Few contemporary cinematographers are as well known as Emmanuel Lubezki. Even if he is not
a household name, the films he has shot over the years probably are. During the course
of his career he’s built up a clinical, clean look that’s aimed at immersing the
audience fully in the content of the films that he shoots.
In this video I’ll be analysing the work of one of the most in demand DOPs out there,
looking at how his opinions on cinematography and the gear he uses contribute to his original
visual style.
Lubezki, nicknamed Chivo, was born in Mexico City and it was there that he later would
meet and team up with his first, and perhaps his most important director, Alfonso Cuaron,
while the pair were studying in film school. They went on to shoot a bunch of films together
such as A Little Princess, Y Tu Mamá También, Children Of Men and Gravity.
After beginning his career on Mexican film and television in the late 80s he gradually
began to DOP local Mexican features as well as high budget international films. Over the
length of his career he’s won many awards, including 3 Oscars for Best Cinematography
[overlay oscars], and has worked with many famous directors such as: Mike Nichols, Tim
Burton, Terrence Malick, The Coen Brothers and Alejandro Innaritu. This is a case study
of the cinematography style of Emmaunel Lubezki.
“I find that if you want to create an original look and feel, you need to get deep into the
world of your own movie and keep focused on that.”
The principle of creating a world through cinematography that can hold an audience deeply,
is at the core of Lubezki’s style. Total immersion is his goal. This idea forms the
basis for him shooting with a clean look that favours a well exposed image with true blacks
in the shadows and maximum resolution. Rather than crushing the blacks too much [grade]
or softening up the image in a stylized manner [gaussian blur] he likes to maximise dynamic
range, creating images that closely replicate the experience of real life; images that try
to match what we see with the human eye.
He mentioned this as being part of his philosophy when shooting The Tree Of Life. “The most
important rule for me is to not underexpose. We want the blacks; we don’t like milky
images”.
Another element of cinematography that he uses to create his clean, immersive look is
with his lighting. Lubezki favours naturalistic, motivated lighting. He prefers using minimal
touches of light when possible to supplement the natural available light on set, never
overlighting. This is particularly true for how he shoots exteriors. First he will scout
locations, noting exactly how the light falls and how it changes throughout the day. They
will then carefully work on scheduling the exterior scene so that it can be shot at precisely
the right time when the natural light works best for the scene.
Even when shooting interiors he feels that in order to create enveloping, true to life
images it’s best to minimise lighting.
“When you put someone in front of a window, you’re getting the reflection from the blue
sky and the clouds and the sun bouncing on the grass and in the room. You’re getting
all these colors and a different quality of light. It’s very hard to go back to artificial
light in the same movie. It’s like you’re setting a tone, and artificial light feels
weird and awkward [after that].”
Using minimal lighting when possible on set also helps free up space for his style of
movement. He has worked on many films with groundbreaking grips rigs and also more traditional
rigs at times. Regardless of the equipment used his method of moving the camera is often
expansive, moving through large areas of space, sometimes in long takes. Minimising the amount
of lights on set, by using as much practical and natural light as possible frees him up
to shooting in this expansive style without worrying too much about avoiding lighting
gear in the frame.
Using long or extended takes also adds to the illusion of reality. A film that cuts
too often potentially makes the audience more aware that they are watching a film. A film
broken up into long, extended takes of camera movement creates a building feeling of riveting
real life suspense.
At the forefront of achieving the clean look that Chivo loves is the gear that he uses.
Before the digital age he always favoured creating the most pristine image possible.
This he achieved through shooting the finest grain film stocks possible using the most
perforations possible.
35mm cameras can be configured in different ways so that more or less of the 35mm negative
is exposed to light in each frame, creating a bigger or smaller negative.
Unlike in digital which is measured in pixels (such as 720pixels or 1080p) on film this
is measured in perforations or perfs. It’s possible to shoot 35mm film in 2, 3 or 4 perf.
Lubezki favours shooting 4 perf for maximum resolution and a cleaner image with less grain.
He usually shoots spherical as opposed to anamorphic.
Since digital cameras have improved he now prefers it over shooting film, favouring the
cleaner image that digital sensors can produce. “The thing that I don’t like about film,
and have never liked, is grain. Some people call it texture, but for me, when you start
seeing grain the movie becomes a representation. It’s almost like putting a veil between
you and the subject.”
In his older work, he’s shot on film cameras such as the Arricam LT or the Arri 235 which
he favours for their more compact ergonomics. Digitally he also likes to shoot Arri, having
used the Alexa Mini, XT and the Alexa 65 for large format work.
He described working on the Alexa 65 while shooting The Revenant. “The images had the
immersive and experiential qualities we had imagined at the very start. Not a representation
of the story, but reality – as if you are there, looking through a clean window.”
For years he’s shot almost exclusively on the same lenses: Zeiss’ Master Primes or
at times the older Zeiss Ultra Primes. These lenses produce a super clean, super sharp
look with minimal distortion or aberrations of any kind.
Although in his older work he’s shot with a range of focal lengths his newer work favours
wide lenses. Especially the 14mm, 18mm, 21mm and 27mm Master Primes. Shooting these lenses
at a deeper stop such as at 5.6 as opposed to wide open at T1.3 also helps to preserve
the sharpness and clarity of the image.
For a similar reason he also chooses to shoot without filters whenever possible apart from
Neutral Density filters to control exposure or a Polariser for exteriors.
Although he is famous for his use of natural light that doesn’t mean he doesn’t light
at all. Shooting exteriors he’ll utilise a white bounce to add light or a black negative
fill to subtract light. When using lighting fixtures he likes to soften the light by pushing
larger sources through a softbox, a textile or a layer of diffusion. This softens shadows
and gives the light a more naturalistic quality on screen, like when sunlight passes through
a cloud.
He likes to backlight, where the key or primary light source comes from behind the character.
He notes “We also used backlight because it gives a sense of depth, whereas frontlight
is flat”
As mentioned before he’s worked with a variety of rigs to move the camera over the years.
His movement is often stable and controlled even when handheld, partly due to his tendency
of using wide lenses.
In films such as Children Of Men they created a car rig which was able to come through the
roof and pan around the car during a long take while driving and multiple stunts happened.
He’s also used all kinds of classic grips rigs such as sticks, dolly, steadicam and
technocrane. He often uses this equipment in conjunction to create cohesive, motivated,
captivating movement.
Chivo is a technically proficient DOP who over the years has worked on films that have
continued to grow in scale: all the way from road trip films to space epics. His sensibility
to creating images that are immaculate and immersive has however remained unchanged.
The creative and technical decisions that he makes on all his films always support the
idea of creating an environment for the audience that is so immersive that they can’t help
but to get on board with the story and the characters on screen.
There’s an old idea that if a cinematographer does their job right then it will go unnoticed
by the audience because they will be so caught up in the visuals that there will be no need
to analyse or be critical of them.
I think Chivo is able to achieve this: creating visuals so strong and compelling that people’s
consciousness of the images fade away so that viewers are just left with the pure experience
of watching cinema.