Happy Sad Confused - Hoyte Van Hoytema, Vol. II

Episode Date: August 24, 2023

Happy Sad Confused's OPPENHEIMER continues with a deep dive with the brilliant cinematographer, Hoyte Van Hoytema! It's a rare extended chat with one of Christopher Nolan's closest collaborators. OPPENHEIMER is his 4th collaboration with Nolan after INTERSTELLAR, DUNKIRK, and TENET. Check out the ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Happy Sad Confused patreon here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠! We've got discount codes to live events, merch, early access, exclusive episodes of GAME NIGHT, video versions of the podcast, and more! To watch episodes of Happy Sad Confused, subscribe to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Josh's youtube channel here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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none of you are safe. New episodes every Wednesday, wherever you get your podcasts. This film had a lot of sort of, you know, dangers, you know, just on script level. It was like, this can turn out bad or terrible or, you know, or people are going to hate it for it, you know. Every film for me is a new challenge to figure things out that I didn't know before. Prepare your ears, humans.

Happy, Sad, Confused begins now. I'm Josh Horowitz, and today on Happy Say I Confused, I continue to embrace my Oppenheimer obsession with the world. the film's brilliant cinematographer, Hoita Van Hoitima. He is the man responsible for bringing the visions of Christopher Nolan to the very big screen in recent years. He's one of the very best at what he does, the list of credits, speak for themselves, let the right one in. Her, Interstellar, Dunkirk, Nope. It was that last film, in fact, that brought him on the podcast alongside the great Jordan Peel.

This time, he's back, center stage. Got the spotlight all to himself today. Hoita Van Hoitima, welcome back to Happy Say I Confused. It's good to see you. Thank you. And thank you for that introduction. As you know by now, I'm a fan of your work. I'm in particular a fan of this work. I've had on, Chris has been on the pod for this. Emily, Killian. I'm just going to keep going down the credits until I'm up and hemored out, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. first to talk to me a little bit about um i mean do you engage with the reception you must be so thrilled obviously box office is great but also just um this is i mean the barbie phenomenon is

one thing but this is kind of like a three hour drama to receive like this is kind of insane i know it is insane and and i mean engaging with uh with um with the reception if that means that I sort of really keep track of how many people are watching it, et cetera, et cetera. Yes, I love, I love, I love, I love, you know, I love sort of reading about the way that the audiences respond. And I think, you know, the numbers that flock to the screens is, of course, a very good indication but but in this particular case for us and for me it was particularly exciting to to also see how many people or at least you know how interested people were in in in in in experience this

film you know on the big screen and and and for instance on analog film and and and on iMacs you know we put always so much energy in trying to create you know the sort of the best experience we can we can give you know and and so in that way to see people actually yeah seeing that and and and and and and realizing that you know that that that that specific screen experience is a little special and therefore you know we're going to tell our friends we're going to tell our family and and it it it's it's it's it's very it's it's very satisfying to see that you know it's it's it's a little bit like so much and we put in there and, you know, it just feels like, oh, people get it. You know, you know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And to see, yeah, the record setting in terms of the IMAX and the 70 millimeter presentations of the four times I've seen it, I've been lucky enough to see it three times in 70 millimeter IMAX here in New York at Lincoln Square. And let me ask you then. I mean, it is slightly different experience, isn't it? It is. I mean, look, I saw it on a digital projection as well, and it worked. And like, I mean, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a or just film in so many different respects. But you guys put so much care and love into the way it's presented.

