In a Lonely Place: How ‘Perry Mason’ Tweaks Its Cinematography for a New Season of Noirish Mysteries
In its first season, HBO’s “Perry Mason” received Emmy and ASC award nominations for David Franco’s exquisitely atmospheric cinematography, which avoided the desaturated look so common to period shows and evoked the 1930s by referencing early color still photography. One might have thought it would be difficult to improve upon the look established by Franco and alternating cinematographer Darran Tiernan, but the new season of “Perry Mason” that premiered March 6 is even more vivid and involving thanks to slight changes in color and a more subjective approach to the camerawork.
When the gritty origin story of Erle Stanley Gardner’s defense attorney premiered in 2020, cinematographer Eliot Rockett was one of its fans. Now, he joins the series — along with showrunners Jack Amiel and Michael Begler — for Season 2, lensing the premiere and alternating subsequent episodes with Tiernan and John Grillo. “I thought the first season was great, so there...
When the gritty origin story of Erle Stanley Gardner’s defense attorney premiered in 2020, cinematographer Eliot Rockett was one of its fans. Now, he joins the series — along with showrunners Jack Amiel and Michael Begler — for Season 2, lensing the premiere and alternating subsequent episodes with Tiernan and John Grillo. “I thought the first season was great, so there...
- 3/9/2023
- by Jim Hemphill
- Indiewire
Even prior to the pandemic, Technicolor was developing a new mobile post suite app called TechStream, because remote color timing and sound mixing — particularly for episodic TV — had become too expensive and inconvenient. Fortunately, for HBO’s “Perry Mason,” TechStream was launched just in time to finish the Depression-era origin story, starring Matthew Rhys as Erle Stanley Gardner’s legendary defense attorney.
“The idea was to have a [real-time] product that was simple and flawless to operate,” said Pankaj Bajpai, Technicolor VP, finishing artist and business development. “If you can use an iPhone, then that was the requirement that would allow people to collaborate, especially when working on episodics, where DPs can’t physically be with you in the color suites. Now, of course, with the pandemic, all of a sudden we can’t live without Zoom and Teams. But a year ago, the way I was doing remote grading sessions...
“The idea was to have a [real-time] product that was simple and flawless to operate,” said Pankaj Bajpai, Technicolor VP, finishing artist and business development. “If you can use an iPhone, then that was the requirement that would allow people to collaborate, especially when working on episodics, where DPs can’t physically be with you in the color suites. Now, of course, with the pandemic, all of a sudden we can’t live without Zoom and Teams. But a year ago, the way I was doing remote grading sessions...
- 7/23/2020
- by Bill Desowitz
- Indiewire
To believe the controversy last year, The Hunt was going to be the most vile film ever to be releases. Of course, those railing against it hadn’t seen it, and arguably hadn’t even seen the previews. However, I have seen the movie, and can tell you that, unsurprisingly, the conservative pundits had it all wrong. No, this is not just 90 minutes of liberals killing “deplorables.” In actuality, this leans into satire, parodying the most liberal and “woke” of individuals. Yes, the bones of what you’ve heard about are there, but this goes in a way different direction than you’d expect. In fact, it’s better for it, emerging as a shockingly good time from Jason Blum, Blumhouse, and the mind of Damon Lindelof (among others). The film imagines a rumored scandal called Manorgate, where wealthy elites bring salt of the earth folk to hunt for sport.
- 3/11/2020
- by Joey Magidson
- Hollywoodnews.com
“The Hunt” may be new and controversial, but stories about humans hunting humans for sport have been around since, at the very least, Irving Pichel and Ernest B. Schoedsack’s “The Most Dangerous Game,” and they’ve pretty much always been used to explore the evils of one form of dehumanization or another.
It’s not supposed to be thrilling to watch a rich psychopath kill poor people. It’s supposed to be a thrill to watch the hunted turn on the hunter. The hunter, in simple terms, is always the a-hole.
Craig Zobel’s “The Hunt” is a little more complex than that, but it’s still a raucous, funny, ultraviolent exploitation thriller about people trying to kill each other. Betty Gilpin, Ike Barinholtz and Emma Roberts star as conservatives who suddenly wake up in a forest with a box full of weapons awaiting them in the middle of a field.
It’s not supposed to be thrilling to watch a rich psychopath kill poor people. It’s supposed to be a thrill to watch the hunted turn on the hunter. The hunter, in simple terms, is always the a-hole.
