From the beginning of the film, it’s all handheld. My idea was to jump right into it, feel uneasy, and tease that something was going to happen. Despite being handheld, it’s pretty static. We don’t really track anyone at first, but as the story picks up with Oscar being followed and his wife Sophia, trying to find her husband and daughter, we follow more intently.
We had custom anamorphic lenses built by Dan Sasaki, using the oldest front element glass he could piece together. He created a new hybrid that also allowed us to do close focus. Jim always likes to be physically close shooting the concert scenes. When we tell our stories, we like to put the audience in the moment. It’s something we discovered on Walk the Line, how to shoot it where you feel like you’re literally on stage with him.
I’m attracted to films that create the feeling that you don’t know what’s around the corner, whether it’s a different scene, a different shot, or a different person. I was most excited about how to use time and use these elements to create a more kaleidoscopic visceral sensation through it.
It’s all about the light and how you use the camera. We captured the moonlight that cast an interesting shadow of Lily-Rose Depp’s face on the pillow in the last shot. There’s this monstrous sort of distortion on the pillow that was accidental. I sort of engineered that, you know, the shadow being that crisp and that hard, it’s like a convex mirror.
I do prefer shooting film. All three films I’ve done with Brady have been period films, shot on film. We are much more able to create an image that is more pictorial, and more impressionistic rather than the high fidelity and definition of digital cameras. We can explore more and underexpose.
The idea was that Zoe is kind of taking control of the film at this moment, and she also takes control of the cinematography. She can point that very hard light that follows her to the people she talks about. She’s also able to bring the camera with her. We had built this lighting system that remotely operated and was able to point at every time ever she would go, you had a lighting operator that was able to follow her in the space.
This is a pioneer story, you could call it a western… Trains are coming and nothing can stop them from coming. We know ultimately what happened. I felt the same way I felt when I read Titanic, I felt like, wow, this is a piece of history. This is less about the gunslinger and more about the birth of America and that blew my mind.
June created this atmosphere on set where it completely felt like a family, and we felt so free to do whatever we wanted to do without judgment. She trusted us. I felt completely free to explore. But the thing about her too is her performances don’t seem theatrical. Looking through the viewfinder at her face, and oftentimes I’m this close to her face on a wide lens and the nuances of her performance, it was like I would get shivers.
“I hope that we’re inspiring people. I feel like it’s so needed right now with the state of cinema and all of that, winning Cannes, winning the Palme d’Or, felt like a win for independent cinema. It truly did. I think the fact that we won, the fact that we were able to stand out, just kind of, to me it’s a sign of the times. It’s a sign that indie cinema needs a comeback. This is what people actually want. They want bold, original films, that are risky, that are subversive.”
“We didn’t have the budget or the time to be able to light everything in the gym. We just used available lighting. We were shooting at this place called The Pit in Albuquerque, which is huge and they broadcast games there. There was enough light but in that case, how do we make this one piece about getting into his head? Let’s turn almost everything off and just play with this idea of creating this world like the spot.”
