Film and TV Technician (1957)

February 1957 FILM & TV TECHNICIAN 23 A Technician's Notebook Magnificent Photography OPINIONS about the merits of War and Peace as a motion picture have varied considerably, but there has been no disagreement about the magnificence of the colour photography. In an interview with Jack Cardiff, published in the American Cinematographer, Derek Hill elicited some interesting facts about the shooting of this hugescale production. First about the photographic credits, which list Jack Cardiff as director of photography with additional photography by Aldo Tonti, a leading Italian cinematographer. Tonti was apparently responsible for some of the battle scenes and all the Napoleon sequences, the rest of the photography was handled by Cardiff. This was his first picture in VistaVision and before production started he spent two weeks in Hollywood familiarising himself with the system. To start with, two new VistaVision cameras were flown to Rome, later four VV cameras were made available and used in photographing the three great battle scenes involving thousands of extras. Summer Snow Cardiff said that his experience on Scott of the Antarctic stood him in good stead when it came to recreating the snow and storm effects in War and Peace. ' Recreating ' is the right word as a large proportion of the film was shot during the height of the Italian summer. For one scene it was necessary to scatter powdered plaster over a square mile of the location to simulate the effect of frost. Sprayed Glass In the ' exterior ' snow scenes shot on the studio stage Cardiff used a sheet of glass sprayed white in front of the camera plus a pale green filter to produce the effect of a slight mist. The duel in the snow sequence which has aroused so much comment, was also shot on one of the stages at Cine Citta. To get the effect of dusk on a winter evening a glass painting of a sky was used in front of the camera, as the wide angle lens with which the scene was shot covered By A. E. Jeakins too great a field. For a sun effect in the same sequence a lamp was directed on to the sky area of the glass painting, this combined with colour and fog filters, gave the effect that Cardiff was aiming at. " War and Peace was in many ways a cameraman's holiday," Cardiff is quoted as saying, " It was a realistic subject and it demanded a straightforward, raw treatment . . . the whole approach stated that the Dutch firm of Philips had been entrusted with the task of producing a suitable projector capable of showing not only Todd-AO 70mm. film but also 35mm. films shot in any of the systems in current use. Stanley Bowler, who saw the projector demonstrated at the Photokina in Cologne, writes about it in the British Journal of Photography. Within a year of the agreement with the American Optical Co. being entered into, the first machines were shipped to America in time for the premiere of Oklahoma, first Todd-AO production. The new Type DP70 machine is now in full production. As is now well known, in this system the picture is photographed with lenses having acceptance angles up to 128° on to 70mm. film. DUEL IN THE SNOW was deliberately broad, almost rough ". It has been announced that Todd-AO will be shown in this country on 1st May. Readers may remember that when details about this system were first given some two or three years ago, it was The release print carries six magnetic sound tracks. As might be expected the projector is of massive and robust construction. The main housing for the film transport mechanism is about two feet high by eighteen inches from side to side and from front to back.