It's not, you know, like, yeah. And by the way, I mean, I absolutely don't want to be snobby or smug about it. I, you know, I don't think that people should watch it, you know, that way because we intended it to be seen that way. But I just, I just want to say, like, we absolutely did our best to, you know, provide that way. And then, however people watch it afterwards, you know,

we have to be happy and satisfied. And anyway, people watch it. But, but a lot of blood, sweat and tears has went into sort of really investing in that very specific cinematic experience. And so, yeah, if you got a chance, you know, see it and get smitten the way I myself got smitten the first time, you know, I saw a test of IMAX running on the screen, you know? Yeah, yeah. Talk to me a little bit about, before we get into my thousand questions

about this particular film, this is, I believe, your fourth collaboration in the last about decade with Christopher Nolan. Interstellar was the first one. How does that happen? Does he just cold call you and offer to you? Do you kind of have to kind of give your presentation

on what you would do with it? How did this relationship begin in the first place? No, I think. I think, you know, careful, because Chris had been working, you know, half of his career, or, you know, I'm saying now half of his career. Back then he had worked his whole his career with a different cinematographer and very consequently with Wally. And at some point, you know, Wally started to focus more on directing. And so Chris was going to need a new partner to do his films with. And, you know, he started looking.

And I think I was on a long list of amazing cinematographers that work in Hollywood. At some point, you know, we met and we talked and we connected. And somehow there's not so much more to it, you know. I think very much those initial meetings, they're very much, you know, about, yeah, just finding some sort of common ground. and some sort of common connection. And, you know, as Chris was, I had always been obsessed with, you know, analog technology, for instance. I had been very much into very hands-on approach, you know, the idea to capture things in camera. That has been always very important to me.

But also, I think, you know, it comes down so much to chemistry between, between, between, to people, you know, you have to spend hours and hours in a scouting van together and and you're spending, you know, you're spending more time with your working bodies than your family. So, so in a way, you know, it has to, it has to flow and it has to be nice and it has to be good and you have to have some sort of understanding as well as, you know, director, for instance and also DP by the way but you know you're very busy on it on a on a on a on a production and there's so many elements that you have to sort of figure out and think about and and and keep you know keep a strong eye over and and sometimes it's it's it's it's it's just

very pleasant when you understand each other maybe a little bit more on a on a intuitive level as well you know the lesser you need to talk about things you know the the the the the the easier it gets you know, and the less time-consuming it becomes. And I always had the feeling that, you know, Chris and I, we just sort of understood each other also on a sort of an intuitive level very much, you know. Is it taste? Is it just the way we'd be making films?

I'm not really sure, and I haven't figured it out exactly. I just know that, you know, in order for us to work together, we don't need, you know, we don't need an endless slurry of work. or explanations, you know, we pretty much on the same line. He's obviously notorious for being a secretive filmmaker up until the script is done. I mean, I talked to this with Killian. Killian had no idea he was writing Oppenheimer and, in fact, was writing Oppenheimer for Killian until it was done and he presented it to him as such.

Are you involved in a different way? Does he clue you in on what he's working on because it has to be part and parcel of the development process? Like in this case, did you know Oppenheimer was being worked on for a while before the script was done? No, I, you know, I'm, you know, I don't know if I knew it before or after. I'm not really sure. I just, I just know that Chris likes to present to his, you know, his, his co-workers. He likes to present stuff when, when he has figured out a decent amount of himself, you know? Right.

for himself he you know he has to have a clue not only about you know the way that he wants to wants to wants it to look or the way he wants to feel but he i i also think you know he needs to he needs to he needs to have a better understanding of you know for instance the physics of things you know he knows that the moment that he comes out of it there's a lot of people going to a lot of questions. So he's a great collaborator, but he's also somebody that feels that he needs to have answers for people that come with questions, you know? Sure.

And also, you know, because these productions, they're so tight and so concise, it's also the only way to push those projects forward is to be able to provide those answers. So the moment that you go on at lunch with him and it says, okay, so, you know, know we have to we have to talk you know you kind of you kind of already know okay you know when you you're pretty far down the road already you get to read the script he has figured stuff out himself so so you know the first read of the script is very tight and and in a way it's very pleasant because you also understand okay this is not going to go through like six generations of changes and evolution so the moment you start working you know a line producers can start

working you know you know the at first you know the production design i can start working ruth you know and start scouting uh but it's it's it's it's it's very productive and it's very sort of efficient from that moment on i think people would be surprised because i i mean even the length of the shoot the length of pre-production etc this isn't like a five-year production and these this is for the ambition of the scope of this it's actually as you say it's a pretty rigid And I think that's probably what you're talking about. He is he gets it so far down the road by the time the train is leaving the station. Everyone's like all systems go.

