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Cinematographer Mandy Walker, ACS, ASC, has teamed up with director Baz Luhrmann
once again on 'Elvis.' postPerspective spoke to Walker about the challenges of
shooting the film, the cinematography, and working with the DIT, DI and visual
effects…

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Cinematographer Mandy Walker, ACS, ASC, has teamed up with director Baz Luhrmann
once again on Elvis. The epic film spans over 30 years, exploring Presley the
artist and the man — through love, loss, his unprecedented rise to fame and the
complex dynamic with manager Colonel Tom Parker — set against the backdrop of
America’s evolving cultural landscape and the timeless music he gave to the
world.

postPerspective spoke to Walker about the challenges of shooting Elvis, the
cinematography, and working with the DIT, DI and visual effects…

How did you approach the look of the movie with all the different eras
stretching from the ‘50s to the ‘70s?
We divided the story into two parts and used different lenses to tell the story.
For the first part, when Elvis is growing up in Tupelo, I shot spherical in what
we called “black-and-white” color that’s a desaturated look with pushed blacks.
Then, once he got to Las Vegas, we used anamorphic lenses — old glass from that
period, with more aberrations. We also had different LUTs for each period.

When Elvis is 10 and running to the Pentecostal tent, we shot it with the
black-and-white color look. It was a very considered color palette that we’d
researched from the period. Then, by the time Elvis got to Hollywood, it was
more Kodachrome-looking, and I had more depth of field, more color in the
lighting and more contrast. Then in Vegas, there were bright, garish colors,
very ‘70s, with lots of flares.

This is your fourth collaboration with Baz. How did it work on this?
Baz is very good at explaining the story he’s making and the whole emotional
journey. Then it’s a matter of me interpreting all that visually. And as he’d
been working on this for 10 years, he’d done so much research, and the visuals
are so important in this.

Fair to say that initially the camera seems to be constantly moving — right from
the carnival Ferris wheel scene at the start?
Yes, we wanted it to fly. But later, when it all settles down and the drama gets
heavy, the camera moves far more slowly so you focus on the situation. When
Elvis is with his mother, it’s slower. Then later, in his Vegas hotel room when
he can’t sleep, the mood is darker, and the camera reflects that.

How long was the prep?
We had a lot of prep on this movie — 16 weeks — and we went through everything
meticulously. We were just about to start shooting when we had to shut down for
four months when Tom Hanks got COVID, so we had even more time to do tons of
testing on cameras, lenses and so on. Baz loves to test and experiment, and we
also worked closely with all the other departments — not just costume and art
direction, but all the visual effects. Really, post is part of prep now on a
film like this.

Did you do lots of shot lists and storyboards?
Yes, but not for everything. It was more about making the connections between
scenes and sequences. For instance, for the bit when young Elvis runs from the
gas station to the juke joint to the tent — that was all storyboarded, as it was
all a build.

We also built the Beale Street set and Graceland exterior and interior, all on
stages and backlots. That way, we could design all the camera moves and
transitions and rehearse stuff physically on the sets before we even shot.
Pretty much everything was shot on the biggest stages they had at Village
Roadshow in Australia, and we also shot on three backlots for the carnival and
Beale Street stuff.

Was there any talk about shooting in some of the real locations in the US?
Yes, early on, but we all soon realized we couldn’t, as it’s all changed so much
now. Memphis doesn’t look anything like it used to when Elvis was there, and the
same with Vegas. That’s why we had to recreate it all from scratch. There is a
bit of archival footage of ‘70s Vegas in there, but that was it.

How did you make all your camera and lens choices?
We decided to shoot on the ARRI Alexa 65, and Baz and I decided to go that way
very early on. It’s an epic story, so why not shoot on an epic format? Then,
when Baz was in LA around August 2019, we met up with [optical engineer] Dan
Sasaki at Panavision and went through all these different lens iterations — some
on 35mm and some on a 65mm camera — until we got to the right ones that were
specially built for us.

To Read the Full Interview with Mandy Walker, Click Here.

For Elvis Screenings and Special Events, Click Here.

Sponsored Content - Warner Bros. Entertainment.
Article was originally published in postPerspective Magazine,
November 30, 2022, written by Iain Blair.


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