| An Interview with Cinematographer Neal Fredericks  Part II |
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wholmmovies: When you talk about Phase Two of the Blair Witch Project, was that just footage that wasn't used? or was it advance work on a possible sequel? or what do you mean by "Phase Two"? Neal Fredericks: Phase Two was the outer narrative structure of the film. The inner structure was the footage that the actors shot. There was an outer narrative structure where their professor found the footage, he filmed himself putting the footage together and talking to the camera, almost like an In Search Of... episode, or an Unsolved Mysteries type of feel. And all that was shot, but the filmmakers felt like it didn't work, so they didn't use it. wm: I can see where that would have been a hard-sell. NF: I think it probably just made it look too much like a TV show. It would have made the audience more comfortable and probably would have made the film too predictable. wm: Aside from Blair Witch Project, which of your films have had the widest audiences? NF: Dreamers had a big festival run, it played eight or ten festivals all over the world. It had a theatrical release on the West Coast, L.A., San Francisco... it got reviewed in all the trades. Variety, the LA Times, everybody covered it. Laughing Dead, a horror film that I shot, you can rent that, it's in most video stores. It was released in 1998 but I shot it in 1996. Killer Me is doing really well in festivals, at Telluride, Hamptons and MethodFest. Those are all major festivals and I expect they'll have a distribution deal for that film very soon. wm: I've seen Killer Me and I think it's great, I really like it. NF: That film was shot on 16mm with a budget under $100,000. wm: What percentage of your work is 16mm? NF: Over the last couple of years I've been shooting more and more of it. Filmmakers that are making direct-to-video movies, they don't want to invest the money, so their budgets usually don't allow for 35mm. The last two movies I shot were 16mm; the one before that was 35mm, The Stonecutter. wm: Can you give us a breakdown of approximately what percentage of your work is 16mm, 35mm and digital video? NF: For features, about one-third of my work has been 35mm and two-thirds on 16mm. I've shot quite a bit of video for Internet-based TV shows, unfortunately all those companies are gone now. People were so ambitious about that at first, but they couldn't get it on the Internet in a way that made people want to watch it. wm: Not everyone has broadband, and even those who do don't necessarily have the stable throughput to support quality video. NF: Exactly. And most people I know don't want to watch programs on their computer, even if they have a good broadband connection. The video work I did last year was either digital video or DigiBeta, and I shot some Hi-Def, including some work I did for a Pauly Shore movie on Hi-Def. wm: How much of the equipment do you own, or do you rent it all? NF: Most of the time, when I shoot a film or a television show, they rent the equipment. You'll talk to some DPs who own the equipment, but I find that to be a detriment. That's just my personal opinion, I'm sure someone will disagree with me, but in the low-budget, independent world, if you own your equipment, that's what people want you for, as opposed to what kind of work you do. I'm sure I've lost some jobs because of that, but... wm: Owning and maintaining all the equipment you use in your work would probably be a big headache for you. NF: I do have three 16mm cameras that I use as "B" cameras. They are "old school" cameras that don't require the level of maintenance of some of the newer equipment, but they deliver the same results. wm: I have to ask you about this film title: You'll Never Wiez in This Town Again. NF: That's a Pauly Shore film. He had a saying when he was on MTV called the Wiesel. That was like his calling card, that was a verb to him. This movie is almost a bio-pic, about himself. The movie got picked up, so you may be able to see it sometime soon.. wm: This may not be a fair question, but do you have any personal favorites among the films you've worked on? NF: At this point, there's two that I'm really proud of. One is Dreamers, the other one is The Stonecutter. Dreamers because it's a film in the vein of Francois Truffaut, that kind of sensibility, and that's so rare in filmmaking. It's so rare when you get to work with a director or a script that's like that. I've yet to shoot anything that comes close to that as far as the cinematic sensibilities. The director utilizes the visual medium to help tell the story, as opposed to it being just a recording device. The Stonecutter because it's a family film, a fantasy film about a fairy tale, and we shot it in Tahiti. It's just a georgeous picture, a cinematographers dream.. wm: Has Stonecutter been released yet? NF: Hasn't been released yet, they just finished editing it. It's by the same director that did Voodoo Mardi Gras, Daniel Zirilli.. He's a director that does different genres. The ironic thing is that we did Voodoo Mardi Gras after we did The Stonecutter, but Voodoo Mardi Gras sold first, just because it's a horror film. The Stonecutter is a family film that kids could watch. wm: What is it like, working with a lot of different directors? NF: There are a lot of different types. Some directors, as long as the shot is in focus, and the film is exposed properly, they could care less about what it looks like. It's mostly the inexperienced directors that are like that, or the ones that come from an acting background. They don't want to be bothered with the technical aspects of the film. When you're shooting a film, if the cinematographer and the director are on the same page, everything usually runs much more smoothly, the director understands what you're trying to do and gives you time to do it. Some directors don't care, they want the actors in front of the camera, they want the dialogue said and then they want to move on. wm: I would think that some directors would be very interested in the technical aspects, and would say "I want this, I want that" and be demanding or even controlling. NF: I've worked with a lot of directors like that. My wife is like that. She comes from a photography background, because her dad used to shoot commercials in China. Asians have this visual sensibility that's incredible. On Dreamers, she told me exactly what she wanted it to look like, what lens to use, where to put the camera... We did photography tests, processing tests, camera tests. Some directors will show me a photograph and say "this is the general scheme of what I want the film to look like." On Callback, the director gave me some visual references of what he wanted, but other than that he basically let me do whatever I wanted to do. Choice of film stocks, choice of lenses, how to cover the scene. We made a really long shot list, which is a good idea. Once we started actual filming, he was more involved with the actors, so I could do my work to accomplish the look. We shot the movie so quickly, in about fourteen days. The budget was only around $100,000 so that only allows you a couple of weeks of shooting. | |
Actor Richard Eden wears a body camera during the filming of Callback. Neal Fredericks (right) confers with Eden while a technician checks the belts and straps. photo copyright 2002, Chris Glatis/G-Man Productions |
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wm: Tell us about the body cam. NF: The actor is controlling the frame. It's an incredible piece of equipment. It gives you a really unique perspective. The foreground, which is basically the actor, has a different movement than the background. It's hard to explain unless you see it, but when you see it, you recognize it immediately. Requiem for a Dream and Pi both utilize a body cam. If you watch a high end car commercial, and they rig the camera to the fender, that's a variation on the body cam. wm: It looks like to me that the body cam has got to effect the actor's movement because of the weight and the bulk. NF: Actually, no. For the rig for Callback, I used a really small 16mm camera. There's no cables, no batteries. The weight was very low, so he was able to walk down a sidewalk on Hollywood Blvd and enter a store as part of one of the scenes. He was able to go and do whatever he wanted as long as he didn't bash the rig into something. When you use a body cam, it can become overused quickly. On Callback, we just wanted to show the body cam shot for less than a minute. wm: The straps come across the shoulders, so when you're using the body cam, the only part of the actor you can use is a closeup of the actor. NF: You can shoot the whole actor if you have the budget for it. There's a Mick Jagger video where he wears the body cam for the whole video. They digitally erased the rig. On a low-budget movie you can't do that. We just design the shot to work in its basic form. Still, the way it captures the perspective of the scene is very different from being handheld or on a tripod. End of Part IIto be continued...! return to wholmmovies main page |