Everybody's on the same page. Everyone's making the same movie. Absolutely. And it's, of course, you know, Chris wouldn't be Chris if everything that he comes up with is somewhat surprising or exciting or different than you would expect. At the same time, I mean, when you work more films in a row, you can see really some things that he picks up from previous productions that will find its way into the next film, et cetera, et cetera. You know, there's there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's,

there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, it's, it's always, it's always very exciting to sort of, oh, I wonder what's going to be next and it's always, it's always, it's always an interesting surprise. Okay, so let's talk, uh, nothing bolts of this one. Okay, you read the script. How much is in there in terms of the visual approach? Is it, Is it always going to be this section, the subjective, is going to be color. The Strauss sections are going to be black and white. This section is meant for IMAX. How many, what are the questions that still needed to be answered when you first read the script?

What were the questions that were already answered for you on that first read? You know, the black and white is that that's pure sort of crisis. It's something that you wrote into the script. And for a very obvious reason, he needed a strong visual distinction between those two storylines. And, you know, you can start talking about looks and about, you know, are we going to make it blue? Are we make it green? Are we going to make it pink? You know, I think that what we, I have the thing that what we tried to do a little bit with that distinction was to sort of,

you know, create a different feel of it without sort of creating a look that you got very aware of, you know, and how can you create a strong distinction in that way to get a very sort of raw and pure medium to combine with our color medium, just made a lot of sense. You know, it just made a lot of sense that, you know, instead of getting fancy, you know, you kind of go back. a little bit back to basics um or you know in in a way i have to say like everything that that that chris writes in the script is is kind of going to pop up in the film so so on one hand his his his scripts are very tight and they're very much uh they very much contain on paper what it what it becomes but but it doesn't it's not you know overtly descriptive you know he would write for instance uh you know scene scene scene eight uh neutrons or atoms colliding into each other creating a ray of lights you know a lot of ways to do that or you know he he is he would write it much more beautiful but uh sure but not not in it not in a

in a hugely descriptive way it's it's you can read those script and you can still, you know, you still, it triggers your imagination very much, opposed to, you know, he's not putting, putting the images in your head. He, he writes the triggers that, that helps you create those images in your own head. Well, I've even talked to, again, the actors, because I think a lot of people would assume watching his films over the years that there's not a lot of level of improv's the wrong word, but just looseness on set. But my sense, from talking to the actors that have worked with him is there is a

real collaborative spirit on set and it's not the 300 crew members watching. It's actually a relatively small, intimate set for everybody. And listen, as a photographer, you know, I experienced

it exactly the same way. I mean, the sets feel remarkably how malleable or agile and in a way

they always feel like creative spaces where we have the opportunity to respond on different energies that might occur you know they're not rigid there's a lot of things that are very rigid, you know, if you want to shoot a film in 50 days, for his or 55 days, you know, there has to be a certain rigidness in organization and infrastructure, et cetera, et cetera.

But on the set, the people that surround the camera, it's a very small, tight group that all shares very sort of, yeah, shares very strongly, the same references, no very precisely what we're doing and and and and at that moment it it it always feels to me like oh this is like a gigantic tiny uh student film almost you know yeah where where where where we have to sort of challenge we have to be able to play around and we have to sort of um yeah try to infuse personality in in in into the written word word and and the actors of course get the chance to have their say and to get into that same sort of rhythm and the same flow, but also Chris and I, and we shoot on real places and we get to fight with the weather.

