Spike Lee's underrated gems

by Cláudio Alves

It seems like Spike Lee's on everybody's mind these days. First and foremost, we have the release of the director's latest feature, Da 5 Bloods, to thank for such cultural prominence. However, it would be irresponsible not to mention how current events are also bringing people to this filmmaker's oeuvre. In a time when racial injustice is being actively protested on the streets, the Black excellence and political vigor of Spike Lee's movies seem more relevant than ever…

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Beauty Break: ASC Tributes + Best Cinematography Honors

The American Society of Cinematographers will hold their annual awards dinner tonight where they'll be honoring Jeff Bridges with their Board of Governors Award, three-time Oscar winner Robert Richardson (Hugo, Aviator, JFK) with the Lifetime Achievement Award, and two time Emmy winner Jeffrey Jur (Carnivàle, Bessie) for the Career Achievement in Television Award. They'll also hand out some competitive prizes and presumably give Alfonso Cuarón yet another trophy for his mantle (let's hope he has steel reinforced shelving at home given this season's worth of hardware.) UPDATE: oops we were wrong and Cuarón lost for practically the first time this season.

Let's look at that beautiful imagery from the winners and nominees again with a few bonus gifs... 

• WINNER: Łukasz Żal, PSC for “Cold War” 

What an incredible DP Żal is. After the consecutive Pawel Pawlikowski's successes of Ida (2013) and Cold War (2018), will he be in demand in Hollywood or just stick to work across the ocean? While his best work has been in black & white in Poland he does color and cinema from other countries as well...

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More Guild Nominations: Cinematography & Sound

by Nathaniel R

Lukasz Zal's exquisite black and white cinematography for COLD WAR has been somewhat overshadowed by Cuarón's ROMA. Can Zal score his second Oscar nod?

It's that Oscar nomination voting week when the awards just don't stop, everybody getting boosts via the Globe wins, the BAFTA nominations (soon), and multiple guild announcements. Here's two more after the jump with commentary for cinematography and sound categories... 

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Yes No Maybe So: A Star is Born

by Nathaniel R

When the trailer for the fourth version of A Star is Born hit yesterday everyone was all surprised like "omg this looks... good. Could it be good?" Dear reader, we been saying that via the Oscar charts! It certainly helps that Bradley Cooper enlisted DP Matthew Libatique (Black Swan, Requiem for a Dream, Tigerland, Iron Man) to shoot it and from early images it looks like Libatique knew what an attention grabber this could be and is really going for broke. So much color and beauty. Yes! Let's do a quick Yes No Maybe So™ on this (and a few more trailers) after the jump...

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April Foolish Predictions: Let's talk Cinematography!

by Nathaniel R

We didn't forget about the April Foolish Predictions. They just got all tangled up with Tribeca screenings, Cannes news, Avengers mania, and everything else going on in April. So herewith another prediction batch. First charts are now up for all of the visual categories, barring Costume Design which will get its own post tomorrow just because. 

Cinematography is always one of the most exciting contests as there are so many genuinely gifted DPs out there doing great work over and over again but only one Oscar to hand out each year. At the moment I'm wondering about the futures of these four DPs in particular...

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