Let’s get into how Erik Messerschmidt does what he does, by unpacking his thoughts and philosophy on photography and looking at what gear he chooses in this episode of Cinematography Style.
00:00: Introduction 01:04: Background 02:06: Visual Language & References 03:44: Perspective & Camera Movement 05:40: Post Production 07:15: Lenses 09:05: Cameras 10:51: Grips 11:33: Lighting 12:28: MUBI
Music: Ottom – ‘Hold On’ Stephen Keech – ‘Grand Design’ Nuer Self – ‘Dawn’ Liquid Memoirs – ‘Distant Dream’ Joley – ‘Night Stroll’ I Am Alex – ‘Bonfire’ The Soundkeeper – ‘The View From The Attic Window’ Sero – ‘Mid August’ Chill Winston – ‘The Truth’
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With The Killer, David Fincher created a masterpiece of cinematic storytelling.
In the first act – the Paris hit – Fincher and his team combined three sets in post. They also added typical artifacts like horizontal flares and distortions to give The Killer an anamorphic vibe.
To learn and explore, we set out to recreate the climax of the first act of The Killer, BUT to do it for real: One real location and real anamorphic lenses. We even developed a way to do film through a real rifle scope – anamorphic of course.
This was possible as DZO just introduced three new focal lengths to their awesome PAVO lineup of 2x anamorphic lenses, a 135mm, a 180mm, and a 65mm Macro. This new focal length and the general short minimum focus distance of the PAVO made them the ideal companions to shoot our short.
We take you behind the scenes, share our experiences with you, and, of course, show you the result: “The Killers” gives the original a slightly different spin…
Disclaimer: We collaborated with DZOfilm and got the full PAVO set of 9 lenses to shoot our short. As always, we strive to give you our honest opinion based on our experience and tests.
00:00: Intro & Contents 02:48: The Killer / A Cinematic Masterpiece 03:44: Subjective Camera Movement 05:00: Subjective Sound Design 05:41: Subjective Edit 06:25: Paris: A Real Fake Location 10:08: Faking the Anamorphic Look| 12:14: Reimagining The Killer 15:49: Gear: The Lenses 23:18: The Rifle Scope 25:01: Gear: The Cameras 27:45: Feature: The Killers 31:08: A Second Killer & Verdict 33:16: Thank You 34:02: Member Shout Out
Kevin Spacey is a two-time Oscar-winning actor, who starred in Se7en, The Usual Suspects, American Beauty, and House of Cards, creating haunting performances of characters who often embody the dark side of human nature.
Paramounthas just made David Fincher’s Zodiac (2007) available in 4K Digital on Apple TV, Vudu, Kaleidescape, and more. Given the amount of effort Fincher puts into his remasters, we believe it’s safe to assume that Zodiac will be coming to physical 4K Ultra HD from Paramount sooner than later as well.
Zodiac, it should be remembered, was shot mostly in 10-bit RAW in 1080p HD (4:4:4) using the Thomson Viper FilmStream camera, along with some footage in 35 mm photochemical film (Super 35 format). But anyone who doubts that it could look great upscaled and remastered in 4K would do well to take a look at HBO’s Game of Thrones: The Complete First Season in 4K UHD. The advantages of high data rate and low compression, combined with an HDR grade, really make a difference. Zodiac in particular was very well lit and photographed.
And it looks good! The color grade in particular is excellent. HDR is subtle, but it makes a difference. There’s obviously not as much detail as you’d see in native 4K, but the image is very dimensional. Color is really lovely. Should make a good UHD disc. Definitely an improvement over the Blu-ray. The best this film has ever looked.
On this episode of Prop Talk, we sit down with PMG member and Local 44Property MasterJames Eddy and his daughter, Local 44 member Assistant Property Master Kelsi Eddy, to discuss their relationship and experiences working for Directors like David Fincher in Mindhunter and The Killer.
Hosts: Chris Call, PMG Founding Member & Local 44 Property Master with Michael Trudel, PMG Secretary & Local 44 Property Master.
Jason Hill is a multi-talented artist who has made a name for himself as an award-winning film composer, platinum-selling recording artist, record producer, and mixer.
Hill’s upcoming projects include; Apple TV+‘s drama series Dark Matter, which premieres May 8th; and season 4 of Showtime’s Couples Therapy, which premieres May 31st. Hill is also a music producer on the forthcoming Robbie Williams’ biopic, Better Man.
Notable film and television credits include David Fincher‘s psychological thriller film, Gone Girl; the Emmy-winning series, Mindhunter; Voir; Videosyncrasy; and his only animated short film, Bad Travelling (part of the Emmy-winning series Love, Death, and Robots); Elijah Bynum’s drama film, Magazine Dreams; Apple TV+’s Extrapolations; and City On Fire; Netflix’s Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened; The Confession Killer; and This Is A Robbery; and Philip O’Leary‘s film, The Buffalo Hunt.