We get to, you know, we got to find specific solutions because of the sort of the architecture of the place or, you know, or we have to change things around because of things that happen, you know, when Echler gets you know, food poisoning for a few mornings or, you know, all these kinds of things, you you know,

you have to feel that you can stay light on your feet and you can you know, change things around and we constantly do, you know. I'm always surprised how, you know, how at the same time, you know,

as he's considered you know, so rigid and this filmmaking so much, it's like, you know, they always become churches of films. How light griss is on his feet and how, how intuitive he actually can work. And I wonder very often does that come from the fact that he just, he just, he just has been so meticulous about that base and he knows that, you know, whatever crazy steps we allow ourselves to make, we, as long as we stand on that base, you know, on that, all that, script that i've been working with and because i've been working everything out you know i'm always wondering if that is what gives him so much you know guts and so much freedom to do all those kinds of

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Do you like to operate the camera yourself, And in these scenes, like, it strikes me watching this film. Yes, the vistas are amazing. I could watch, like, I watch this movie and I was like, I want to see Chris Nolan Hoyto Van Hoytima Western in New Mexico. But I also love, you know, you're in love with Killian's face and what, and you, as you should be, these up close and personal moments. Like, are you almost like a, feel like a screen partner with Killian?

Like, are you, you're, you're, you're, you're, we are very close to each other for a lot, lot of time, you know, and Killian is basically looking at a, facade of the camera and half of my face sort of poking on the left side. You know, he sees my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, which is not looking through the fuel finder is usually sort of poking around, you know, to, so, so it must be some sort of a weird, um, a one-eyed monster that is constantly like on top of him. Uh, but, but, but, you know, as, as it's a very intimate situation, uh,

And I also think the actors are a little bit used to it. And, you know, I'm doing whatever I can to make it as little intimidating as possible, you know. Yeah. But, you know, one myth that can easily be debunked here is, you know, you say, IMAX cameras are notorious, very heavy. You know, the 65-millimeter five-perf camera, you know, that you use to, you know, also enables you to record sound is a much heavier camera it's uh it's it's it's it's it's it's is a clumpy camera and it's a it is it is slightly big but it's it's it's not crazy it's uh it's people

always you know always you know always you know throw up this midst like it's big and it's like it's a it's a you know i always describe it as a as a as a small mini bar in a hotel, you know, something that rocksters would throw out of the windows easily drunk in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the 70s. A little more expensive. Yeah, a little more expensive. But and effectively, it's a it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, and and and and and and and and and a whole and a lens, you know, it's, it's a very. Right. It's a very rudimentary, uh, it's a rudimentary, it's a very precise piece of equipment, but it's a very simple piece of equipment and it's, you know, it's as heavy as it needs to be, but it's not a crazy, crazy, weird, you know, alchemistic mechanical machine in that way. It's, it's, it's, you know, it's not as ergonomically designed as a lot of factory built sort of smaller digital cameras and so on. And, and, but, you know, the weight sort of result ratio is, you know, it's, you know, it's,

very reasonable. Fair enough. Fair enough. There is a mystique around those cameras. I understand it. Let me pick your brain on a couple of sequences in particular. Obviously, the film builds to a crescendo after, like, by the end of the second act, which is, I guess, Trinity Test, of course. And that must be a sequence you're circling in the script.

How do we even approach this? What were the conversations revolving around in terms of, from your perspective, in terms of how to capture that short of detonating a bomb on your own. No, no, totally. I mean, there's a lot of sequences that you circle around in the script, right? Because as I said, for instance, Chris can put like a tiny little, like two lines in a script that describes, for instance, you know, stars being sucked into a black hole or you know a chain reaction unfolds itself you read them and you of course you automatically have to think okay so what is this going to be what are we going to do here and as well as the trinity test you know it's it's very much on script level it's it's it's kind of a description of what people are seeing you know and and those descriptions they they are also very much

