ncdrawl
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Alright... I need some examples of amazing cinematography/videography..
Scott Wheeler
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Days of heaven
Bladerunner
Ran
Lawrence of Arabia
Sound of Music

geoffkait
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Forrest Gump
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KBK
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Apocalypse Now has incredible cinematography.

One must research the term 'cinematographer', to be sure the recommendation is correct.

There is a film, I cannot quite remember the name, where the shot is One single sequence totally uncut.

It has to do with visiting the Palace there, the Palace in St. Petersburg, and in olden times, during a big bash/ball/gathering. It is a period piece, obviously. You are taken around by a 'guide', who is not always the same person, you walk through the ball, participate in various things..but the whole thing is about 80-85 minutes long, and is taken in the one single shot, which is utterly unique in film history.

I mean -no- breaks. none, nada. zip. No cheating. No effects, no digital, zero. Analog-one shot. 85 minutes long.

Found it. It is a single 96 minute shot. Imagine the planning and execution required to get it right. Gives meaning to the term 'live show'.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Ark

"The effect of the unbroken flow of images (experimented with in the past by directors like Hitchcock and Max Oph

Buddha
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As a fellow Apocalypse Now! fan, I agree with KBK.

Also...

Lawrence of Arabia

The first 8 minutes or so of The Player are amazing - because it was all shot as one scene.

Fred Astaire and Eleanor Powell did a complete dance sequence that's pretty amazing...from the late 30's or early 40's, if ya Google, it's around.

It's a little cliche, but Peter Jackson's Hobbit movies have some GREAT cinematography - even if much of it is 'virtual!'

I didn't dig the movie, but the start of "Saving Private Ryan" was pretty amazingly done.

Clint excels in putting out movies with great cinematography. Unforgiven, as a director, and most of westerns all offer cinematography that beautifully conveys the mood and atmosphere Sergio and others were after. The spaghetti wetsrens he did, High Planes Drifter, Outlaw Josie Wales, Pale Rider...all great in that category.

j_j
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The 70mm "Local Hero" version had fantastic cinematography, as well, over some fantastic scenery in Scotlad. The Dallas parts are unremarkable, well, at least for the cinematography

ncdrawl
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all noted..

looking for some a bit more obscure, though, as I am sure Prof has probably had all those submissions a lot..

geoffkait
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"looking for some a bit more obscure, though, as I am sure Prof has probably had all those submissions a lot.."

These should bring tears to your Prof''s eyes:

Sundays and Cybele (1961)
No Country for Old Men (the cinematographer Roger Deakins has been nominated for 7 (count 'em) Academy Awards)
Paths of Glory
Always
Fellini's Satyricon
Kagamusha
Ashes and Diamonds
Angel Heart
The Man Who Wasn't There
The Third Man (of course!)

Buddha
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Hmmmm, more obscure...

The street scenes in "Choose Me" are very well done, with wonderfully saturated colors and a great nocturnal atmosphere.

The long walk the Wild Bunch takes before the final shoot pout is pretty epic and the cinematography actually tells the story behind the line, "Let's go..." before they start down that street.

The end of Platoon where the helicopter is taking off and William Dafoe is left behind is another good example of cinematography setting up the power of the scene.

The cramped feeling of the assault scene in True Romance, where the bad guy gets stabbed in the foot could be an example of intimate cinematography defining the mood of a scene.

The last scene of Dazed and Confused, where Foghat is playing as they drive off toward the horizon.

Thunderbolt and Lightfoot has some damn good scene setting.

The look of the plains at the start of Hair, as Claude boards the bus for NYC are nicely juxtaposed with the scenery of New York. The LSD trip scene in Central Park is quite good, too.

The end of Midnight Cowboy, with Ratso on the bus is well done via showing him intimately, while using the reflection of the bus window to do the rest of the cinematography is nice.

The Eiger Sanction had some great scenes where the great outdoors is worked nicely into the plot, giving scale to the action.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon had some mighty fine stuff, too.

Ran, by Kurosawa had some good stuff to check out, too.

linden518
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Tarkovsky's The Mirror and Nostalghia
Antonioni's Red Desert and L'Avventura
Shinji Aoyama's Eureka
Rene Clair's Under the Roofs of Paris
Cocteau's Orpheus Trilogy
Godard's In Praise of Love
Bresson's Diary of a Country Priest
Carol Reed's The Third Man
Wong Kar-wei's In the Mood for Love
Bong Joon Ho's Memories of a Murder
Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Tropical Malady
Masaki Kobayashi's Kwaidan
Ozu's Floating Weeds... etc etc...

