57 Quotes by Vilmos Zsigmond

If you use hand-held techniques just to make the film stylish I think it’s wrong.

I love the Dutch impressionists – Vermeer, Rembrandt. What they were able to do with light was astonishing. As for photographers, I think mostly of the Hungarians: Robert Capa, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Jozsef Pesci. In fact, I have one of his photographs hanging in my house.

The best way to know when there’s good lighting is when you don’t notice it.

Each story has a different approach for me and I try to work with lighting that will tell you visually the story better than if it was shot in available light.

You make a film for a million dollars and then it costs $10 million to sell it. That’s the problem at the moment with independent filmmaking: You can make it cheap and then there’s no money to market it.

Telling the story with only a few shots, I love that style. It makes you feel like you’re part of the action, part of the story. It reminds me of the theater, where one act is basically like one long shot. It almost makes you forget that you’re seeing a movie.

I should mention Vittorio Storaro, who was Bernardo Bertolucci’s cinematographer. You watch those films and they are exceptional.

There are many, many different kinds of movies and directors and styles. I don’t mind that a movie looks like a movie.

I like to work with talented people, I must say that. That’s my weakness. I really like to work with good directors. That doesn’t mean I don’t like to work with starting up young directors, that’s fun also.