derived from, you know, witness descriptions of, you know, of these scientists that saw this for the first time. So it's a very subjective sort of description of the event. And in a way, what I'm, what was already written on the script level, there is these different stations that all sort of experience this bomb in a, in a, or this explosion in a different way, you know. And we're sort of getting to look over the shoulders of these scientists seeing that. And that sort of subject, subject point of, subjective point of view, that's something that, you know, that Chris was very meticulous about, that this film wanted to feel very subjective. You know, it wanted to sort of experience things the way that people would have experienced it. We wanted to be in people's heads and we wanted to really be very tight over people's shoulders watching, you know. doesn't mean that the stuff that happens in front of cameras is in a way, it's in a way crazy.

But then the next step is, you know, is kind of to take the next step, but take it as a very small little step. You know, we are, we, you know, we are not sort of magicians, you know, we're we're, we're all pragmatic people that have to sort of figure things out. So we start meeting and we start figuring things out that the post to sort of knowing exactly how to do things. We really go step by step and we start testing things and we start, you know, re-reading the script once more and then testing and then seeing a test and then sort of responding on the test and then changing things slightly. And by a lot of those small steps sort of this thing start to bloom. I mean, Chris, very early, he, you know, I mean, listen, he knew we can never do this. We can never reach that skill to do, to do things for real. He also has a sort of a mandate upon himself saying, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to do things just in CGI and so on.

I want to, I want to see things for real. I want to figure out, you know, physical ways of doing it. So very early he kind of knew that he would end up in this sort of macro world, you know. We always work with forged perspective a lot, but the forced perspective, but then actually go even smaller and going to a macro world, you know. So Andrew Jackson and Scott Fisher, Andrew Jackson, our official effect supervisor, Scott Fisher, our special effects supervised, they straight away, they started.

experimenting a lot with you know with with with with with science experience you know with with doing things on a macro level and a micro level um you know with with pieces of molten metal and and and and and and and and and and et cetera et cetera and and and and and and with all these little playing around over over months of time you know you start piecing together sort of an overall image and of course we we set off we set off some very big explosions you know right but everything is sort of interwoven with each other and and and and and yeah and and and and sort of peace together to create those very subjective you know visions of or or or or witness descriptions of how these things actually would have looked. We looked a lot of archive material,

you know, and really picked it to pieces like, okay, now we cut to the other camera and that camera looks like this. Right. A close-up camera really shows that and how can we, how can we do that? Like, for instance, you know, how can we, how can we do the shockwave? And, you know, very often instead of just thinking, okay, we have to create a shockwave in a desert instead of a lot of explosions, it's like, how can we tell that in a macro level and how can we that piece that together with that shot that you can get very big? So it's, yeah, for me, it's super much like hobbying and engineering and and just, you know, constantly telling yourself what we're going to see is it's going

to be the sum of small elements rather than it's that one thing and we just have to put cameras to it and then and then hope that it's good you know yeah and it's and it's sound design and it's cutting to the actors reactions and it's and it's the music and the lack thereof and it and that's the matter of that's a mechanism that Chris has you know in my eyes have become a master of you know throughout is you know cross-cutting in those sequences you know He can dissect an action sequence by piecing together all these point of views where things are seen from, and as well in time, you know, the way that time runs through a sequence like that. So that's something that is there on a script level already. And even on paper, you read that sort of you can reach a certain magnitude just by that vehicle alone, you know.

Yeah, well, it's what also makes something like this. And I know JFK has been brought up a lot and it reminded me of it in that way, too, where it's like these are notoriously talky movies. Yes, there are bombs and there is an explosion, but these are talking movies that yet feel like intense thrillers because of the way it's edited and music and the sound and the, it's the marriage of all of it. It's cinema at its best.