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Quote:
Ran, by Kurosawa had some good stuff to check out, too.

YES!

I had forgotten this. Splended cinematography.

Buddha
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I plumb forgot a good one - Silverado had some great western style cinematography.

andy_c
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Greaser's Palace

Orb
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From a technical perspective I thought that the Matrix series would count for the advancement they gave for the use of 360degree bullet-time/time slicing, which even if you do not like the films provides a stunning visual effect that pushed the boundaries of what was achievable at the time.
http://www.debevec.org/Items/SoftImage1999/

Cheers
Orb

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Stagecoach
Once Upon A Time In The West
My Name Is Nobody
Rashomon
La Strada
The Virgin Spring
8

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In no particular order and including some modern films that while, not always high "art", or Aht as we say in New England, have incredible camera work. I list directors as they start with the vision and are closely tied to the cinematography.

Wings of Desire- Wim Wenders
Ran - Akira Kurosawa
The Matrix- The Bros Wachkowski
Blade Runner- Ridley Scott
Gladiator- Ridley Scott
Saving Private Ryan- Stephen Spielberg
Citizen Kane- Orson Welles (widely regarded as perhaps the greatest cinematography ever)
The Shining- Stanley Kubrick
Transformers: Michael Bay
The Dark Knight- Christopher Nolan
The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, & Her Lover- Peter Greenaway

That's all that come to mind without really digging in. Of course there are MANY more...

KBK
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Hero - (Jet Li film)

clarets2
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Eraserhead and Blue Velvet - David Lynch
Rear Window and North by Northwest - Alfred Hitchcock

enframed
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The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
2001
Badlands
Days of Heaven
There Will be Blood
Encounters at the End of the World
Fitzcarraldo
Lessons of Darkness
L'avventura
Mad Max
Le Mans
Blow-Up

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McCabe and Mrs. Miller
Casino
Barton Fink
A Clockwork Orange
The Departed
Shane
Barry Lyndon
Babe 2 - Pig in the City
The Ring (US version)
Mulholland Drive
The Elephant Man
Once Upon a TIme in America

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Buddha, Silverado was terrific, in every way. All American Westerns are morality tales, and the only question comes out of how the tale is told. Again,
Silverado was a classic. It doesn't hurt that the cast was A-one.

Of course, it never hurts to have the "set" encompass the entire California-Nevada landscape, when it comes to "amazing cinematography." Of course, we know. We live here in this wonderful blend of urban scum and untamed wild...

All you have to do out here is point your camera and contrive a narrative. Silverado did much more than that, with its outstanding cast and panoramic sweeps of what we all out here (sadly) take for granted.

This will always be the untamed frontier.

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Silverado is a tremendous western. However, it was filmed at the following locations in New Mexico:
Abiquiu, New Mexico, USA
Cook Ranch, Galisteo, New Mexico, USA
Eaves Movie Ranch - 105 Rancho Alegre Road, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
Galisteo, New Mexico, USA
Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu, New Mexico, USA
Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA
(opening scene)
Nambe, New Mexico, USA
Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico, USA
Tent Rocks, Cochiti Pueblo, New Mexico, USA
White Rock Overlook, Black Mesa, New Mexico, USA
White Rock, New Mexico, USA

Orb
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The Sound of Music !
The King and I !!
Mary Poppins !!!

ncdrawl
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Quote:
The Sound of Music !
The King and I !!
Mary Poppins !!!

you are not allowed to post for at least 13 years or until you are not gay anymore. whichever comes first.

ncdrawl
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Quote:
All American Westerns are morality tales

oh yeah? what sort of moral did blazing saddles have?

Orb
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Bah just no style for musicals there
Classics I say
Cheers
Orb

dbowker
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I think Clint Eastwood's two last westerns were some of the best ever- Pale Rider and Unforgiven. Both were faithful to all the Western themes we know and love but tweaked them to bring out something more. 3:10 to Yuma was also a great take on the classic genre.

Like science fiction, it's a kind of reality that is removed enough for a director to project their own ideas and themes and play out some things that wouldn't other get talked about: race, gender, honor, sacrifice, and gray areas of morality.

Orb
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Ok to be a bit (ok a lot) more serious than my choice in musicals, here a few more thats been missed so far.
Epic period pieces:
Dances with Wolves
The Last Samurai
Last of the Mohicans
Mongol

And something a bit different; The Piano

Cheers
Orb

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