Craig Zobel’s “The Hunt” is a little more complex than that, but it’s still a raucous, funny, ultraviolent exploitation thriller about people trying to kill each other. Betty Gilpin, Ike Barinholtz and Emma Roberts star as conservatives who suddenly wake up in a forest with a box full of weapons awaiting them in the middle of a field.
- 3/11/2020
- by William Bibbiani
- The Wrap
When I interviewed cinematographer Paul Cameron about his work on the Westworld pilot, he likened the show’s mechanical hosts to the workers on set. “By the end of the day, half the hosts have been shot up and need to get washed down, the lead pulled out and get re-programmed to be put back into work the next day,” said Cameron with a laugh. “It’s kind of like a film crew.” For Season Two of HBO’s sci-fi/western hybrid, cinematographer Darran Tiernan was among the crew getting the metaphoric lead pulled out every night. Tiernan lensed five of the ten episodes, […]...
- 6/14/2018
- by Matt Mulcahey
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
When I interviewed cinematographer Paul Cameron about his work on the Westworld pilot, he likened the show’s mechanical hosts to the workers on set. “By the end of the day, half the hosts have been shot up and need to get washed down, the lead pulled out and get re-programmed to be put back into work the next day,” said Cameron with a laugh. “It’s kind of like a film crew.” For Season Two of HBO’s sci-fi/western hybrid, cinematographer Darran Tiernan was among the crew getting the metaphoric lead pulled out every night. Tiernan lensed five of the ten episodes, […]...
- 6/14/2018
- by Matt Mulcahey
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
In new television series “American Gods,” adapted by showrunners Bryan Fuller and Michael Green from Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel about the epic battle between the Old and New Gods, we have a superhero fantasy for adults. In this Starz drama, the Old are obsessed with faith, the New with branding.
Costume designer Suttirat Larlarb and cinematographer Darran Tiernan felt they needed to ground the Gods in a believable reality before going wild with visual eye candy. That meant using protagonist Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) as an anchor. He’s a former convict with a crisis of faith, who’s recruited to protect con artist Mr. Wednesday/Odin (Ian McShane).
Dressing the Old and New Gods
“I was harboring a low level anxiety about the project because, from the outset, we’re given a host of characters who exist in reality but are supernatural,” said Larlarb. “And they have to exist among living,...
Costume designer Suttirat Larlarb and cinematographer Darran Tiernan felt they needed to ground the Gods in a believable reality before going wild with visual eye candy. That meant using protagonist Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) as an anchor. He’s a former convict with a crisis of faith, who’s recruited to protect con artist Mr. Wednesday/Odin (Ian McShane).
Dressing the Old and New Gods
“I was harboring a low level anxiety about the project because, from the outset, we’re given a host of characters who exist in reality but are supernatural,” said Larlarb. “And they have to exist among living,...
- 6/8/2017
- by Bill Desowitz
- Indiewire
More from Nathaniel at the Tribeca Film Festival
Electric Slide
There's something about the Killer Films logo, that has me rooting for the film that follows every time. Christine Vachon's company has shepherded so many confrontational and interesting indie films and voices into the arthouse over the years that it has both a nostalgic pull And an edge, and those things rarely come conjoined.
Electric Slide, about a bank robbing loser in 80s Los Angeles, definitely has the confrontational edge part though it's not what you might call "interesting". The only likeable characters are way on the periphery (Vinessa Shaw is engaging despite very little to do as a furniture store employee) like the pretty bank tellers who really sell their brief moments of victimization and carnal attraction to Eddie. But as a film it's intensely narcissistic, less concerned with what you think of it, than what pose it's...
Electric Slide
There's something about the Killer Films logo, that has me rooting for the film that follows every time. Christine Vachon's company has shepherded so many confrontational and interesting indie films and voices into the arthouse over the years that it has both a nostalgic pull And an edge, and those things rarely come conjoined.
Electric Slide, about a bank robbing loser in 80s Los Angeles, definitely has the confrontational edge part though it's not what you might call "interesting". The only likeable characters are way on the periphery (Vinessa Shaw is engaging despite very little to do as a furniture store employee) like the pretty bank tellers who really sell their brief moments of victimization and carnal attraction to Eddie. But as a film it's intensely narcissistic, less concerned with what you think of it, than what pose it's...
