Bernard Couture
Le Dernier tunnel

‘We complement each other pretty well,’ says Bernard Couture, a first-time Genie nominee, of his collaboration with director Eric Canuel on the crime thriller Le Dernier tunnel.

‘He’s extremely demanding, and I always find a way to say, ‘Yes, it’s possible,” says the Montreal lenser, who worked with Canuel a year prior on the romantic comedy Nez rouge.

Director and DOP modeled the look of Tunnel, which tells the true story of a subterranean Montreal bank heist, after thrillers such as Se7en and The Ring.

‘We had lots of green and grey, and it always felt like the walls were closing in on you, even if you’re outside and not in the tunnel,’ says Couture. ‘We wanted to make the audience feel uncomfortable by using out-of-place colors – for example, the leaves outside were made yellow so that they’re almost threatening.’

Lighting a tunnel proved especially challenging. ‘In a sewer there is no light, so you have to make it believable that there’s light coming from other sources,’ the DOP explains. ‘To create depth without much light, you have to put a source of light that looks like something that’s coming from afar in the tunnel.’

Louis De Ernsted
Nouvelle-France

Montreal DOP Louis De Ernsted remembers going on film sets with his father since he was 12 years old.

‘My father worked as a lighting gaffer for the National Film Board, and since I only had some schooling in photography, the real learning came through [being on set],’ he recalls.

De Ernsted is a first-time nominee for the historical drama Nouvelle-France, directed by Jean Beaudin.

The epic love story, set in politically turbulent mid-18th-century Quebec, was filmed in Canada, the U.K. and France, with a cast that includes famed French actor Gérard Depardieu.

It was a challenging shoot for De Ernsted, who adds that Beaudin wanted to avoid the feel of typical period pieces. ‘I didn’t try to make it very romantic, since Jean wanted something very intimate and somewhat dark,’ he explains. ‘We went for a contrasty look, with images that are not nice and clean where you can see everything.’

Cutting from a cabin in the woods of Quebec to the Marine Navy Institute’s painted hall in London tested De Ernsted’s abilities.

‘I played with tones and went for a colder look when illustrating England’s military power,’ he explains. ‘I always try to take a simple, logical approach to the situation.’

Pierre Mignot
Ma vie en cinémascope

With 10 previous noms and three wins, veteran Montreal director of photography Pierre Mignot is no stranger to the Genies.

Mignot, 60, received his first award for Gilles Carle’s drama Maria Chapdelaine back in 1984, followed by Jean Beaudin’s Mario in 1986 and for Léa Pool’s Anne Trister one year later.

His latest nomination is for Denise Filiatrault’s Ma vie en cinémascope, about Quebec music-hall legend Alys Robi, starring Pascale Bussières.

Mignot says he found inspiration for the film’s look from the Oscar-winning musical Chicago.

‘When Denise asked for it to have a similar appearance to Chicago, I decided to go for a warm, saturated look,’ he explains. ‘The look resembles that of 1950s bars and clubs: smoky, moody, with hot spotlighting on the main characters.’

The DOP applauds Filiatrault’s helming, adding, ‘She’s a great actor’s director.’

Mignot’s career began at the National Film Board, where he worked for 12 years on various documentaries and features. His Hollywood credits include the Robert Altman farce Prêt-à-Porter and the Arnold Schwarzenegger actioner The 6th Day.

Mignot won this year’s cinematography Prix Jutra for the Léa Pool film Le Papillon bleu/The Blue Butterfly.

Paul Sarossy
Head in the Clouds

Busy Toronto DOP Paul Sarossy never tires of the accolades for his work.

‘It’s always exciting to be acknowledged and to get positive feedback,’ the 41-year-old cameraman says.

In addition to having collected various international awards, Sarossy is a four-time Genie winner, for the Atom Egoyan films Exotica (1994), The Sweet Hereafter (1997) and Felicia’s Journey (1999) as well as Barbara Willis Sweete’s Perfect Pie (2002).

In the romantic drama Head in the Clouds, set in England, Paris and Spain, Sarossy and British director John Duigan explore two distinct looks that separate the heady early 1930s from World War Two.

‘The warmth and romantic quality of images in the 1930s change as the war approaches to a more monochromatic look, where the color is drained,’ Sarossy notes.

The logistics of shooting in three different countries (Canada, France and the U.K.) while maintaining the film’s look proved challenging.

‘We built [Paris’] Montmartre in a Montreal studio, where we recreated the lighting to make it appear as if we were shooting on the streets,’ Sarossy recalls. ‘I had to ‘paint’ the streets with artificial sunshine.’

The DOP says being able to photograph ‘some of the most beautiful people in the world’ (Charlize Theron, Penelope Cruz and Stuart Townsend) made the project especially exciting.

André Turpin
Childstar

While director of photography André Turpin revels in writing and directing his own features (2002’s Un crabe dans la tête won him Prix Jutra for directing, writing and cinematography), he is more than happy to take orders when lensing feature films.

‘I avoid ‘directing’ when I’m DOP,’ the 38-year-old Montreal lenser told Playback in an earlier interview. ‘I want to be directed like an actor when I’m lensing.’

Turpin’s gig on the comedy feature Childstar, about an unruly Hollywood brat, marked his first collaboration with writer/director Don McKellar, whom he had known for nearly a decade.

The cameraman says he doesn’t approach lighting comedy any differently from drama. ‘I don’t believe that comedy should be shot really high-key, like most [seem to be]. I don’t bend lighting to adapt to comedy,’ Turpin explains.

Childstar, rather, is lit in a simple and naturalistic style, while the blockbuster film-within-the-film is lit for a more typical Hollywood look, with saturated colors. But Turpin adds that it’s hard to define how Hollywood lights these days: ‘It’s gone from ‘classic’ to a bit more nondistinctive. There’s a lot of experimentation going on.’

Childstar is Turpin’s fourth Genie nomination for cinematography. He took home a statue for shooting Denis Villeneuve’s drama Maelstrom (2000).

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