Yeah, yeah. But there remains, of course, like the, you know, I mean, it's also a lot of. close-ups and they still have to look interesting, you know. Yeah. Yeah, I can only imagine when you're like reading the script and like a third of it is in a nondescript conference room and a Senate hearing room. Are you like, how am I going to make that visually arresting?

Yeah, very much so, you know? I mean, that was kind of from the beginning, the biggest worry that is, you know, you know, classically a closop at a white shot that's like, like, like, like, like, like, like, crescendo or like a single note or right you know it's like the you know in film sometimes a close up can be like a guitar solo you know it's like okay now we're gonna get in there and now we put the close up and in that way in that way you kind of you kind of yeah you know put put the most gasoline on the fire but right right in this script in a way you're all the time you know looking in somebody's face so you're kind of all the time forced to listen to the guitar solo in a

in a song, it's just the song is going to be a, you know, a big strung-together guitar song. And so that was, there was, of course, a very big worry is sort of creating dynamics as you are sort of, you know, as you know already, that you're going to shoot a lot of close-ups and then a lot of things happen in the eyes, but not only happens in the eyes, but also happen beyond the eyes. You have to be able to look into somebody's eyes and imagine a million things, you know, or look in somebody's eyes

and, you know, understand that somebody is developing a whole new concept of looking at physics. No, invariably, I know, yeah. Watching films all my life, it's always like that, conundrum for a filmmaker of like someone creating artistic stuff or scientific stuff and like someone thinking is like the hardest thing to capture i feel like on film i i totally agree and and and and and it's a difficult one it's and it's very much a balancing game but i think you know this film had a lot of

a lot of sort of you know dangers you know just just on script level it was like okay this can be this can be this can turn out bad or terrible or you know or people are going to hate it for it you know i mean the information and the intellectual information that is being being pulled by the by the by the script is very important and very interesting and very sort of it it's really i'm you're instantaneously fascinated by it but you know visually i mean you could you can you can you can there's a very easy way that you can sort of punch your audience to you know to death and into oblivion you know without even getting to a level where people open up for that information so so so so there was always that danger and always that sort of fine fine fine balance to to to to to to to walk but you know

in perspective you know and chris had had had had you know he he had much he had he had very much faith in it and and he was in a way very strong you know you know guide her in in in this for us you know you know But I have the feeling that once we started really shooting and we started looking at those close-ups and at this material and, you know, at the same time, really kept our head school and kept our sort of puristic approach, you know, at some point things start to vibrate. They start to sing and things started to feel right and fall into place very much. And so gradually I very much lost my worries about it and gradually I just, I just, I just understood that, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's. It's, it's it's. It's very much to face is and killian and and Danny all the actors that Chris put in there, you know, and that knew exactly what to step on the breaks or step on the gas. It somehow, you know, it somehow really started to scintillate or to vibrate. You know, it really, it really caught a good rhythm for us. More points, more flights.

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I mean, we, you know, there's very strong implications about, you know, about what it was and what it did, and very strong sort of, you know, you live through it through very much for our protagonists, right? Yeah, the imagery of the scene, obviously, his speech at Los Alamos that conjures up what occurred. Yeah, and I think that, you know, I think Chris was just being very meticulous with with you know

living through all this stuff through the eyes of our protagonists you know and not not sort of you know create some sort of a godly overall you know all telling this is what the situation was you know

it was the situation was that situation through the eyes of Oppenheimer and and and and and and and very much a lot of things that took place between Oppenheimer and Strauss, for instance. And I'm always a big proponent of experience things, you know, through your own mind as well, right? You look at something and sometimes your own imagination is what completes an image.

