira Knightley version of Pride And Prejudice] who happens to be a good friend of mine going back nearly 20 years, on Atonement. I've just seen the rough cut and I'm delighted with it.

Because Joe and I are pals, there was a great, easy communication that made things very easy. Film sets can be high-octane places - tempers can flare - but if you have a shorthand in terms of communication, it means no energy is wasted on the usual dance of diplomacy.

Atonement is epic in scope - the narrative encompasses Dunkirk and war-torn London. How do you go about the cinematography for such a film?

The book itself is very detailed in its descriptions, so it's a good inspiration for scene-setting, plus Christopher Hampton's screenplay was characteristically excellent.

For the Dunkirk scene, we were on location in Redcar, on the north east coast of England, and the whole seafront was utterly transformed with about 1,000 extras, period trucks, tanks, etc. It was a real example of how daring Joe is as a director. A scene of that magnitude costs an absolute fortune, yet Joe decided he wanted to do everything in one take, which is very complex.

The result is mesmeric. There's no lie involved. It's completely unbroken by editing or contrivance.

Another of the films on your CV is High Fidelity, the Hollywood adaptation of Nick Hornby's popular novel. Most people, when they think of that film, will probably remember the soundtrack rather than any visual element ... was that experience very different from Atonement?

Cinematography doesn't always have to be bombastic or grand in scale - you have to bring the same discernment to a small, indoors film. But sure, High Fidelity has a blander patina, photographically speaking - I mean, most of it takes place in a fluorescent-lit record shop. To go all Kurosawa would just have been ridiculous!

It was your first Hollywood film?

It was, and because of that, a very important stepping-stone. It showed the studios that I was capable of working on a big-budget film. It was also great fun - it was one of Jack Black's first roles, and the outtakes were priceless.

And John Cusack was a wonderful actor, and we had Catherine Zeta Jones, and Tim Robbins and all these great people dropping in.

It opened a lot of doors for me.

Do you watch films you've worked on for pleasure?

Sure. I recently took my daughter and wife to see Charlotte's Web, for example, and I was completely blown away. It was quite a technically difficult film to work on, so I hadn't really connected with the bigger picture.

I was so impressed by the end result and the emotional punch of it.

How did you start out?

With still photography. I got myself a little camera when I was about 13 and growing up in Armagh. I would take black and white photos and develop my own pictures around Armagh - really building up a sort of portrait of the city.

An art teacher at the Christian Brothers school, Declan Forde, was very, very encouraging and he lent me a Super 8 camera and I started making wee films. Soon I realised I had a serious interest in making films, so I applied to do a cinematography course in London - there were none in Ireland then - at what was the Central London Polytechnic and is now the University of Westminster.

After three years of study, I started working as a clapper-loader, and got my first cinematography job proper on Michael Winterbottom's Butterfly Kiss - a lucky break.

You must get pretty up-close-and- personal with actors on set ... presumably you've met a few prima donnas?

I've been really lucky in that I've always worked with really great actors.

Oh, come on - stop being so diplomatic! Dish the dirt!

Seriously, there's nothing I'd love more than to give you a nice bit of juicy gossip, but I have to honestly say that all the actors I've ever worked with have always been really great. You do get quite close to them while you're on a set, but then at the end of the day everyone just goes back to their trailers - it's very rare that you'd actually socialise together.

Well, to come from another angle, have there been any actors that have particularly impressed you?

Yes, Emma Thompson is a class apart, both as a professional and a person. The same goes for Julianne Moore and Keira Knightley. And James McAvoy is one of the most down-to-earth people I've ever met, as well as being a supremely talented actor.

What about Sasha Baron Cohen?

I only worked on Ali G for a few days, as I was filling in for someone else, but it was really good fun. I'm quite a Cohen fan as I thought Borat was one of the best films of last year. I laughed all the way through.

As a cinematographer, you are one of the key members of a film crew ... yet you'll never be a household name. Does it ever grate that the director gets all the credit?

No, I'm very glad to be behind the camera - I wouldn't want to have a public profile or to have to do lots of socialising, or anything like that. Anyway, the whole process of making a film is totally collaborative - no one person could make a film by themselves; it's a process that's shared by many different people.

Speaking of which, what exactly is cinematography - in layman's terms?

It's the process of putting on to film the director's and the writer's vision in a practical way. It will include setting up shots, discussing how each scene will be broken down into parts, what the overall look will be, the lighting, the tone, the texture, etc. It's a joint process between the director, screenwriter, production designer, set designer, costume designer, art department, etc.

Lastly, what film are you most proud of?

Probably The Hours, which starred three of the most talented - and beautiful - actors I've ever worked with: Julianne Moore, Meryl Streep and Nicole Kidman. Because it's set in three time-periods - the 1920s, 1950s, and the present - it threw up a host of technical challenges. But it was so well-received, critically, and that was really gratifying.

In Conversation With Seamus McGarvey takes place tomorrow from 12-2pm at the studio cinema, 23 Donegall Street, as part of the Belfast Film Festival. The Hours will show tomorrow at 5pm at the QFT. Box office www.belfastfilmfestival.org or 9033 0443.