In addition to his work in film/television scoring and production, Hill is also the lead singer, guitarist, and producer for the band LOUIS XIV along with the band Vicky Cryer (which contained members of bands The Killers, Muse, Julian Casablancas and the Voidz, Jet, and Jamiroquai). In 2011, he also joined The New York Dolls and played bass on several tours after producing the album Dancing Backward in High Heels, their final Dolls album. He has produced, written records or otherwise worked with such artists as The Killers, David Bowie, Robbie Williams, Jet, Sky Ferreira, Brandon Flowers, Ariel Pink, The Virgins, Macy Gray, Neon Trees, The Bronx, Nick Littlemore/Luke Steele (Empire of the Sun, Pnau), IDKHBTFM (I Don’t Know How But They Found Me), and more. Hill was also part of the seminal alt-country band, Convoy in his early years.
In 2015 Hill bought a building in Glendale that was originally built as a music studio in the mid-1970s and reimagined it into one of the world’s premier modern recording facilities, Department of Recording and Power. This iconic complex was once the birthplace of massive hits from The Beach Boys, James Brown, Barbra Streisand, Billy Joel, Michael Jackson, Joni Mitchell, Joe Cocker, and many more, and is now reborn for the next generation of influential artists.
In David Fincher’s Netflix darkly comic thriller The Killer, Michael Fassbender is the nameless assassin who goes on an international hunt for revenge while insisting to himself that it isn’t personal.
The film marks the second Fincher-directed feature shot by Erik Messerschmidt ASC, following the Citizen Kane drama Mank, for which he won the 2020 Academy Award for Best Cinematography.
It is also the latest in a long line of Fincher movies since The Social Network to be shot on RED.
“There was not a conversation about using another camera system – there never is with David,” Messerschmidt says. “RED as a partner have been enormously collaborative with us in terms of helping us develop new ideas and solve problems. RED is absolutely creative partners to David’s process and certainly to me.”
I’d been thinking about comfort movies because I was recently bedridden with a bad cold and watching the same movie over and over. I suppose I’ve been thinking about why so many of these sorts of movies, for me at least, tend to be ones meant to make the viewer feel bad. Maybe not “why”, maybe not “meant.” Pathologizing cinematic taste can quickly turn into phrenology and, like so many artforms, one encounters works of art at various times in one’s life to vastly different effects.
I spent many solitary afternoons walking home from school while my parents were working, grabbing a box of grocery store doughnuts from our pantry, sitting on the couch, and pulling up a list of DVR’d titles I wasn’t allowed to watch, titles I hoped would be buried beneath the long column of my parents’ recorded TV shows.
Any DVD of any movie we owned that I was remotely interested in, if there was a commentary track, I’d listen to it. An increasingly rare staple of a post-theatrical release, one hears in detail how the production came together, or one hears gossip.
The first commentary track I remember listening to accompanied Stephen Sommers’ monster romp Van Helsing, featuring Richard Roxburgh, Shuler Hensley, and Will Kemp. The second was David Fincher’s Fight Club. Fincher has lived inside my ear for most of my life. Thanks to a superfan known as The Fincher Analyst, who maintains a thorough database of pretty much anything and everything related to Fincher and his work, I have the audio from the director’s available commentary tracks, plus a few of his interviews, downloaded onto my iPod. I’ve listened to the lot of them dozens of times.
The singularity of cinema lies in its unprecedented capacity to transform the energies of the other arts into an integrated audiovisual experience. This synthesis makes cinema particularly engaging, immersive, and resonant, although, precisely because the constituent elements are organically fused together, it can easily be taken for granted. Film Secession creates new ways of exploring the ideas and artistic currents that have shaped different filmmakers, periods, and art forms. Subscribers will discover nonlinear pathways through the histories of the arts, be able to watch rare films provided by the world’s preeminent studios, production companies, and archives, and have special access to events held worldwide.
The Vienna Secession is a key inspiration. Created at the very moment of cinema’s emergence (1897-1905), its motto was, “To every age its art, to every art its freedom.” By fostering deeper understanding of our cinematic heritage and revitalizing our shared creative legacies, Film Secession will similarly provide opportunities to reimagine the future.
Darius Khondji is one of the most acclaimed and influential cinematographers working today. This exhibition explores Khondji’s work – especially his approach to light, color, space, and framing – and the larger question of the role of the cinematographer as a shaping agent in the overall style of a film.
Meet Beverly Wood, an innovator in color technologies for major motion pictures. She began working as an analytical chemist in the early 1980s before moving from the east coast of the U.S. to the west coast—a move which greatly influenced the trajectory her work. Her specialized knowledge of chemistry, engineering, and filmmaking led to her award-winning contributions to the creation and development of Color Contrast Enhancement (CCE) and Adjustable Contrast Enhancement (ACE) motion picture processes.
During this live online interview, you will be inspired by the story of Wood’s career, helping cinematographers, like Darius Khondji and Roger Deakins, to achieve their visual goals, and guiding them through the transition from chemical to digital technology, which changed how we see films today.
The Fincher Analyst 