Yep. You know, and, you know, it's a very fine line. a very fine territory and you know i think you have to really steer away with something like this to not become exploitative you know you have to sort of keep your audience's perception open for that own interpretation and and that own understanding you know you you you you have to be very careful that you're not treating your audience like, you know, a goose that you're stuffing to get, you know, greasy duck liver, you know, you kind of, you kind of have to take them 90% of the way and treat them with the respect that they have, they can bring something to the table and exactly. And I think that people's own imagination is usually one of most

powerful tools that we have, you know. Yeah. And that's also, by the way, that's That's what I found super enjoyable with Oppenheimer as well. When I was the first time, you know, Oppenheimer, it really felt like, okay, you know, this is, this is a film that is not sort of in any way patronizing its audience. Oh, no. This is a little bit the audience.

But I also, I also have the feeling. And when I talk, talk to people about it and talk after it, you know, I think, I think, you know, people feel good about that when they come out of it. out of the theater like that? All of his films are like that. They're overwhelming at first blush. I mean, the first time I saw it,

I could probably, you know, 70% understood what I had seen. I felt it and experienced it. And each time I see it, it's richer in a different way. But that's also why why this fissorality is always so important, you know? It's, you know, we all know that Chris's films, they are, you know, they're very often,

they're intellectually very challenging. But it's not like, you know, they're not made with an arrogance, okay, if you don't understand it, you're not worthy. It's like, it's like, you know, there is, there, there, there's a lot of stuff to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, on a, on a, on a, on a, on an intuitive level, right? And in this film specifically, because, you know, we are making a film about a total different way of thinking of modern physics, you know, quantum physics. It was for, at that time, it was like, you know, when art would change to abstract art, you know, when Stravinsky started making his music, it was a whole different way looking at the world. by by sort of utilizing very different concepts, you know, and somehow we as a filmmaker,

and the audience has to have to understand that. Yeah. But, you know, there's just no way that you and I or, well, I will not talk for you, but for myself, we'll even get close to understand, to get an understanding of quantum physics, you know? You can speak for me. It's okay.

You can speak. But yet at the same time, there you are with that assignment to make an audience feel that they at least grasp a little bit of it, a little bit of that ungraspable sort of given. And that's kind of what we're doing, you know. One thing on your resume that you have over, Chris, is you have a James Bond film on your resume. He's been on the podcast three times. Invariably, we end up talking about James Bond because he is an unabashed. lover of all things bond do you talk bond with him i mean i keep i always teased him that like he's got a bond i mean we we we we talk a lot of bond he knows he knows the franchise better than

anybody i know yeah do you do you do you do you want to see him tackle a bond films but chris can actually uh uh he he knows more about about them than i do you know he he's teased me that he has a take on a bond film like he knows kind of what he would do you know what he would do Has he talked to you about it? No, nothing that he would ever tell me until he's, you know, no, I know nothing. Would you like to see him do one? You know, listen, anything that he puts his teeth in is going to be interesting and fun and a very specific take, you know. wouldn't anybody

love to see a James Bond take from Chris but there's same time there's like a million films that you know out of his hands would be magic and special I know that the Howard Hughes script is still out there one day perhaps he'll go back to that

yeah it's a long career we got a lot to go you know the most beautiful isn't it beautiful like there's all these great crazy things like Bond films and Chris he chooses himself and he finds a freaking book

and makes a film about you know older man talking in rooms and makes it interesting. I think that's kind of that speaks for itself. That's badass. Yeah, it's pretty amazing. Talk to me, do you know, I mean obviously we're taping this in the middle of these strikes

are you are you strategizing do you know the next gig? Are you waiting for the call? No, I mean we're all kind of standing by you know yeah yeah do you um keep in touch with jordan obviously we last spoke for nope do you know what he's cooking up um i'm i'm not not no i i don't know i this is exactly the way you were when i'm exactly the wrong person to ask when i asked you about oppenheimer when we were talking about nope you clamped up and this the same reverse these two guys have you but i cannot i cannot be the guy that will spill any beams it's like it's like this you know