- 4/25/2014
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
Colm McCarthy's Outcast is a low-budget British genre production that manages to be visually attractive, relatively naturalistic and features some wonderfully deft plotting which, while relatively predictable, still carries a refreshing level of moral ambiguity. It treats its fantasy milieu (cribbing from legends of the Sidhe, the ancient race of Gaelic folklore) as Serious Business yet it never appears particularly melodramatic or campy, which is a minor triumph all by itself.
Part thriller, part horror, part psychodrama, Outcast is far from perfect, but it's the kind of debut that could have fallen horribly flat and McCarthy deserves to be applauded for holding it all together.
Kate Dickie and Niall Bruton play Mary and Fergal, a mother and son arriving at a run-down housing estate where it becomes apparent they're in hiding from people who want to do them both harm. Liam (Ciarán McMenamin) and Cathal (James Nesbitt) are the hunters on their trail,...
Part thriller, part horror, part psychodrama, Outcast is far from perfect, but it's the kind of debut that could have fallen horribly flat and McCarthy deserves to be applauded for holding it all together.
Kate Dickie and Niall Bruton play Mary and Fergal, a mother and son arriving at a run-down housing estate where it becomes apparent they're in hiding from people who want to do them both harm. Liam (Ciarán McMenamin) and Cathal (James Nesbitt) are the hunters on their trail,...
- 9/2/2010
- Screen Anarchy
[With Irish effort Outcast making its first Canadian appearance we re-visit our previous review of the film.]
Shot through with flashes of outright brilliance, Colm McCarthy's Outcast is a film that never quite figures out what it wants to be. Is this the story of Fergal, the roving Irish teen of unusual parentage struggling to hold on to the first romantic relationship he has ever experienced? Or is this the story of Mary, Fergal's wild and wildly protective mother? A woman steeped in lore and history Mary fears that her son may take a wrong turn and may unleash something terrible in the process. Or is this the story of Cathal, the man with a dark history tracking down both mother and child, intending to kill them both? Because the film never decides which it wants to be it ends up being a curious and sometimes clumsy amalgamation of all three, an unfortunate situation that prevents it from reaching the heights that are so nearly in its grasp.
Shot through with flashes of outright brilliance, Colm McCarthy's Outcast is a film that never quite figures out what it wants to be. Is this the story of Fergal, the roving Irish teen of unusual parentage struggling to hold on to the first romantic relationship he has ever experienced? Or is this the story of Mary, Fergal's wild and wildly protective mother? A woman steeped in lore and history Mary fears that her son may take a wrong turn and may unleash something terrible in the process. Or is this the story of Cathal, the man with a dark history tracking down both mother and child, intending to kill them both? Because the film never decides which it wants to be it ends up being a curious and sometimes clumsy amalgamation of all three, an unfortunate situation that prevents it from reaching the heights that are so nearly in its grasp.
- 7/11/2010
- Screen Anarchy
Shot through with flashes of outright brilliance, Colm McCarthy's Outcast is a film that never quite figures out what it wants to be. Is this the story of Fergal, the roving Irish teen of unusual parentage struggling to hold on to the first romantic relationship he has ever experienced? Or is this the story of Mary, Fergal's wild and wildly protective mother? A woman steeped in lore and history Mary fears that her son may take a wrong turn and may unleash something terrible in the process. Or is this the story of Cathal, the man with a dark history tracking down both mother and child, intending to kill them both? Because the film never decides which it wants to be it ends up being a curious and sometimes clumsy amalgamation of all three, an unfortunate situation that prevents it from reaching the heights that are so nearly in its grasp.
- 3/13/2010
- Screen Anarchy
Shooting has begun on 'Belonging to Laura', a new 90 minute feature drama to be commissioned by TV3. Directed by Karl Golden (The Honeymooners) and produced by Martina Niland and David Collins for Accomplice Television, the production will be shooting on location in Enniskerry and Ballsbridge for three weeks. Director of photography for the project is Darran Tiernan (The Honeymooners). The cast includes; Christina Carty (Crystal Park), Brendan McCormack (The Daisy Chain), Gerard McCarthy (Hollyoaks), Aisling Bea (Fair City), Domhnall O'Donoghue (The Escapist) and Tatianna Ouliankina (Fair City).
- 7/17/2009
- IFTN
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