Documentary News Letter (1947-1949)

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70 DOCUMENTARY FILM NEWS GREGG TOLAND (contd.) hardier. It semed to me that helped tell the story.' It is the story which matters most to Gregg. He has gone beyond the literal rules of camera grammar to use the written word as his point of departure. He feels motion picture photography can be judged good or bad only in its relation to helping tell the story. Obviously, if the screenplay describes a plain girl, the cameraman isn't helping the story any if he makes a gorgeous glamour close-up. In Hollywood, studio policy usually results in the cameraman .trying to make the plain heroine as glamorous as possible. It is just this kind of disregard for story values which concerns Gregg most in his thinking about standards of motion picture photography in Hollywood today. Recently, a test of a young actor was made by one of Hollywood's leading directors with a reputation for brilliant camera effects. The actor was seated behind a table, seen in threequarter profile. A man was seated in the foreground, asking him the usual 'personality' questions. The man was smoking a cigarette, and the cigarette smoke was artfully worked into the composition. It was a beautifully 'composed' shot, with only one drawback : because the actor was placed in the background of the shot, and because the smoke partially concealed him. the function of the test had been subverted, and a prominent director who was viewing the test with an eye to hiring the actor, commented, 'Very fine cigarette smoke. Now, if you bring me a shot where I can see the actor, I'll be able to tell whether or not we can use him.' This is a crude criticism, and a fairly obvious example. Of course, one would say, you should be able to see the actor in a test. But how can you apply this functional, or utilitarian doctrine to scenes in a film? Do you mean all photography should be 'newsreel' in quality to be realistic? Under ideal conditions the cameraman should work very closely with his director. Gregg's own account of his approach to a few of his films may throw some light on the matter. Since each of the stories posed different problems, no set formula could be used. Gregg felt he had to study the script, discuss the story with the director, and evolve a separate style for each picture. 'Wuthering Heights: he explained, 'was a soft picture, diffused with soft candle-lighting effects. I tried to make the love scenes beautiful in a romantic way. It was a love story, a story of escape and fantasy. So I tried to keep it that way photographically, and let the audience dream through a whirl of beautiful closeups. 'On the other hand. Grapes of Wrath had to be a sharp picture. It was a story of unhappy people, people of the earth, who had real problems and who suffered. So we made it very sharp. There wasn't any make-up used. The picture had some extreme effects in low key, but they were, I think, real. As I remember, the camera moved only once — a long travel shot through the sordid streets of a Hooverville. It was what the occupants of the car, afteY the long drive to a promised haven, were examining. Photography such as we had in Wuthering Heights could ruin a picture like Grapes of Wrath completely. 'Long Voyage Home was a mood picture. Storywise ("storywise". significantly enough, is one of Gregg's favourite words), it was a series of compositions of the mood of the man aboard the ship. It was a story of what men felt rather than what they did. The camera never moved in that picture. 'Citizen Kane was a great experiment. It was a story of Kane's personality, what he had done to other people, what his life meant. It was a psychological story, yet the external realities were very important. It required a still different kind of photography, an expansion of camera technique beyond the usual limitations. Many points of view had to be shown. We had to experiment because the scope of the story demanded it. Kane's photography would scarcely have suited Wuthering Heights or even Grapes of Wrath. We experimented in forced focus depth, in travel shots, in startling effects, and in full ceilinged sets. ''The Best Years of Our Lives was another experiment. But in a different way. It was Wyler's first picture after the war and was my first black and white since the war. We talked at length about the story and decided it demanded simple, unaffected realism. Willy had been thinking a lot, too, during the war. He had seen a lot of candid photography and lots of scenes without a camera dolly or boom. He used to go overboard on movement, but he came back with, I think, a better perspective on what was and wasn't important. Anyway, Willy left me pretty much alone. While he rehearsed, I would try to find a method of shooting it. Usually he liked it. When he didn't. he was the boss and we did it his way. However, at this point we understand each other pretty well and Willy know" that I will sacrifice photography and time i' it means a better scene. I, in turn, know thahe will listen to any suggestion. I thinl Best Years was well photographed because the photography helped to tell the story. It wasn't breathtaking. Tt would have beer wrong to strive for effects. We were after simple ■reproduction of the scenes played without an> chi-chi. The only time I held my breath was in the powder-room scene when I thought we might begetting arty and trying to prove how damn clever we were instead of playing a scene. But Willy was right. It worked for us. If I had to label the photographic style of the picture, I'd call it "honest".' gregg's working habits may be of interest since they run counter to so many established views about Hollywood's creators. While it is true that technical personnel on a production, and cameramen in particular, put in long and hard hours, it seemed to me, that as I observed Gregg during the production of The Best Years of Our Lives, that he and William Wyler, the director, worked harder than anyone else in Hollywood. Under ideal working conditions, the cameraman should be included in the preparation of a picture. He should work very closely with his director. 'Unfortunately.' as Gregg pointed out. 'they don't in this business. The director may work for months on a story, but the cameraman is tossed a script a few days before shooting.' In Best Years, Gregg worked on the picture from its inception, getting each version of the screenplay, and the revised pages as they came from the writer, Robert E. Sherwood. This enabled Gregg to plan the production requirements, to scout locations and shoot photographic tests. But. in addition, it enabled him to familiarize himself with the story itself, so that he had a thorough 'storywise" understanding of each scene, of each character. With this background, and with constant discussions with Wyler, Gregg was able to use his technique in the best interests of the story as a whole. During the writing of the script. I remember going out with Wyler and Gregg to look over the location for the exterior of Fred Derry's father's house. On our return to the studio. Gregg suggested that I take Sherwood out to see it, partly to see if it was what Sherwood had visualized, and partly to see if it would give him any ideas. A few days later, when Bob Sherwood and I went out and looked the place over. Bob said he was very glad he came because seeing the dilapidated exterior of the Derry home made him realize the audience would not have to be told very much specifically about Fred's background. One shot of the wretched exterior would give a very real feeling of what his life had been like before he came an officer in the Air Forces. Therefore, added exposition in dialogue would be superfluous. Gregg is in an advantageous position for working with writers and directors, because as well as a cameraman, he is a key figure in the operation of the Samuel Goldwyn production set-up. He is under exclusive contract to Goldwyn. and works \er> closely with the production executives in all their planning. The average cameraman works by the picture, and consequently is not in a position to add efficiency to production. Other companies might well profit by Goldwyn's example of more closely