i just should shut up i i promise to let you go in a minute but i'm just curious like i'm getting a script at some point and then i read it and then i'll shoot it okay there you go that's your job you you know you're wayne script comics i know yeah exactly um do you are you like what are your ambitions as a cinematographer. Do you think in terms of like, I'd like to tackle this kind of genre, a Western, a musical, a certain kind of filmmaker, do you have a list? Like, what's your, I mean, the last 15 years especially have been remarkable in terms of your journey. Do you look ahead? Yeah, I mean, listen, I always like to put my teeth in different genres, you know? you know

and some genres I found more interesting than other genres and I think inherently like you know for cinematographers some genres are just more interesting right because because of the emphasis on visual visuals etc

but you know I I don't know I just love to make things that that somehow vibe with people I I believe very much in that sort of cinema experience.

I believe, you know, I'm in people sitting in a room, you know, watching a big screen can have a connection with the screen and with each other that is very hard to get anywhere else. And my ambition is sort of to master that language as good as I can in order to sort of provide and as strong as possible experience in the cinemas. And I think that that's always been a little bit my ambition, you know. I have to do my best in order to, to, to, you know, to give my sort of penny's worth of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, you know, do you think there's other beautiful things, you know, I'm also, I'm also a questioning. kind of guy. And I'm also, you know, I'm also always figuring out things. And every, every film for me is a

is a new challenge to figure things out that I didn't know before. And, you know, do you think there's room left in like, look, I grew up with superheroes, but is that, is that genre, is there any creativity left to kind of mind for you? Like, do you see that as fertile ground still for filmmakers and cinematographers or as the run, as the well run dry a little bit? I mean, it's, it's running running dry, but on the other hand, you know, somebody comes up with a creative take on something and can blow a new life and the whole thing, you know. So, so, so, so, you know, I will not steer away from a genre like that just because the, the ground has run dry. For me, it's always about, you know, the creativity comes very much from, you know, that single person that has its

a unique take and comes up with their own sort of perspective on these things. And, you know, I mean, we see it all the time. I mean, like last year, like everything, everywhere all at once, which is kind of a superhero film. I mean, we've never seen anything like it, you know? Right. And, and, and, and so, there's no such thing as it running dry. The ground might run dry for sort of.

as a business model, you know. Yeah, until the next great visionary comes and brings their unique stamp, right? Exactly, and that's kind of what you have to sort of do as well as a cinematography. You have to really find and choose those people that have a unique take on things. I mean, boys and girl, boy meets girl, like, fall in love. There's the oldest story in the world, yet, you know, that given has turned, you know, has become so many powerful and interesting films, you know. And that's all just very dependent on, you know,

the different individual takes that people have on it. And last question for you, have you Barbenheimered, Hoita? Did you, have you seen Barbie? Are you curious? I'm super curious. I haven't because I have been traveling for the last months. But I'm very curious and I'm very excited. to see it and you know most people that i speak today they they they they they feel it was great so so i have to i have to yeah i have to in one of these three days which is probably in a week from now i am i i'm going to see it another another talented dp rodrigo prieto and and brett is very

talented incredible dp incredible director yeah um thanks so much again for the time this has been a real tree i mean this is like tip of the iceberg i got like 10 percent of what i want to talk to you about but hopefully through this award season we'll catch up more um as you can tell them a fan of all of your i mean again all your other work we could talk about too but this one in particular man um i don't think i've seen a film this many times in such a short span since mad max fury road that was my last obsession so you're you're you're in good company and a different different kind of movie i mean we couldn't have we we couldn't have more happy for you know for the response on this film it's is it's been you know across the board amazing so

I'm super happy to talk about it. I think it's, you know, it's so much nicer to talk about something that didn't turn out to be a tough. It did not. It did not. Enjoy the moment. Enjoy the ride. I'll see you soon. I hope.

Thank you, Huita. Thanks a lot. Bye. Thanks again. And so ends another edition of happy, sad, confused. Remember to review, rate, and subscribe to this show on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm a big podcast person. I'm Daisy Ridley, and I definitely wasn't pressure to do this by Josh.

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